Eighteen months of capital trials look set to begin this summer for e-Bebé – an initiative promising to cut city-centre congestion and shave hours off parents’ and carers’ journey times each year.
At July’s Transport & Environment Cmte, Lyons-based urban solutions consultants SeraParfait (SARL) will seek consent to pilot a 300-strong fleet of rentable battery-assisted prams and push-chairs, available for pick-up or deposit at over 20 Edinburgh ‘communication nodes’, starting in August.
Vitesse and vigour
Like conventional infant conveyances, e-Bébé prams can reach any speed the pusher is fit enough to achieve. But battery-power will give users an electric boost up to 15mph (the top speed, SP says, of an average above-average jogger in their 20s–30s).
It will, claim the team, make the slog of summiting Edinburgh’s hilly footways – even for unfit users – a thing of the past. But the e-Bébé pram's enhanced speed offering (much faster than conventional e-pousettes) will have special appeal to a health-conscious generation of parents eager to incorporate ‘vitesse and vigour’ into all aspects of their daily routine.
e-Bébé prams come in three models, each able to carry 2–3 passengers: the classic saloon for recumbent babies; the sit-up-straight sports coupé for little ones with views; and the durable people carrier capable of effortlessly transporting offspring and groceries weighing up to 100kg with no loss of performance.
All models come with a hop-on hop-off passenger step at the back as standard.
Battery power – everyone benefits
Avancez’s Director of UK Operations Benisses Chausettes-Encoton is confident the experiment will succeed. ‘I think most parents want to respect the planet and keep their kids out of the car.
‘But I’m also sure most parents find getting prams on and off buses a hassle, and don’t enjoy the fatigue and inconvenience of pushing infants uphill across uneven surfaces. e-Bébé is the complete solution.’
For everyone else, she continues, ‘the walker without children hurrying to work, the tourist on foot wanting to see as much of the capital as possible in a day, the busy high-school kid racing for baguettes at lunchtime – the reduction in slow, conventional prams and their sweaty chauffeurs will be a real bonus.’
Clean, cheap and coming to a communication node near you
Every e-Bébé pram comes with a supply of clean, compostable, elasticated liners for fitting and disposal (in pram-hub-mounted bin boxes) at the beginning and end of each journey.
Trips are priced at 10p per minute (with a 30p unlocking fee for pay-as-you go journeys), making them cheaper than balancing a baby over the handlebars of your average Voi bike.
e-Bebé prams won't block family halls or common stairs, being situated outside in areas of dense population and high footfall.
Some hub locations have yet to be finalised, but provisional proposals include: Arboretum Place, Bonnington Road, Bruntsfield Place, Calton Hill, Chambers Street, Chalmers Street, Canonmills Bridge, Charlotte Square, Church Hill, Cluny Avenue, Elm Row, George Street, Newhaven Road, Parliament Square, Picardy Place, Warrender Park Rd, Saunders Street and St Andrew Square.
Green-transport and active-travel campaigner Ivan Golightly has mixed feelings about the scheme. ‘Anything which encourages people out of their cars in Edinburgh is to be welcomed,’ he told Spurtle.
‘But I’m not sure I’d want to meet a loaded pram coming up the Mound on the pavement at 15mph.
‘I certainly don’t want to meet one coming downhill, fully laden, at speeds well in excess of that.’
Since 2024, Avancez has run similar pilot schemes in Bergamo, Bergen, Budapest and Lisbon, and expects trials to begin in Sheffield later this year.
Its first full commercial operation commenced in Toledo in November 2025. For more information, visit here.
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[AI images: Perchance.]
