Why Americans Have A Love-Hate Relationship With E-scooters
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- čas přidán 1. 06. 2024
- The global market size for e-scooters is projected to surpass $30 billion by 2028. Although e-scooters have become a regular mode of transportation in major metropolitan areas, ride-share e-scooter businesses are struggling with profitability and facing issues working with cities.
Chapters:
00:00 - Introduction
02:01 - E-scooter rentals in cities
04:24 - Benefits
06:20 - Safety risks
08:36 - Profitability
Produced and Edited by: Liam Mays
Animation: Alex Wood
Supervising Producer: Jeniece Pettitt
Additional Camera: Magdalena Petrova
Editorial Support: Shawn Baldwin
Additional Footage: Getty Images, Bird
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Why Americans Have A Love-Hate Relationship With E-scooters
The big issue is just the lack of infrastructure for anything other than a car. A dedicated lane that allowed for bikes, scooters, etc solves all of the safety concerns. Scooters and bikes don’t have to ride on sidewalks to feel safe from cars. It’s literally giving up one lane of traffic, but in North America that’ll never happen. We need a newfound emphasis on human infrastructure as opposed to vehicle. Once we break that cycle things would get a lot better.
It causes injuries because of this. Bike lanes will be littered with trash and things that a ten inch tire has troubles going over. This is my biggest issue. I have an electric scooter and every ride is dangerous because of no bike lanes and messed up sidewalks. If they do the green paved bike lanes like in big cities it would help alot.
Thankfully, no one in my city walks anywhere, so the sidewalks are completely clear. I ride an e-bike to work every day, and I use sidewalks for half the distance. The alternative is riding in bike lanes that literally go between lanes of traffic, which is insane to me, when half the vehicles are pickup trucks that take up so much space.
A lime rental is 45 cents per minute and unlock fee is $1. For a 1.5 mile ride I’m charged almost $9 which is ridiculous when an Uber is $7.
I ended up buying my own scooter
This is the exact reason why I don’t use them. Public transportation is cheaper where I’m at or even ride share.
They usually have monthly plans (where I'm at anyways) that ends up being around 3$ per day for 90minutes
This is the way , welcome
That’s insane! In Vancouver, Canada, there’s a car ride share service called ‘Evo’, charging CAD .49 cents a minute. Gas is reimbursed if you have to refuel. They use only hybrid or all electric cars.
When I visited Charlotte one of those Lime scooters cost me $14. I looked up one of the rideshares and it was a few bucks less lol. I did have to stop twice to look at Google maps though. I kept popping wheelies by accident.
I literally broke my arm on an electric scooter and so I'm qualified to say, it's not the scooters, it's the people riding them. Wear a helmet if possible, my injuries would’ve been worse if I wasn’t wearing one. Even after my crash I still think that are a great way to get around the city. I’ve owned an electric scooter for three years and have ridden thousands of miles on it saving me a lot in gas and car insurance.
No one cares!!!
@@nixonhoover2 Some of us do
@@nixonhoover2 I care about this post so shut it!
Oof, hope the arm heals quickly, man. I've had one or two scooter crashes, but no broken bones.
I hope you feel better with your arm! Take care and have a good rides!
Americans when cars lead to over 35,000 fatalities per year: "Oh well. There's nothing we can do."
Americans when a scooter bumps into pedestrian: "OMG scooters r so dangerous! We must ban them! Think of everyone's safety!!"
paris banned them lmao but yeah its just americans
cars and bicycles dont drive on the sidewalks like scooter kids.
@@timothyd125 meanwhile drunk drivers and constant cars hitting pedestrians is ok for you?
@@Drunkenstupor I never mentioned either of those things? lmao
You're wrong
Americans when cars lead to over 35,000 fatalities per year: "cars need more freedom so that people can drive more. It's not like we care about pedestrians, they're like rats to us"
Americans when scooter bumps into pedestrians: "THIS IS WAR ON CARS"
The scooters themselves do not pose a safety issue, safety becomes an issue because of A LACK OF INFRASCRUCTURE for anything besides cars. Banning e-scooters does nothing but kick the can down the road until a city inevitably realizes how completely unmanageable their car congestion problems are
Spot on
The government makes more tax money from cars also
@@OM-bs7of that is true, but car-related infrastructure is also immensely more expensive. Things like bridges and overpasses, as well as stoplights and most signage isn’t necessary for bike and scooter infrastructure because of the slower speeds. Most good bike/scooter infrastructure looks like glorified sidewalks, which local governments already foot the bill for anyway
I've seen cars and motorcycles in the San Francisco bike lanes when I'm on my scooter and even though there is a huge bike lane people with scooters still go on the side walk. Lack of enforcement, but then again SF have higher priority things to worry about.
@@Hongriki yeah, ideally they’d have something completely separate that motor traffic can’t block or drive in but unfortunately a lot of places don’t have the political momentum to do anything more than painted bike-gutters
We just need two things:
- infrastructure for non-cars
- places to "park" scooters
But this is North American city planning. We don't have either. I survived off a scooter for a while only because my workplace didn't care about me taking the scooter into my cubicle and the sidewalks were almost always completely empty (mostly suburban area / business park)
Personally, I ride an EUC which is capable enough to either keep up with city traffic on the roads, creep along the sidewalks like a normal pedestrian, and does amazing off road for everywhere in-between, and going up or down curbs is no issue. I never worry about parking it either, because it has a trolley handle and can roll alongside you anywhere you can take a wheelchair. Definitely worth the hassle of figuring out how to ride the damn thing. lol.
Good luck having the EMS team carry you on their back on a scooter to the hospital when you have a medical incident 😂
@@chiquita683 what is your point?
