Originally Posted by
somnatash
A brompton from the shelf can be a poor roller. But with a rack and Ezy-wheels or - better still - self modification with good skateboard wheels instead of the small hard brompton roller wheels and having the handlebar stem not folded, its perfect for rolling. It can be used as a shopping cart in the mall then (scroll down to pic 17):
http://www.engtect.net/70
But with the handlebar stem riser unfolded the footprint of the package is tremendous (must be at least twice that of a Strida or at least five times that of a Carryme). As you said, it's like a shopping cart and who wants to push a giant shopping cart everywhere? Like I said, my Carryme fits places like a pair of boots. Although the crowd in this photo was gracious enough to make way for such an unwieldy package (after all, at the grocery store the aisles are wide and people expect shopping cart sized monstrosities), the way that Brompton is sprawled out all over the floor it's fitting more like a big screen television. Most of the 20" Dahon-style folders will fit on the floor similarly in a ready-to-roll configuration with the handlebars up, but I think the general consensus is that, day in day out, it gets pretty inconvenient (certainly that's my opinion).
Also what do you do when you want to walk up/down stairs (ie at the mall)? You can either fold the handbars down or just pick the bike up by the main tube and whack everyone around you as the handlebars wave back and forth.
Isn't it obvious why the chap in the following pic is obviously about to dislocate his shoulder carrying his Brompton like that instead of rolling it with the handlebars up?
To me it seems clear that he's doing it because with the handlebars up the bike is freaking huge.
As I said, the Brompton will roll as will Dahons, Downtubes, etc, but it's an entirely different class of convenience compared to the three bikes I mentioned.