The Rise of the Electric Scooter • Hacker News Board

Re: The Rise of the Electric Scooter

#101

Post by com2kid » Thu, Sep 12, 2019, 7:02 PM UTC

blacksmith_tb wrote: post #98

com2kid wrote: post #87

I am amused this is still a topic of discussion in America. Visit China sometime, electric motor scooters (larger than the kids versions we have here[1]) and motorbikes are everywhere, the large majority of small vehicles on the road there are now electric. It is super nice, the streets are far cleaner and quieter than just a few years ago. One huge benefit China has is an existing infrastructure for smaller vehicles…

I like watching the Cambrian Explosion of electric vehicles unfolding in China now, though it seems like a lot of them will not last. I think it would fair to say that bike lanes in the US are intended more for ease of litigation than safety (but that's true of a lot of US traffic infrastructure). The mix of traffic making things safer sounds a lot like a Woonerf[1]. 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woonerf

> I like watching the Cambrian Explosion of electric vehicles unfolding in China now, though it seems like a lot of them will not last.

Most of the companies probably won't, but the changes to the market place will. Everyone is used to quiet comfortable electric small vehicles now.

Watching hundreds of mothers swarm a school to pick their kids up on electric motor scooters really drilled that home for me. Especially contrasting that to the utter nightmare in America of a similar number of swarming SUVs! American schools end up wasting space for "pick-up zones", in contrast it isn't even a concept in China, an electric motor scooter is what, 4x-5x as space efficient?

Re: The Rise of the Electric Scooter

#102

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Sep 12, 2019, 7:02 PM UTC

[deleted]

Re: The Rise of the Electric Scooter

#103

Post by olalonde » Thu, Sep 12, 2019, 7:04 PM UTC

com2kid wrote: post #87

I am amused this is still a topic of discussion in America. Visit China sometime, electric motor scooters (larger than the kids versions we have here[1]) and motorbikes are everywhere, the large majority of small vehicles on the road there are now electric. It is super nice, the streets are far cleaner and quieter than just a few years ago. One huge benefit China has is an existing infrastructure for smaller vehicles…

It's great overall but I do miss being able to walk on the sidewalk without having to worry about getting hit by those Meituan delivery scooters. At least here in Shenzhen, bicycles and small electric scooters are required to share the sidewalk with pedestrians.

Re: The Rise of the Electric Scooter

#104

Post by bsder » Thu, Sep 12, 2019, 7:04 PM UTC

BurningFrog wrote: post #15

ses1984 wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do scooters solve any of these problems? Do you not have to park scooters? Do they not suck in the rain? Do they not need some surface to ride on?

The great thing about the scooter is that it isn't mine, so I don't have to worry about it getting stolen. That's it. That's the killer feature.

> The great thing about the scooter is that it isn't mine, so I don't have to worry about it getting stolen.

Except that the scooter companies can't figure this out either and are moving to a monthly rental to put the burden back on you.

> In April, it announced the launch of a more traditional rental program in San Francisco and Barcelona, in which users could pay $25 per month to rent a Xiaomi m365 from the company rather than paying per ride.

The gig economy is about externalizing all the costs, ya'know.

Re: The Rise of the Electric Scooter

#105

Post by squarefoot » Thu, Sep 12, 2019, 7:06 PM UTC

I would buy one right now if it had larger wheels and proper brakes. In my area such small wheels would turn any speed bump or road irregularities (pretty normal over here) into a fatal accident waiting to happen.

Re: The Rise of the Electric Scooter

#106

Post by cryptopeeper » Thu, Sep 12, 2019, 7:07 PM UTC

I am still waiting for segway to be the phenomenon that Bezos promised. They said cities would re-design themselves around them. Instead we have kids zipping on scooters hitting old ladies.

Re: The Rise of the Electric Scooter

#107

Post by Blackstone4 » Thu, Sep 12, 2019, 7:08 PM UTC

Zenst wrote: post #80

Here in the UK they are illegal (unless used on private land), which is sad as whilst they are illegal as technically a motor vehicle, needing some form of test, insurance, mot.... That has not happened and in limbo as clearly a need for some standards control etc, but an unwillingness to address that and more so a periodic fashion stopping of people upon such vehicles in an apathetic way that causes many to get one,…

I agree that it’s sad that e-scooters are banned in the UK. I take the train to work and I have ~20mins of waking either end (1 hr 20 mins per day total). An electric scooter could save me ~40 mins per day....

Why are electric scooters banned when e-bikes are fine? What if they were capped at 20mph? Below the 25 for bikes

Re: The Rise of the Electric Scooter

#108

Post by samsolomon » Thu, Sep 12, 2019, 7:08 PM UTC

rtomayko wrote: post #100

eldenbishop wrote: post #38

I rode a non-electric kick scooter (Xootr) for three years working in downtown SF. It is by far the best form of transitional transport there is and superior to bikes for 99% of actual real world travel. It was easily 4-5 times faster than walking and more importantly suddenly made the entire city open due to how insanely efficient it was for "glueing" together various forms of public transport. I could hop from tran…

I’ve been thinking about bike vs scooter a lot lately too. Austin is overrun with scooters and I used them for a little while before finding the electric Uber Jump bikes. They seem superior to scooters in every way in Austin, which makes the 20:1 ratio of scooters to bikes a bit baffling. But I can see your point in SF where I use to walk 5 blocks from my apartment to the muni train and then another five blocks from…

We have the Jump e-bikes here in Atlanta, and I also prefer them to scooters. There are a lot of old roads and sidewalks with cracks that make riding a scooter can be dangerous. With the small wheels, you really have to pay attention to the road ahead of you.

Unfortunately, I received an email earlier this month that Jump is pulling all the e-bikes from the city. I wonder if operating costs or cost fo replacement make them unrealistic?

Re: The Rise of the Electric Scooter

#109

Post by dawhizkid » Thu, Sep 12, 2019, 7:09 PM UTC

I wonder why mopeds have never taken off in the US. Seems more practical than a scooter for medium to long distances within a city. I have relatives in Taiwan and mopeds are everywhere there (and other parts of Asia).

Re: The Rise of the Electric Scooter

#110

Post by vonmoltke » Thu, Sep 12, 2019, 7:11 PM UTC

melling wrote: post #34

vonmoltke wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Now we simply need to make the 50-75 miles in-between more bearable. Mine is 15 miles, and the problem is stops (which top speed does nothing to address).

You're being a little vague so it's impossible to analyze. However, if your average speed is 25 mph and the average doubled to 50 mph, I'm sure you'd be happy. With maglevs, we'd probably want more express trains.

My point is that top speed is only relevant when a train can reach it. If a train stops every two miles or less (like mine does in the morning), the vast majority of the time is spent accelerating, decelerating, or stopped.