cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/16133154
Link to original Tweet: https://x.com/DavidZipper/status/1795048724021862898
cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/16133154
Link to original Tweet: https://x.com/DavidZipper/status/1795048724021862898
There are two kinds of escooters, the rentable, and personal.
The rentable escooter are absolute shit, they are scattered over cities, making is difficult for disabled people to get by, they promote use without helmets which increase severity and frequency of accidents, they also are driven recklessly.
The personal escooters are mostly fine, people drive them less recklessly, often wear helmets and in general take better care of them.
Both types are bad in that they move people away from existing public transport lowering demand meaning that public transport gets less money which lowers the quallity and again moves people away from public transport.
Ebikes doesn’t have that direct cause and affect as they mostly replace cars, ebikes also tend to have less severe accidents as the result of the combination of larger wheels with better banace, a better riding possition with a lower center of gravity again improving balance
There’s a lack of infrastructure to accommodate rental scooters which cause the problems you mentioned. Having safe places to ride (i.e bike lanes) and designated places to park them would solve these issues. I could also argue that cars do all the same things.
Reducing demand for public transport is a good thing in a developed city. You want there to be more space for people that aren’t going to choose micromobility, which is much cheaper for a city to provide more capacity for.
I’d be interested to see some research into your theory of ebikes replacing more car journeys and escooters replacing more public transport journeys.
I agree with your points on why ebikes are safer, but scooters are also more compact and therefore easier to transport and store when not riding, and the safety issue is really solved by having safe places to ride. Having the choice available is important because different people have different priorities and preferences.
Thr lack of infrastructure for rental scooters is intentional though. It makes their overhead non-existent while making their scooters the city’s problem. The Netherlands figured out how to do bike rentals decades ago, but just leaving a bike/scooter wherever is a menace to the community. People used to keave them in my yard or the middle of the sidewalk until my town banned them. Personal scooters are fine, but Bird and Lime are terrible.
Bike rental in the Netherlands is great for certain uses but not for others. You can’t use the OV-fiets as a tourist, and you generally have to take them back to where you got them from.
Docked systems are better, and you can remove most of the cost of the docks by doing the “dockless docks” where you just have to return them to designated areas. This can work for both bikes and scooters.
Companies like bird & lime take advantage of the lack of regulations, but there’s clearly a demand. Cities can take advantage of this by regulating, providing infrastructure, and charging the companies to operate, things already done for cars.
I live in Taipei and it’s also pretty dense and even tho we have one of the best transit systems, an escooter is much better for the last leg of the trip.
And now the incentive for the public transport company to improve last mile service is gone.
Why would you expect public transport to take you the last step?
Why would you not have a bus stop within walking distance of your destination?