@@chiquita683 Why would EMS use a scooter, that makes no sense. EMS is a good reason to get rid of most cars from the road though. If we reduce city traffic, police and ambulances will be able to get where they're going much more quickly in cities. Zero reason everyone needs an entire 5+ person car on the road for a single passenger, blocking the actual important traffic like freight, work vehicles, and emergency services
Why did u stop using the scoot
I've been riding my electric scooter to work for over 2 years now, over 3000 miles on it and I love it
private e-scooters aren't much of a problem, it is the 'rented' ones that get routinely left in the middle of side walks or bike lanes (or rivers) that are the problem. People like you who own their scooter don't leave them around and take care of them (and often drive more capable and sensibly). People who rent them treat them like a rental (go figure) and are often ill prepared to ride or simply incapable of riding with any skill or awareness.
@Ayayin21 This video isn't talking about private escooters. It's talking about public ones.
Some or many dont try to properly park them and so they get left around as clutter or by chance fall or trip over for any reason. if the renter really cared about use they would park out of way or put where not a burden or hassle to others. some or many riders dont care and just leave them anyplace they wanna no matter what might happen later.
You're lucky your employer or the owner of the building allows you to take your scooter inside the building. Some would not allow it due to the potential fire hazard.
How many flats have you had. I've had my scooter since 2019 and have had 4 flats
A lot of the e-scooter issues for these companies could be fixed by having docking areas similar to how bike share programs do it.
ownership not share. solved
Many cities around world that use Lime have this, and you're charged a huge fine if you don't return to the docking station.
The drop anywhere and next person pickup off the ground was the cheap way to implement. The eScooter damage and loss was less expensive than the docking racks...and didn't require location permitting or objections.
So like a playground for 5 yos, they became a situation of crash them into any area, walk away, or leave them in a pile.
They are most appealing to teens and 20somethings which in modern standards is pretty careless and self interested.
EXACTLY. Of course there will always be people who don’t put them back where there are supposed to. But it would help a lot
Isn’t just parking it against a wall enough? I mean surely walls are everywhere where’d you have a destination, and those tend to be out of the way when walking
It would be great if the urban planning CZcams community differentiated personal e-scooter usage from rental e-scooters. There is a huge difference in the types of trips taken and overall sustainability as a mode.
Solid point.
Elaborate? I'm kinda curious lol
That'd be real interesting. There's a bike share but no scooter share in my city, so I bought my own when I couldn't ride my bike due to a surgery that interfered with my sitting on a bike. I wind up carrying the thing on the train every now and again (as opposed to riding the whole trip on my bike).
Only nerds ride these 😂 damn I wish I lived in a big city like this with 16 billion people in one place, not!!!
so true
I believe e-scooter injuries are severe because riding shared ones 98% don’t have helmets. Privately owned one may be faster, but drivers usually gear themselves up
Helmets make little difference, much like in bicycles, most injuries caused by these vehicles are in the limbs, and out of the percentage of those that affect heads a typical bike helmet would have prevented damage to only something like 20% of accidents (this is because they are either not strong enough to damage your head either way or so strong you wouldnt have survived either way). Making it such that the combined statistics say that wearing a helmet while riding one of these vehicles makes as much sense as wearing a helmet while walking. That is to say: yes, it helps. No, it's really not worth it. (These stats only apply to commuting though, wear helmet if riding as sport.)
Another part, is many people just don't know how to stand on a scooter. They treat it like a bike and try to stand facing forwards, when it is more like riding a skate board, which is one foot behind the other. If you can't put weight on the back foot when breaking you may end up over the handle bars.
And at least for NYC, for all mirco-mobility, there is almost no training for rules of the road, it is a bit of chaos that will get more dangerous as the lanes get more and more congested.
Bans e-scooters because of accidents, does not ban cars even though it's way more lethal. If they just made bike lanes bikes, roller-skates, skateboards and e-scooters could share them.
I couldn't wait for the ride share scooter in NYC so I just bought one. Aside from the inherent dangers, It saves time, energy and is a ton of fun. I wish I did it sooner.
Always wear a helmet, and don't ride at night. The small wheels and high center of gravity are very unforgiving. The scooter can easily catapult you from it in the event of a crash.
wish the title specified it's about rental e-scooters, not private ones
Americans: escooters destroy the athletics of our city
Meanwhile: parking taking up more land than the business itself, extending walking distance to not be walkable
You mean aesthetics?
@@MathGPT "athletics". 😂
@@MathGPT I can't believe I missed that (I won't edit for laughs)
@@MathGPT No, I am sure he means that if you ride a scooter you won't be very athletic as there is no exercise value in riding a scooter (well I am sure he thinks that).
@@megapangolin1093more athletic than a car but a lot less than a bike. You're standing, you have to push/kick every now and again, and keeping balance on a bumpy road takes a lot of effort.
Micro-mobility (electric scooters, bikes and skateboards) are a great option for urban commuting, but if you're going to own one then you should take a few safety precautions.
• Never charge the battery near other combustible materials.
• Never charge the battery in a place that blocks your escape routes.
• Never charge them overnight.
• Check the battery for any signs of swelling or physical damage after each use. Take the battery to a recycling facility if it's swelling or damage.
• Test ride the device in a safe parking lot to get familiar with its speed and capabilities.
I'm a first responder in a city and we respond to e-bike/scooter/skateboard fires nearly everyday and battery failures are the common cause.
some models prevent over charging, you should definitely look into whether or not your potential scooter will
@@saynotop2w Overcharging is one of the factors. But remember the battery compartment on these devices is typically not in a shock resistant housing. So all the bumps you run over on the road will eventually cause physical damage to the battery. We've responded to fires where the owner witnessed (and recorded) the battery burst into flames when it was not plugged-in charging. Just stationary.
The part indicating that escooters emit 200g CO2 is grossly exaggerated. Like by 30X. Real-world range of my scooter is about 40 miles per KWH. In NYC that's 7 grams CO2 per mile. In Spain, that's about 3 grams CO2 per mile.
