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What’s the topic that Colorado springs, New York and Chicago shared this week? We’ll escooters of course.
People have already embraced escooters as a great way of transport that’s convenient, easy to learn, and yes, also safe when done right. We are still in the early phases of the escooter boom, as people started to use them a lot more starting from the pandemic as they wanted to avoid using crowded metros. Now many people are saying that they want to keep on using escooters instead of metros – and we can easily understand them. It’s not only that you avoid the metro but the fact that riding scooters in fresh air is fun. Who wouldn’t want to start their morning and commute to the office by riding a great scooter? This has put on some pressure for the cities to evolve. Let’s take a look what are the latest developments in USA lately.
New yorks ridesharing program which startin in August has already surpassed more than 175 000 rides and that’s just one program. Total rides oIver the country are easily counted in tens of millions as some estimates are that already in 2019 the rides totaled 100M nationwide.
Even though people love the scooters they have brought change to the city streets as the traditional bikelanes / if there is any are not designed for the increase and changes in the traffic as it’s not only escooters that have arrived but also ebikes, electric skateboards and unicycles aswell.
Cities has also seen increased reports about accidents related to e-mobility but when researched many of these issues seem to be about riders not following the rules already set up for traffic such as stopping at red lights and giving way to pedestrians. This has lead to age restrictions for riders.
Still, these issues can be seen as fixable and cities like New York are up to the task as the benefits of electric scooters are clear and the issues we are having now can be seen as growing pains as the citizens and the city itself is adapting to new technology, as we mentioned in an earlier blog automobiles had to go through the same path and eventually changed the whole city infrastructure to suit them.
Other benefits of escooters are that as they are nice, quiet and take much less space than cars they can also support the growing movement in city planning where more and more streets are blocked from cars and returned to pedestrians. A mix of e-mobility and walking boulevards will have several health benefits too.
After last years failed pilot program the City Council has voted to give green light to the escooter ridesharing programs.
The ridesharing scooters return with some interesting new developments as they Chigago wishes to limit the areas they can be used. The new shared scooters will be equipped with gps and horns that will start to beep and warn surroundings if the scooters are ridden where they are not allowed.
The scooters must also be locked in designated areas such as bicycle parks and poles reserved for them in an effort to stop people leaving them around. Similar system is in place also in China where bicycle ridesharing started and the apps show exactly the places where the bikes are allowed to be parked after use – otherwise the ridesharing company will charge the last user who left the bike in wrong place to move the bike. This method has proven to be effective.
Colorado Springs is also starting it’s program allowing two new operators to start a program in the city. The city hopes the escooters will reduce car traffic, free parking space and provide people with flexible and affordable way of transport. The pilot will last for 1-year.
From people’s perspective these pilots usually result in a growing userbase for escooter that leads to people wanting to buy their own escooters as they are much more convenient for regular riders – for work commute one can’t take a change that there’s no rental scooter available or if you go shopping with a scooter and come outside just to find out that someone had already rented the scooter that you came with.