Segways give riders stand-up tour of downtown Anchorage
By CINTHIA RITCHIE
Anchorage Daily News
Published: July 24, 2006
SegTours of Anchorage
Guided Segway tours of downtown Anchorage Alaska
SEGTOURS IN THE NEWS
SLIDING TOWARD SHIP CREEK
Oh, the glory! The wonder! Perched on our machines, our tour group slides over the sidewalks of downtown Anchorage, backs straight, knees locked, eyes ahead. We looked strangely futuristic, like something from a "Star Trek" episode.
Tourist stared and pointed, hooted and hollered. "Wh-what in the tarnation was that?" an old man yelled.
"A Skagway," someone answered.
"Not Skagway, a Segway," a teenager said with disgust.
When we reached Ship Creek, we got off our machines, our legs wobbling like Jell-O. We leaned over the railing and watched the huge king salmon mingle with the shadowy silvers. And then, wonder of wonders, Weinstein took out the black keys and cranked our Segways up to 8 (yes, 8!) glorious mph. We jumped on our Segways. We were giddy; we could hardly control ourselves.
Barbara Ash bravely approached the oh-so-strange machine. She hopped on, gave her hips a little roll and immediately took off down the sidewalk. "Whee!" she cried as she executed a wobbling turn and slid safely past a tree. "Did you see that? Wow!". There were six of us taking the SegTours through downtown Anchorage: leader Alan Weinstein, me and the two Dons: Don and Barbara Ash from Texas and Don and Trish Morris from Tennessee. But first we had to pass a mandatory training class. "Remember," Weinstein instructed, "the Segway has no brake and no gas. It moves totally by the weight of your body."
The Segway is a funny-looking machine with a long pole body, narrow handlebars and shiny hubcaps. It resembles a pogo sticks with motorcycle tires slapped on at the last minute. Inside, though, exists a complicated network of computerized circuits churning out more than 100 pieces of information per second. Its brain consists of five gyroscopic sensors able to detect the slightest forward or backward pitch; this enables it to continually adjust to movement while maintaining balance.To control speed, weight is shifted forward and backward. This is accomplished by twitching the hips to and fro. Speed is set and locked using a series of color-coded keys: black for 6 mph, yellow for 8 mph and red for the top speed of 12.5 mph. Once the speed has been set, the machine can go slower but not faster.
"Left," Weinstein called out, and we twisted our left handlebar right and swung to the right. Then we twisted to left. "Whoa!" one of the Dons yelled as he circled around and around. "Whooaaa!" A half hour later we were all driving like pros.
FROM TEACHER TO TOURS
Weinstein understands this. A teacher with the Anchorage School District, he sees his Segway summers as a way of getting in touch with his inner child. "What is neat is how everyone smiles when they ride," he said. "No one looks unhappy or worried. How can you worry riding a Segway?" The SegTours business idea came a few years ago while he was visiting his sister, who has a mobility impairment. After telling about a Segway tour she had taken at the Epcot Center, Weinstein knew he had to try one.
So he did and immediately became hooked. He contacted Hilowitz, bought five used Segways and started a part-time summer business. He encountered a few kinks along the way: rider inexperience, bad patches of sidewalk and heavily trafficked areas that made steering difficult. "When I started, I was a nervous wreck," he said. "I couldn't handle it. So I took more time with training and revisited the route until I got everything smoothed out." His customers run from 84-year-old men to people with cerebral palsy to families and couples. The Segway, he said, is a godsend for people with mobility issues. "Here's something that allows people to get around standing up, not sitting down in a wheelchair," he said. "That perspective can make a world of difference."
FAST, FASTER, FASTEST
On the way back to town, our tour group zoomed along at its faster pace until we had to stop in a small parklike area, where we circled around and around until we were breathless. We glided up streets lined with flowers, the smells intoxicatingly sweet.
"Ah, Segway," a Japanese tourist called out.
"Ahhhhhhhh," the rest of his group sang out as they gathered around, snapping pictures and patting our machines. We smiled and laughed. It was like being a celebrity: Everywhere we went, people noticed us. Everyone was so glad to see us!
"Oh," Trish said. "This feels sooo good."
Our eyes gleamed with a wicked, childish glee. We leaned forward, milking every inch of speed out of our shining gray machines.
"Imagine," one of the Dons said as he slid smoothly past. "Imagine what it would be like at 12 miles an hour."
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Daily News reporter Cinthia Ritchie can be reached at critchie@adn.com.