Their numbers are including things like cars picking up the scooters for charging, manufacturing of the scooters, etc. It's numbers they pulled from a Verge article, because it was the first thing that showed up on google. Very poor research by CNBC
@@mikea5745still sounds a bit exaggerated to me. And I think it'd be easy to reduce if there were charging stations people could go to for small discount.
@@mikea5745 I also bet they just pulled the first photo that appeared in Google to make the tumbnail. That's the only plausible explanation to put a photo from Lisbon in an article all about American cities.
I would love to see studies break down statistic of behavior and injury between new renters, veteran renters, new scooter owners and veteran scooter owners
I bought a scooter almost exactly a year ago, as a bike replacement when I was having a surgery that would prevent me from sitting on a bike. When I got mine I took it on a few rides to get a feel for it, mostly the same rides I like to do on my bike. That way I could get accustomed to it and feel more confident riding it before I had to use it for "real" trips.
They are running a pilot project in my area. The scooters have been out for 2.5 weeks - and a 20 yo woman died after colliding with a pickup truck. I can’t say who is at fault… not that it matters, it comes down to human error. I own a scooter and have just passed 3000 km. Not one issue- people need to have some rider training….. and pay attention to everything that goes on around then at all times. I kinda feel like there should be some basic rider training- maybe force the renter to watch a few safety video’s through the app before riding for the first time.?
@@hertzdount safety videos or even a 1hr safety course, like rent out a parking lot every other weekend and practice with the newbies, and do a bit of 'rules of the road'. I'd also say that drivers, as their licenses expire/reissue should need a refresher course about interacting with smaller vehicles (scooters, bikes, motorcycles, pedestrians).
Oh it’s bad some people have no business being on one… me on the other hand I’ll be 10 beer deep jumping stairs and jumping over things.. and I drove it in snow storms and everything… the ninebot max is a tank
It doesn't matter, the label of "dangerous" it's very obviously misplaced, however you look at the stats they are way safer than cars and motorcycles, which we allow on the road. So way would you ban scooters? It's nonsensical.
It’s not the E-scooters themselves that are causing cluttering on the sidewalks but rather the business model. I ride an e-scooter but I own it too so you don’t have to worry about my e-scooter laying around in the city where it shouldn’t be. I rarely have to even lock it up because I just bring it into buildings with me unless the shop asks me not to bring it inside. The only place that it’s crowding up is my bedroom but that’s okay with me because that’s my personal space.
Same, but if a store asks me to not bring it inside im going to another store so their loss.
I mean yes, but the argument is dumb. If scooters that occupy a space of 20cm by 60cm are clutter, then what are cars that occupy 200x350cm? it makes no sense.
My brother and I rode all over downtown Atlanta. It was the best days we’ve had. We went to places we never would have went otherwise. There are a lot of factors cities aren’t considering when banning e scooters. They are losing a lot if money from other avenues. Side note. It’s ridiculously expensive. If I lived there I wouldn’t have bought my own scooter. But since I work overseas I’m waiting until I get back home for good. They need to lower the price. Revenue would go up or they will loose customers forever that will get their own bikes. Then they would be catering to only tourist.
Scooters were originally well priced at like 50 cents a minute but are now outrageously expensive . It's beyond stupid that I could wait at a light for two two minutes and that time just costed me dollars despite the motor on the scooter being idle. Some trips I'd go less than a mile and notice my bill was more expensive than an Uber pool ride. Outrageous. The upcharge is double or triple what it should be.
I just bought my own. Easier and then you can go on joy rides without worrying.
Run the red light, that is what they do in the UK. That is why there are problems here.
They really become more effective and affordable once you own your own. In a month of renting a scooter for daily use, you'd probably have 300 dollars in fees and whatnot. but if you get a 600 dollar one, you pay it once and you're done. I've been using my scooter for a while now and it's definitely my preferred way around town. My truck I save for driving up to Albuquerque on the weekends essentially at this point.
And bird still lost 250million somehow. They should have figured out the business model already.
There is a glaring ommision in that the injuries involving escooters aren't compared to those from cars. If escooters are (partially) replacing car trips, then this would be a useful comparison.
I ride e scooter everyday to and from work 5 miles away. Its been a year and i love it. No traffic in the bike lanes.
As a cyclist, I don't hate scooters. I hate scooter rental companies.
E-Scooters are a great solution to traffic congestion and pollution. But the rental companies got to go! Unless they have a docking station like many bike share companies have. In my city they are everywhere and blocking sidewalks, driveways etc. It’s also hard to move them out of the way because the brakes engage.
LOL they are so light you can pick them up and throw them.
@@eagle25311the share scooters are a lot heavier because they are designed for a bit more abuse and they max out the battery capacity on them which adds weight. Also my eScooter, isn't even one of the extra large ones and it's almost 35lbs. If you're an elderly person and one is blocking the sidewalk, it can be a pretty big impediment.
@Kimberlee Model my backup is 50 lbs and my main is 120 lbs I can throw them both get good noob. Nobody cares about old people.
@@eagle25311 I have to lift them over my head when we throw them in our dumpster at work and they get pretty heavy but not bad haha I’m sure these companies will go bankrupt eventually
Ideal city
Mixed use building (business group floor, +5 floors residential)
No cars (except for businesses)
Tams
Sidewalks for pedestrians and wide "bike lanes" or a fast lane for e mobility not in vehicle (e bike, e scooters, one wheel, extra)
The two main concerns here are safety and blocked sidewalks. To make it safer, it's protected bike or in this case scooter lanes and for blocked side walks: make it mandatory to return scooters to a certain space. Just make one parking spot per block a designated parking spot for rental scooters and companies can make sure you can't lock your scooter anywhere else. Thoughts?
In Antwerp they now have installed a geolocation system in the rental scooters so that they only lock in certain areas. So as long as you don't park in that area, the meter keeps running and charging you.
