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How should local governments deal with the e-scooter problems?

Posted: Tue Aug 06, 2019 12:09 pm
by Freebird
Baltimore just kicked out Bird and came up with new terms for the remaining four rental companies: $70,000 for a one year permit for up to 1000 scooters and 10 cents per ride tax. They are also charging $500 fine for not taking scooters and bikes off streets from 11 p.m. to 4 a.m. I'm not sure if this is per scooter of one missed scooter left out incurs the $500 fine. This looks like municipal piracy since there's no mention of how the city plans to appropriate it's new revenue stream to make scooting better or safer.

Atlanta had another scooter fatality last week. The city has recently begun cracking down on riders on sidewalks. All three fatalities so far this year were scooters out on the street colliding with vehicles. Scooters that top out at 15MPH do not belong in streets where cars travel at a much higher speed.

Earlier this year, man from Woodstock, GA hit a tree on a sidewalk in San Diego and is now taking the eternal celestial dirt nap. The town of Woodstock, Georgia immediately banned e-scooters even though none operate there and probably never would. The details of the incident in San Diego are missing information about the guy's sobriety, etc, but one fact is obvious: 15MPH scooters do not belong on sidewalks where pedestrians only move at 3mph.

Paris decided on a laissez-faire approach and just let all the scooter companies roost there. At one point, there were 12 companies operating in Paris and over 20,000 scooters out on the streets. The city is now proposing limiting the number of operators to two or three. The are also proposing speed limits, fines for improperly parked scooters, etc. The rental companies are littering the streets and don't have a way to control how or where the dockless scooters are placed at the end of a ride.

The safety and rider responsibility issues are two huge problems that the scooter companies have decided to ignore and unfortunately the local governments have all been forced to come up with some sort of resolutions including:
  • Outright bans
  • Mafia tactics like big fees and fines
  • Force the scooters off the sidewalks and into the streets
None of these are good comprehensive solutions. Most people are actually in favor of cities having scooters and outright bans are short-sighted because scooters are an amenity and are reducing car traffic in places like Mexico City. Even in Atlanta, 30% of scooter rides replaced car rides.

How do you think cities should regulate the dockless scooter (including wheels, e-bike, etc) industry?

Re: How should local governments deal with the e-scooter problems?

Posted: Tue Aug 06, 2019 5:24 pm
by Edmund
Rider safety is the most important area for me. I’d like to see the following happen.

Night = No Shared Scooter Rides
The back of these scooters have a small light a couple inches from the ground. This does not provide enough visibility to be seen by a driver. When Bird first launched they turned the fleet off at 9 pm and cited safety as a reason for doing so. All three of Atlanta’s scooter deaths happened at night.

Tax Scooter Rides to Build Infrastructure
Most US cities are lacking the bike lanes and similar safe areas for scooters to operate. Scooters have been banned from sidewalks and riders are ignoring the rule to keep themselves safe. Having a little bit from each scooter ride going to build infrastructure to support those of us commuting by bike, scooter, or unicycle would be a good start.

Re: How should local governments deal with the e-scooter problems?

Posted: Tue Aug 06, 2019 5:50 pm
by Ben J
Tax Scooter Rides to Build Infrastructure
I am good with that. Make renters pay tax for extra for infrastructure for us owners to enjoy. Thats how it works on pretty much all forms of renting...
Its really great for the Administrators of the collected funds too. They get to spend loads of it on salaries and "feasibility studies" to keep themselves and consultant friends with an easy job.
Most US cities are lacking the bike lanes and similar safe areas for scooters to operate. Scooters have been banned from sidewalks and riders are ignoring the rule to keep themselves safe. Having a little bit from each scooter ride going to build infrastructure to support those of us commuting by bike, scooter, or unicycle would be a good start.
Good luck...

Re: How should local governments deal with the e-scooter problems?

Posted: Tue Aug 06, 2019 10:00 pm
by Freebird
I guess another issue is the age of scooter pilots. Of course all the rental scooters have "18 years or older, wear a helmet, no riding on sidewalks" printed on them.

In Georgia, the minimum age to operate a 49cc moped is 15 years old. There's no minimum age for electric bicycles with motors less than 1000W.

Some states like Tennessee have even lower ages and requirements. Most all have helmet requirements.

In reality, there's no age requirement to ride a scooter and local law enforcement can't enforce the 18+ age limit.
Likewise, there's no legal helmet requirement for riders over the age of sixteen.

A sixteen year old can ride a scooter on a public street with no helmet and he is perfectly legal. He might be in violation of the rental agreement, but that is a civil matter outside of law enforcement (police).

There's also a huge gap in dealing with drunk scooter pilots. There's lots of news about intoxicated riders getting killed, etc., but I still haven't seen a single article about someone getting arrested for driving a scooter drunk. I was in San Diego earlier this year and there were drunks on scooters all over the Embarcadero walkway in the middle of the day at the beer festival yet not a single police officer. I don't even know the laws for drunk scooting.

Re: How should local governments deal with the e-scooter problems?

Posted: Wed Aug 07, 2019 5:43 pm
by Sc00tr
Presumeably you could get a dui for operating a vehicle while under the infleuence?

Re: How should local governments deal with the e-scooter problems?

Posted: Wed Aug 07, 2019 9:44 pm
by Freebird
Sc00tr wrote:
Wed Aug 07, 2019 5:43 pm
Presumeably you could get a dui for operating a vehicle while under the infleuence?
One would think. I haven't seen any city actually try to enforce DUI on a scooter to get the message out that it's illegal.

Re: How should local governments deal with the e-scooter problems?

Posted: Wed Aug 07, 2019 9:58 pm
by Freebird
Sadly, Atlanta just lost a 4th scooter pilot today. That's the third fatality in less than a month :( I suspect that there will be some knee-jerk legislation or executive orders coming soon.

One part of the article:
"As of March, Atlanta has collected more than $450,000 in permit fees, according to a report issued to the city council. City officials have issued permits for roughly 12,000 scooters, but less than half of that number have been deployed."

Re: How should local governments deal with the e-scooter problems?

Posted: Wed Aug 07, 2019 10:44 pm
by Edmund
FIrst I’m hearing about a fourth escooter death in Atlanta. Truly sad... The city is severely lacking the infrastructure for anything other than cars.

The city leaders took all the fees they collected from eacooters and put it towards this $23M bridge.
Image

Re: How should local governments deal with the e-scooter problems?

Posted: Thu Aug 08, 2019 12:08 am
by Ben J
Presumeably you could get a dui for operating a vehicle while under the infleuence?
Its illegal where I live. Does not matter if its a bicycle, skateboard or whatever.
Police seldom enforce it. Firstly, its hard to catch and there is usually bigger crimes at hand.
The only times I know its been charged is if the drunk caused some kind of damage to somebody else. Crashed into a car, hurt a pedestrian, etc.

Re: How should local governments deal with the e-scooter problems?

Posted: Thu Aug 08, 2019 12:05 pm
by Sc00tr
That's what I would assume, it's kind of like fix it ticket type violations where if they tried to enforce it everywhere it would add too much extra work to an already strained system so they just address it when it needs to be addressed.