- In a collaboration between Yamaha Motor and the National Trust, the UK’s leading conservation charity, ebikes from the brand have been made available at its Ickworth Estate site.
- The bikes will be available both for staff to travel around the site, and as ebike rentals for guests to use.
- The National Trust have been implementing bike and ebike rental schemes at several of its larger sites.
An opportunity for the National Trust to promote ebikes to the mainstream?
The ebikes being supplied by Yamaha Motor are its ‘Booster Easy’ series, which start around the £3,000 mark, featuring fat, off-road tyres, and a range of around 140km. Ickworth Estate is a site measuring over 2.8 square miles, making it ripe for the use of ebikes, also helped by the preexisting cycle tracks which line the site. Ebike rentals at the site have been priced at £14 for the first two hours, with an additional charge of £7 for every extra hour. With that relatively low price to test out what is a significant investment for many, such rental schemes are key in driving awareness and adoption of electric bikes.
The addition of bike and ebike facilities alike to National Trust estates is just one small driver in the organisation’s push to become carbon net zero by 2030. Accessibility vehicles have been electrified at a number of sites, such as the use of an LEVC taxi at its Cliveden site. What’s more, the National Trust have also been busy installing public EV chargers across its properties.