Perfectly reasonable suggestions. We have tons of parking spaces for cars, and we can fit 10-20x more scooters per parking space. Protected bike lanes are necessary due to how dangerous cars are
Perfectly reasonable, but TBH the arguments are ridiculous to begin with. Cars block like 6 square meters and we are fine with that. Also you can move a scooter if it's in your way, you cant really move a car. And as for safety. Even at it's worst they are still 15 times safer that cars for the rider and like 60 times safer for pedestrian, while it could be better, by that logic you should ban cars or even motorcycles who are like 80 times less safe. It's just dumb.
I love using e-scooters when I am in DC and cities that have them. These are, to my believe, possible solutions to the current problems:
• Road safety: Draw bike/scooter lanes in between the sidewalk and the off street parking (if it fits). If not, designate a section off a lane for scooters and bikes and paint them bright green so drivers can easily identify them. All is needed is about 3 feet in width for adequate space.
• Personal injury: Encourage users to wear helmets while riding e-scooters. Make helmets affordable through some government - company assisted programs.
• Cluttering: Designate places each block to park e-scooters. For example, in every other intersection, remove one or two parking spots and designate that parking as a e-schooner, e-bike, or personal bike parking spot. Make sure the signs are easily identifiable and that barriers are installed to prevent cars from using it as a car parking spot. This way people could stop leaving scooters on the sidewalks. I myself think that’s so annoying and disrespectful. People need a safe sidewalk free of clutter, specially people on wheelchairs.
• Charging stations: Since designated parking is possible, incentivize companies to invest in charging stations in the same newly designated e-scooter parking spots. This way scooters are always charged and not just laying unchanged on the side.
• Side walk incidents: As we know, pedestrian can be injured if riders use the sidewalk instead of the designated lanes or roads. But also, injuries are more commonly seen at night when cars collide with scooter. A possible solution would be to ban scooter using the sidewalk rides during the day time when the side walks are the busiest but only allow e-scooters to use sidewalks at night because the sidewalks are not as busy and the roads at night are more dangerous.
These are easily obtainable solutions that could help the growth of these companies, people coexisting with this new way of transportation, and safety.
That’s just my opinion. What do you guys think???
Given the US has been able to embrace bikes for 100 years, its probably going to take a while (and not be cheap) to install cycle/scooter lanes everywhere.
This is excellent. You’ve laid out a great solution strategy in a CZcams comment. If only the city government and these companies were willing to take the energy and time and money to plan, these issues could easily be solved.
I think 3 feet is too slim for an unprotected bike/scooter-lane. Especially on roads with higher speed. Otherwise I think your idea is good.
@@PatrikKron I agree but it’s better than nothing. The car drivers will argue agains taking space from driving lanes. It’s about finding a happy medium where we all can agree until we can adopt a culture is using bikes, electric scooters, and safety.
One model that I really like is the Biki Bike in Hawaii. They need to be returned to a bike rack after each use where most of these scooters are just thrown down and discarded. It requires a hefty upfront card authorization but once returned to a bike rack the authorization is refunded.
Clutter and safety are the biggest issues. I've lived in two college towns where these things are EVERYWHERE. And not only are they left in places where it blocks sidewalks and lanes of traffic in parking lots, I've had to slam on my breaks multiple times for people not following stop signs or traffic signals with them. And since they're on a scooter and I'm in a car, they'd probably die if I hit them. Or at least be seriously injured.
These things need to be regulated and there needs to be serious education given to the public on how to use them. Because at the present moment, it seems they're not going away.
I agree there should be more understanding on the operation of scooters.
We need to remove a car lane and add an e-lane then!
I also think we need another way of pricing the ride. At a high cost per minute it gives incentive to drive quicker (and more recklessly).
I would say the majority of e scooter accidents are the result of unsafe lane and lack of dedicated bike/ scooter lanes. As a biker, it’s scary as hell biking down a busy road that has no side walk, or a sidewalk that is too busy to bike on, while cars are fly past at 45+ mph
e-Bikes are a much more efficient and safe mode of transport than e-Scooters. They need less energy because of pedal assist, and the users are in a more comfortable stance, so they can ride longer distances.
e-bikes are also more useful on hilly terrain. with pedal assist, you get a little bit of exercise but not sweaty on the way to work
amen
I think e-bikes are better in many ways, but not all. Scooters take up less space when parked, thus making room for more of them and they are much cheeper to buy. Where I live the cheepest electric bike is twice the price of a quality electric scooter, and reasonable electric bikes are almost double the price of the entry level e-bike. If you have a multi-part commute. Where you have a train ride in the middle but need the bike/scooter on both sides the e-scooter is also much easier to transport (and it’s more likely you are allowed to bring it, and without a extra cost).
That being said. E-bikes are more comfortable to ride, cover longer distances (i think), are (although cumbersome) possible to use with a dead battery, safer, quicker (at least with the laws in my area) and (slightly) harder to steal (if left outside).
One of the problems with e-scooters is that a small percentage of riders/renters abuse the privilege by riding fast and reckless around pedestrians and leaving them parked improperly blocking roads and sidewalks at the end of the rental. This ruins it for responsible users.
As for parking, I don't get why they can't just pass on the fine to the last rider who put it there.
@@kimberleemodel7182 They need legal authority to do that. The city police could handle it just be asking the company who the user was, but it's easier for them to just fine the company.
In Melbourne, Australia, about 80% of e-scooter riders break the law. I've been tracking them.
Perhaps, but even if all of them did this, it would not compare to the problems car create. Scooter accidents fatality is non-existent compared to cars, they might block a sidewalk but you can always move them, when cars block infrastructure, there is nothing you can do. And you can place like 20 scooters in the space a single car takes. There is no comparison. The fact that governments feel the need to regulate because of this is at best incongruent, or down right nonsensical
@@arturodelarosa4394 Most of the scooter accidents involve only them as they crash into something. The fatalities involve cars as usual.
