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Paris votes to ban rental e-scooters

france24.com

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Re: Paris votes to ban rental e-scooters

#41

Post by muyuu »

twic wrote: post #22
muyuu wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

maximising revenue and control from the authority it makes sense in a way

Except the streets are still littered with them. While cycling to work a while ago, i came across one parked in the middle of a segregated bike lane, in between a fence and a lane of heavy traffic. If this is the authority maximising control, i dread to think what uncontrolled use looks like.

it's more control than letting people own them, in a certain aspect

of course, carelessness is a problem but that also happens with so-called Boris bikes (Livingstone bikes)

Re: Paris votes to ban rental e-scooters

#42

Post by mlok »

sharperguy wrote: post #34
FeistySkink wrote: post #3

I hope this becomes EU-wide. Every season it seems like there's a new generation that discovers and abuses them to no end, endangering everybody around.

As someone who regularly uses them I would be very sad if they were banned. It is a very convienient mode of transport and can often cut journey times in half for me compared to public transport. I also ride a bike but I don't always have it with me, or want to lock up my bike somewhere overnight and risk having it stolen. I think it would be unfair to punish responsable users because of a few bad apples. Half of the…

Paris has a pretty good shared bike service, there is no need for a personal bike.

Re: Paris votes to ban rental e-scooters

#43

Post by londons_explore »

londons_explore wrote: post #38

Rental scooters are often competing with walking. A 10 minute walk might perhaps be a 2 minute scoot. Great. But in my city, for every 1 scooter ride, you will see 100 pedestrians walk past. Ie. they have a sub-1% market share. And the scooters are idle >95% of the time. I suspect, the friction of needing an app is too high. The complex signup process needing a driving license is too complex. The pricing (multiple do…

The scooter companies should also add screens to the scooters, and use them for promotions. Eg. "Ride me to XYZ bar for free!".

These promotions can be paid by businesses who want traffic, but also help the company redistribute the scooters back to gaps in coverage.

The promotions should again be appless and authless. Friction is what prevents people using these things.

Re: Paris votes to ban rental e-scooters

#44

Post by tomatocracy »

twic wrote: post #22
muyuu wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

maximising revenue and control from the authority it makes sense in a way

Except the streets are still littered with them. While cycling to work a while ago, i came across one parked in the middle of a segregated bike lane, in between a fence and a lane of heavy traffic. If this is the authority maximising control, i dread to think what uncontrolled use looks like.

The rental escooters in London are terrible. You need a driving licence to use them, unlike rental ebikes. Yet they are slower than an ebike or even a regular bike. They are also really expensive. Then add to that the fact that'll they all have geofencing which (i) forces you off the less occupied bike lanes or roads in many cases (eg in/near the Royal Parks - including roads which are open to cars) and (ii) doesn't work properly so that if you're just near to a "slow" area but not on it then you end up having to push them.

This is all entirely down to government enforced regulations - honestly I'm not sure why the companies bothered putting them in at all as they must have pretty well zero repeat custom.

Meanwhile there are plenty of non rental escooters on the bike lanes which seem to work pretty well for people, despite being technically illegal.

Re: Paris votes to ban rental e-scooters

#45

Post by bombolo »

kortilla wrote: post #37
publicmenace wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So that's a whole other debate (and I disagree), but even if you're right, getting rid of cars would be a gradual, multi-decade project. It's just not possible to get around modern American cities without cars. You can't just abandon the city. These cities represent trillions of dollars of investment. Otoh, you could ban e-scooters tomorrow and after dramatically improving various urban areas, the biggest effect woul…

> dramatically improving various urban areas That’s just in your opinion though. Scooters are super convenient if you’re not just an old fuddy dud afraid of new things.

It's so convenient having to lift them up and throw them out of the way all the time! /s

And while everybody must pay for parking or public soil occupation… apparently these companies are exempt and can completely fill a sidewalk for free (of course people then have to walk on the bike lane).

Re: Paris votes to ban rental e-scooters

#46

Post by Freedom2 »

mherdeg wrote: post #11

Bird and Lime will always have a special place in my heart for inspiring the last silly season political debate before covid in our town. The very first day rental escooters were legal in town the company hosted demonstration had someone fall off in the town hall parking lot and require hospitalization. It was all so silly and things only went sideways from there. I saved tens of minutes over the course of a summer t…

> Pour one out for the micromobility startups' dreams and may whatever comes next be as delightfully odd as those things were.

Could you elaborate on this? I'm not sure what Homebrew has to do with rental scooters...

Re: Paris votes to ban rental e-scooters

#47

Post by arijun »

I would like to provide a contrasting viewpoint. I can’t speak to the situation in Paris, but in the city I live in, scooters are amazing. They reduce car usage which is better for both pedestrians and car users. They turn a 45 minute walk/30 minute bus ride/20 minute cab into a 10-15 minute trip, which opens up much more of the city (the city I live in was not built for the number of cars it has in it so getting anywhere is a slog).

When they first came there were a bunch of scooter on pedestrian collisions, but between an aggressive ticketing campaign, adding bike lanes, and adding slow zones, these numbers have gone way down.

(I rarely use them as I tend to cycle everywhere, I’m just glad my city has them)

Re: Paris votes to ban rental e-scooters

#48

Post by yladiz »

pm90 wrote: post #32
publicmenace wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So that's a whole other debate (and I disagree), but even if you're right, getting rid of cars would be a gradual, multi-decade project. It's just not possible to get around modern American cities without cars. You can't just abandon the city. These cities represent trillions of dollars of investment. Otoh, you could ban e-scooters tomorrow and after dramatically improving various urban areas, the biggest effect woul…

> It's just not possible to get around modern American cities without cars. Well but it is. Restricting/Eliminating cars in city centers especially would do wonders to promote them as places that people want to live in.

Too many American city centers aren’t really set up for non-car usage, so even if cars went away, people would need to walk pretty big distances to get to where they’re going. Modern American cities need to be fundamentally redesigned to support a car free or reduced system.

Re: Paris votes to ban rental e-scooters

#49

Post by bombolo »

hackerlight wrote: post #10
FeistySkink wrote: post #3

I hope this becomes EU-wide. Every season it seems like there's a new generation that discovers and abuses them to no end, endangering everybody around.

Cars are far more dangerous, no?

Do people often park 5 cars between you and your door so that you have to walk over them to go inside?

Didn't think so.

Re: Paris votes to ban rental e-scooters

#50

Post by bombolo »

fsh wrote: post #20
shtopointo wrote: post #2

Excellent vote from the people of Paris! It's too easy to take these things on the sidewalk, go 20mph and disregard the people around you. Those things also weight quite a bit, so getting hit with that may be life altering.

They are electronically limited to 20 km/h in Paris and weigh no more than a bicycle.

Getting hit by a bycicle at 20km/h can severely injure you.
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