I can't speak for everywhere, however... I live near Phoenix, Arizona and I think we hit our peak e-scooters in 2019. I use to work at a supercar supply company and my lead did that job in the morning and picked up Spin scooters at night (dude was sleep deprived as all hell due to this schedule). I told him I had never actually ridden an e-scooter before and he told me he'd pick up a couple and swing by my house after work before his full night began to let me try it. Admittedly it WAS very fun, but I even remember telling him that night how I see how people could easily abuse this as the laws in AZ at the time were loose at best and rarely enforced.
I ended up quitting that job and that guy moved to another state to pick up scooters full time, super proud on the idea that he was going to make a lot of money doing this. I still never learned what happened to him as no one could have predicted COVID, but my guess is that he ended up having to abandon that as everyone was indoors.
Today I use an ebike as my primary form of transportation and really only use my car for groceries or really long trips. I love it, I absolutely love my ebike, but like a lot of other people have said in this comments section, America is simply FAR more interested in being car dependent to the n'th power where drivers feel they have a *right* to throw bottles out of their pick-em-up-trucks at people in bike lanes. It is insane the amount of entitlement and, weirdly, how threatened they are by someone riding their bike.
4 years ago I bought my own personal scooter, so I don't use these sharable shooters. But having a scooter has been so fun and made short trips easier. My scooter has about 3000 miles on it with battery still 86% capacity. When the weather is nice I ride it 8 miles each way to work. It's just unfortunate roads in the US aren't built for pedestrians. It would be so much easier to get vehicles off the road if the roads were constructed for it.
I agree. I'm an over the road trucker and I have a scooter in my truck. It makes getting places much faster than walking. But there are so many places with no sidewalks or shoulders so you just have to ride down the road with the cars and it's scary.
E-scooter laws make no practical sense and this piece helps to highlight why, which is appreciated. From a practical standpoint, it is really no different than riding a bicycle around, except bicycles have very different and far less restrictive laws around them. It is just the e-scooter is generally something you can fold up and stuff somewhere reasonably small with relative ease, far easier and more practical than a fulled sized bicycle, making it far more practical to use with other modes of transport. For example, I have a very long commute to work. I ride my e-scooter down to the local rail transit station with my laptop in my backpack. I get on the train and setup at a table as there is plenty of space on the train; it is under-utilized for the direction I travel. I place the e-scooter on the table folded up. I take out my laptop and also place it on the table. I get to work while commuting to work. Eventually, I get off and e-scooter the rest of the way into work and then continue working. I have no real choice but to continue living where I live, so this solution is very important to me to be able to make ends meet. In addition to spending hours in traffic when I drive to work every day, I have things I have to do on either side of the day on most days of the week, so being able to work most of the time I am commuting is essential to getting far more hours worked in during the week and I need to make enough money to survive somehow.
Here is what I think should happen with e-scooter laws:
1. Follow the data, not hype - This whole pedestrian safety thing is overblown, the data proves it, instead e-scooter riders are being forced to their death in certain places around the world because they are forced into dangerous road conditions and get creamed by bad drivers. This is just crazy. If it is safe to be on a road, then ride the e-scooter on the road. If it is not safe and there is a sidewalk there with nobody on it, let the e-scooter rider ride on the sidewalk. If the sidewalk is full of pedestrians, then get off the e-scooter and walk.
2. If officials are so concerned about e-scooter riders being unsafe, then have an all ride-able age training certificate program. Just something online and something you can show on your phone from an app. If an e-scooter rider is seen as driving unsafe and they haven't done the online training or haven't re-certified when they needed to, then they get a citation, basically a fix-it ticket.
3. Cities need to spend more on being micro-mobility friendly, not trying to ban the new-fangled thing, granted e-scooters are nothing new. Sure, some things need to happen to keep things from getting too crazy as more and more people do this, but really back when I first rode an e-scooter, the few of us out there were very considerate about how we rode around and I think most riders, especially e-scooter owners, are pretty considerate about how they ride around. This shouldn't be because you cherry picked an example of some drunk person renting an e-scooter and crashing it, ban or severely restrict for everyone. We could use the same reasoning for anything, even for banning automobiles entirely, but we don't.
Only 3% of the emergency room visits were by pedestrians involved in e-scooter accidents? And how many pedestrians were injured in e-scooter accidents that _didn't_ go to the emergency room? 🙄
This is Finland so people will generally go if they are injured as all healthcare is publicly funded and is free at the point of service.
Also unlike in America, they legally get time off in case they are injured as well. Which is why it is in the cities’ best interest to reduce healthcare costs by improving safety of citizens. But yeah living in America I would think twice before I went to the doctor because of how insanely expensive it is.
Scooters are also generally safe for pedestrians. Amsterdam has a lot of mixed use spaces which forces people to be careful as people come from all directions but are quite safe as you cannot go fast on a scooter and have to pay attention.
The real issue is cars. I can bet a huge portion of the rest of the 97 percent of injuries would be collisions with cars.
This video is entirely focused on the flawed rental e-scooters startups. Private e-scooters owned by individuals actually replace car trips (unlike rentals) and cause less societal issues. IMO ban rental e-scooters, put a reasonable speed limit on private e-scooters and treat them as a bike alternative (and build more bike lanes).
I would not necessarily ban all rental e-scooters but they should definitely be more regulated. Such as adding fixed docking stations.
@@itsliam4905 I agree! Bike-share programs have fixed docking stations so should e-scooters (plus they would charge them so they’re always ready to go)
Agreed!
A lot of people don't realize, but the trick with the e-scooters is to buy an hourly pass. Those are cheaper than just riding them and being charged per minute. I use them all the time in DC when I am in a rush or running errands (when I don't feel like biking) and they are somewhat of a cheaper alternative over Ubering.
Also scooters are a more efficient way to view a city you’re traveling to. I visited Denver in 2019 and we ditched the car and only rode scooters as it was affordable and enjoyable riding and exploring the city. I live in San Francisco and ride my own everyday to work and back. It’s very enjoyable! Thanks Unagi for my monthly subscription.
I love Bird & Lime scooters…I’ve got 37 of them in my garage already 😊
They’re great for reducing emissions and traffic in cities as pointed out in this video. I don’t think we should do away with them but just introduce more safety measures like docking stations for the scooters to charge and reduce clutter/tipping over issue, 10MPH regulators, and limit availability after 10pm (as most injuries occur in late night hours). To make this industry closer to profitability these companies should look into advertising space on their scooters or said potential docking stations.
10mph limiters? Thats jogging speed.
@@Zerospacedude Yupp. These are short commuters in densely populated cities not drag racers. If safety is the concern limit speeds to reduce risk of accidents and severity of injuries should an accident occur.
Walking reduces the emissions to zero, so don't get fat on a scooter, get fit walking, or running.
@@megapangolin1093 I mean you’re not wrong but that doesn’t mean people shouldn’t have the option to get around faster and not have to arrive to their destination dripping in sweat. If anything a more robust public transit system is a stronger argument against e-scooter rentals.
Getting them off sidewalks and car roads would probably resolve a lot of safety issues.
I am impressed, very well researched and very well done short documentary! I did not expect that from CNBC - the guys which where responsible for it should get a bonus, the full team! 😄
I need to know where this 200g co2 emmision comes from for electric scooters considering much bigger EVs use 100g for an hour of use
E-scooters were taking off in the uk till they were banned. The complaint about how e-scooters are sometimes left on the pavement is fair but these are rentals as private owners surely wouldn't leave their scooter on the street like that.
E-scooters are the mist affordable means of zero local emission private transport but our government has pushed people back into previous forms of transport so they can push rental scooters. To me to increae safety it would make sense to make it mandatory to take a compulsory basic training course and pass. In the uk you have to have a drivers license (or provisional license) to rent an e-scooter but that doesn't mean you'd be any safer than specific training to understand the hazards of a two wheel vehicle.
I also agree with the no where to ride rule. I ride on the street or in the bike lane and cars get mad at me. Bikes get mad that I’m there. I’ll go to a sidewalk and I ride slowly as I know it’s not ideal and people get mad there too.
This is all really good información considering I’m a E-scooter user myself however whoever edited this video needs to keep in mind same audio levels throughout the length of the video. It was pretty annoying having to adjusting volume levels
Agreed. And the narrator needs to slow down. Not everyone watching this is a native English speaker.
I love them because it’s instant transportation almost anywhere in the city. Problem…. There’s this one brand where the accelerator gets stuck. I almost drove into traffic after breaking. I also stopped once and it kept going and flew in the air with me luckily still holding on.
San Diego has done a great job of geo fencing scooter usage and parking. They redesignated regular car parking spaces for shared emobility vehicles too which is great because you can fit more than 10 scooters in the space of one car! Now if only we could get designated infrastructure like protected bike/scooter lanes so you're not riding between cars... baby steps i guess
The problem I have with these is with the idiots who insist on endangering pedestrians by riding on sidewalks and at unsafe speeds, as well as the constant destruction and vandalism of these scooters by mainly unhoused idiots who steal the batteries and motorized wheels, then leave the debris on the sidewalks.
The fundamental problem is that sidewalks are safer than streets. Cars are incredibly dangerous and drive at dangerous speeds through cities. A scooter on the sidewalk might cause broken bones in the case of a collision, but a car crashing into a scooter on the street can be fatal. It is fundamentally that cars have forced all other transportation onto a small sidewalk
We need protected bike lanes. Never seen a scooter on the sidewalk when they have a protected lane to ride in
I can also say, getting around San Francisco is way easier and faster than driving. I used to drive for Lyft and on my scooter I can get across the city in 10 minutes, in a car it usually takes 30.
For the at night collisions, I'd recommend that scooter riders clip a blinker on their back to increase their visibility. I keep a bike light strapped to my purse (cross body strap) for this.
Ebike, escooters should be encouraged. They're great for traffic. You save tons of money and you can park anywhere.
Ebikes, yes, eScooters, no, dangerous, and used on the sidewalk, yes they can be left on the sidewalk and in public places to cause injury. Very responsible.
@@megapangolin1093 biased opinion, they shouldn't be allowed to be left on sidewalks and danger is similar to bikes
@@megapangolin1093 less dangerous than cars and trucks!
@@megapangolin1093 Cars are by far the most dangerous. Let's ban those, then talk about banning less dangerous things like scooters
I own an e-scooter and I love it! All of the problems addressed in this article are the result of the rental model, and not a shortcoming of scooters alone.
I’m 💯 for electric micro mobility! However, the difficulties and issues we face stem from hire e-scooter companies. Anyone can ride, no matter their skill. Injuries happen due to rider error/skill and the perception of Personal Electric Vehicles (PEV) takes yet another hit. PRIVATELY owned and responsibly ridden devices are the way to move forward. People who own and ride their devices are less likely to park their precious devices, which they paid with their hard earned money, just anywhere and will take extra effort to care and maintain them. On top of that, they level of skill and familiarity with riding their own devices will dramatically decrease injury. Now I’m not saying every PEV user will be angels but I like to point out that the same can be said for drivers of motor vehicles! The difference is that it won’t be a 1 tonne metal box hurling down the street! PRIVATELY owned… NOT hire schemes.
A true e-scooter solution would be better PEV infrastructure as many has pointed out, safe from cars and pedestrians. Parking can be solved by vertical trolley wheels, think trolley bag which is always with you and has low footprint area usage. Also, users must not unlock the safety (speed) limit; those things does wonders.
4:40 They incorrectly state e-scooters emit 200g of CO2 per mile traveled, which is not correct. The actual amount is closer to 50g. If you google it, one of the first results is a Verge article which states the incorrect 200g number and 400g for cars. Clearly they just grabbed the first result they saw and never verified. Very poor research from CNBC
Haven't seen a lot of scooters recently, except rental ones lying around in the way because, yes, it is not profitable to come back and pick them up every day outside of pretty narrow limits. And no one should have ever acted like it was going to be profitable. If you have a use case to own one, e.g. a commute more than a mile or so that makes it a significant timesaver over walking, but that is short enough that you can normally plan around weather, I get that (though a bike would be safer!). But add the labor to curate them and either the cost gets ridiculous for the user, or the profit evaporates.
This is why it should be kept to personal brought scooter to prevent those who don’t treat them properly
in most places in galveston county can go over 20 leagally and can use the sidewalks only when clear
Scooters are plentiful in my area. I normally use them to go to the store, restaurants nearby, or occasionally to a subway station if the bus is too far away. I tend to stick to side roads, bike paths, and trails whenever possible and park responsibly.
buy your own stop being foolish
The clutter part is where the weakness in the e schoolers is. If local business like parking garages etc would help to house the scooters instead of on the sidewalk there would be less issues. Maybe the price would go up but things could improve.
I love these things, used them several times in Bismarck for running around town, i just wish they wouldn't shut down when you get close to a park
I believe the shared escooter model has contributed significantly to the negative perception from the general public, they clutter up the pathways and drive up the negative statistics. Essentially these businesses are all about profit. e-scooters should be personally owned.
ya imagine me parking my fleet of rental cars on the sidewalk in front of your business, but they all have flat tires, yet at the same time the city complains because i want to have a sign painted on the eaves of my building to say hey public, im open.
Electric kick scooters are great for combining with transit because they fold up small and you can take them into your office and charge at your desk, but if you're doing the whole journey, electric bicycle will be much better.
Ironically, these escooter probably place best in smaller cities or former big ones losing population and tourism. I remember visoting Corpus Christi, TX with my dog and used one. Left car parked for the three days. Many happy memories of my dog chasing me on the scooter along the beach.
I bought my own personal e scooter with safety gear. I can't wait for the infrastructures to change to accommodate to this new way of commuting.
BUILD👏MORE👏BIKE👏LANES👏
Also it's kinda rich hearing drivers complain about litter considering how much of our roads are taken up by their cars...
Roads originally were made for cars and other heavy duty vehicles, why won't they be taken by cars.
@@avina84 Roads weren't originally made for cars. Originally public roads were for all sorts of transportation; street cars, pedestrians, bicyclists, and especially horses. It wasn't until the 1920's when auto manufacturers invented jay walking and forced all other traffic off roads
@@mikea5745 exactly. We've had roads and streets for thousands of years and they have only been exclusively used for cars in the last 100. And look how well that's going...
Hell No!! Here in Tampabay you find these escooters in all states of disuse, disrepair, and oftentimes at the bottom of the bay. Big taxpayers expense extricating this pollution waste from the environment. In addition, there several near misses by automobiles and people when these things are driven on the sidewalk by ignorant individuals. Imagine walking out of your building only to have some idiot wiz by almost kocking you over possible injuring you.
We need more motorized vehicles that can be easily accessed by drunk people. Keeping drunk people out of cars will greatly improve safety
I got one! The night bus!
The rental scooters are good to get a LOT of people to try em... some of those who try em will buy a PEV ... ebike/kickscoot/EUC. Every one of those is one less car on the road.
People need to stop complaining this is a way of transportation I use one for work and it has saved me alot of money in gas and train fair along with time wasted standing in stations .
we have cars parked in bike lanes so yeah… let’s try fixing that and we can stay in our lane .
I went to town on my motorcycle, rode past a lot of idiots on e-scooters who use the road instead of the cycle lane, rode past a couple of places with e-scooter riders running red lights, rode past a couple of places where e-scooter riders carry passengers (scooter are not made to carry two people...), the last straw for me was when I was looking for a specific motorcycle parking spot an idiot decided to park their e scooter there and take up the space. Sorry those services either need to be banned or implement a registration system where if users break some EUGs they get fined for it, similar to car sharing, it would solve sooooo many issues and reduce the number of irresponsible users by a huge amount (but then again those companies probably think less users = bad).
I get the same thing too. I've gotten the talk too about "haha we call those donor-cycles" from the same people that ride an e bike or an e scooter with just a half helmet on while I wear full gear on a motorcycle and have a license to operate one. I don't even think regulation is good enough for rental scooters and they should just be banned. I have a feeling though that if people bought their own e scooter they probably wouldn't want to trash it or leave it somewhere it shouldn't be.
"Others are complaining about how they clutter sidewalks"
Giant parking lots full of cars and street parked cars everywhere:
I purchased an electric scooter last April seeing the crazy gas prices and wanted to have a more environmentally commute to work. I've put over 3000km on it (instead of my gasoline sedan). I'm having so much fun getting to work (and saving a lot on gas too!)
The solution is just people buying their own personal scooters, not renting them everyday.
For the main reasons bird tanks in my honest opinion it's because they required that I submit a photo of my driver's license which was a no-go I shouldn't need a driver's license to ride an electric scooter lime didn't require that so I use lime a lot.
I HATE Escooter rental companies but I love Escooters, we just need better education and the infrastructure to use them.
North Americans are addicted to cars and the car companies lobby the government hard to keep it that way
My Electric scooter is so good it's replaced my car for commuting to work and running errands it's such an amazing quality of life device
It is a new reality that needs to be dealt with and helped to grow safely . It got to be made available for everyone everywhere
I am curious how scooters will make major inroads into local car trips on a consistent basis. I am not riding a scooter six blocks to my local grocery store or dry cleaners and have to juggle four bags of groceries, three dress shirts and a couple slacks while trying to operate my scooter through traffic...and of course that's in good weather.
"15million miles" = how many collisions/ unreported injuries and such?
And 2 miles for even 2-5 dollars?!? Truckers make 50 cents a mile!!!! Not affordable at all.
If these are better than they shouldn't be rent to use. Monthly pass only or buy your own
I enjoy the Lime scooters in my suburban city. I use them to get around town or just for fun.
You have to make an informed choice when it comes to these things. These are not for everyone.
Recent - some might even say that it’s ongoing - hike in used car prices tempted me into getting rid of my 2017 Sonata. I paid 20k new and sold at 18k in 2022, it was probably the best deal I could have possibly gotten with a Hyundai, a once in a lifetime kind of a deal.
The problem was: what should I replace it with? The options ranged from a regular motorcycle, e-motorcycle, a moped, an ebike, a bike, e-scooter and e-skateboard. I live on a generally flat terrain, but the genius engineering of American highway entrances design means that a few roads I do have to go through have big inclines unsuitable for skateboards and other smaller capacity batteries. Most if not all retailers are dishonest with the battery capacity and ranges, real life ranges on electrified vehicles are basically less than half of what the lable says. That means, when a scooter is labeled at 7 miles range, it really only goes 3 miles on a flat land. Factor in inclines and it’s likely that it won’t even make 2 miles.That’s the reality.
On the other side of the spectrum are the e-motorcycles and e-mopeds. Normal ones didn’t suit my needs as they would have cost me the same gas(petroleum) prices as well as environmentally vexing. Another problem on top of that is safety, when it goes faster it’s more dangerous. Many do make those vehicles work, but I never had a formal training with motorcycles and I was afraid I would eventually crash one, as the common saying goes. They also currently cost higher end of four figures, which was not easy to justify for me.
So in my case, the best option ended up being an e-bike. Hundreds of years of bicycle history means a bike really is infinitely customizable: there can be cargos, trailer, extra seats, accessories holders, and the parts can be easily and cheaply replaced when broken. Also, a bike in general benefits best from the existing infrastructure. I can use it in conjunction to the bus network since my city buses have these bike racks on them, and since bike lanes are designed for bicycles, I don’t have to think about tripping over uneven grounds like I would had I been on a e-scooter. There are many bike mechanics conveniently nearby whereas a broken e-scooter had to be shipped if anyone even offered a repair at all. The downside was that bikes are attractive targets for thieves and I did get one stolen. Luckily I got it back and I started putting it inside my work when I arrive with apple airtag and I feel good about it. The extra benefit of it all is that since I got an ebike, I became quite healthier and have not had one single night where I would have problem falling asleep. I like to think it paid for itself, because a nice bed to cure my insomnia would have cost me twice what the bike would have.
I think we might be not yet ready for e-scooters yet. It has the disadvantages of a bike without the positives of it. Please consider the range, safety of yourself and other pedestrians, the repairs, and
… the thefts and insurance costs.
120,000 ER visits 6:24 I'm assuming that's Nationals since no city was cited. What's that, like 1% of the national motor vehicle ER visits? Mostly of these scooters can't go more than 15 or 20 mph. And injury severity is a square root of speed from what I understand.
Scooter clutter can't be a hard fix.. If someone rents a scooter charge them a $50 fine if the scooter they rented isn't placed in a reasonable area when they are done.
Great subject.
I didn’t even use a car when I visited DC. I was there for 2 days and used scooters and spends only $50 the whole time. I loved it.
see these everywhere on my visit to budapest right now. first time i seen a city go all on it
Just crossed 200miles on my ninebot with a 2 mile commute it's been a blast. I will add my work area has a perfect spot to store it out of the way.
I wish I could go up to 25mph on those scooters. It’s hard to keep up with the flow of traffic if I need to go into the road because someone is double parked on the bike lane. Rode one today and had to wait for 20 cars to pass before I could continue.
You're real likely to crash standing over such small wheels though. Past running speed it's real advisable to at least be seated and lower your center of gravity.
@@doujinflip Oh I usually take the big scooters that’s like a bike. They have a seat on it. Yeah, the regular standing scooters, I wouldn’t trust more than 20mph.
In my area a bird scooter costs something like $23/hr
The more scooters/cyclists/public transportation users = less traffic to get stuck in for drivers
And more idiots not following traffic laws to hit on the road
@@StealthyDead as if drivers are innocent and following all traffic laws. By their nature lighter vehicles are inherently safer than a car for other road users. If you hit a pedestrian at 20 miles per hour in a car they are very likely to either die or get heavily injured due to the mas of the vehicle. These lighter vehicles inherently have less force on impact and are thus safer in any scenario.
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Scammer
Love these scooters. Use to love riding these things in downtown Miami .
Back in 2019 when we were in Washington d.c. they had those scooters and a half and it rode on a bird one and by now they have them in Kansas City
I wish there were more penalties for people leaving them wherever they please.
I like how scooter owners get lumped in with rental companies that treat them like disposable property and renters abuse them.
I for one enjoy just throwing my scooter I paid 1500 dollars for down on the ground like it's someone elses problem /s
4:36 whhaaaattt??? How is an e-scooter the same emissions as a prius?! I find that very hard to believe.
I got one coming in the mail rn; I can’t wait!!!
Of course. I advocated for it 7 yrs old. It's a game changer for everyone
It is important to note; yes 89% of the voters that showed in Paris did vote to ban them - but less than 10% of residents actually voted.
It is a presumption that other 90% will vote in the favor of the e-scooters. Besides that if it is important to them they should had come to vote.
@@avina84 I understand that but IMO it is still misleading to not mention this. Additionally it was mostly non-users of the rental services who voted (mostly older people) so it is not the best reflection of the entire population.
The French are known for their sense of liberty but unfortunately they too don’t care to vote for things that directly concern them