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Ford Buying San Francisco-Area E-Scooter Startup Spin

nytimes.com

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Re: Ford Buying San Francisco-Area E-Scooter Startup Spin

#101

Post by 3pt14159 »

djrogers wrote: post #80
wafflesraccoon wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personal anecdote, cyclists blow through stop signs because the infrastructure isn't built for bicycles. Having to come to a stop and then start up on a bicycle is the hardest part and cyclists hate it. Source: Commuting to work on a bicycle for years.

Uhh, so how exactly would you reccomend building the infrastructure to support the use case of 'never having to stop'? Intersections are a thing, and bridges/overpasses are very expensive - especially if you start demanding them at literally ever one.

Roundabouts and yield signs. For T-intersections no yield along the top for cross intersections that can't be roundabouts for whatever reason make the yield the direction that has a bike lane if possible.

The problem with coming to a complete stop on a bike is that for people getting to work it means a much more likely chance that you end up there sweaty; and most work places don't have a shower.

Re: Ford Buying San Francisco-Area E-Scooter Startup Spin

#102

Post by sbilstein »

wafflesraccoon wrote: post #70
TylerE wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Start doing dumb shit? I've been seeing cyclist blow through stop signs for 30 years.

Personal anecdote, cyclists blow through stop signs because the infrastructure isn't built for bicycles. Having to come to a stop and then start up on a bicycle is the hardest part and cyclists hate it. Source: Commuting to work on a bicycle for years.

I’m a cyclist too but I just don’t see how cities could be built in such a way that avoids stop signs unless everything is a roundabout. It’s annoying to stop on a bike; doesn’t mean I am justified in being lazy about it.

Re: Ford Buying San Francisco-Area E-Scooter Startup Spin

#103

Post by [deleted] »

wafflesraccoon wrote: post #70
TylerE wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Start doing dumb shit? I've been seeing cyclist blow through stop signs for 30 years.

Personal anecdote, cyclists blow through stop signs because the infrastructure isn't built for bicycles. Having to come to a stop and then start up on a bicycle is the hardest part and cyclists hate it. Source: Commuting to work on a bicycle for years.

[deleted]

Re: Ford Buying San Francisco-Area E-Scooter Startup Spin

#104

Post by ryanmercer »

samstave wrote: post #84
wafflesraccoon wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personal anecdote, cyclists blow through stop signs because the infrastructure isn't built for bicycles. Having to come to a stop and then start up on a bicycle is the hardest part and cyclists hate it. Source: Commuting to work on a bicycle for years.

Exactly. People who don't bike don't understand. Imagine having to effectively park you car every single time a stop was legally required. All moving vehicles should be operated safely, but obeying a stop sign, just because its a stop sign isnt always safe, or efficient. @drRogers below me... To anyone bitching about stop signs, they should be bitching about the lack of roundabouts. There are myriad ways to design in…

>To anyone bitching about stop signs, they should be bitching about the lack of roundabouts.

Uh. Roundabouts cost orders of magnitude more than stop signs and eat up several times as much space as a standard intersection.

https://safety.fhwa.dot.gov/intersection/innovative/roundabo...

>The average construction cost of roundabouts is estimated at approximately $250,000[2]. Roundabouts discussed in this report ranged in cost from $194,000 to just under $500,000, depending on their size (or "footprint" and right-of-way acquisitions that were needed.)

Let's see... 200k$ roundabout or sub 2k$ (probably sub 1k$) for 4 stop signs installed.

Re: Ford Buying San Francisco-Area E-Scooter Startup Spin

#105

Post by ivankolev »

ismail wrote: post #60
ravenstine wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's why it's aggravating to me how many cities insist on building everything at ground level. Cars? Ground level. Bikes and pedestrians? Ground level. Trains? Ground level, creating chaos at intersections. And now we have tons of scooters. Ground level, and causing chaos as people ride them without helmets and weave into car traffic. Adding more ground level transit isn't ever going to be the solution, and widenin…

I recall Toronto had a labyrinth of passage ways under ground, with shops etc. It connected to the subway and it was very convenient. Guess they built under ground due to the weather?

Yes, the PATH is vast and convenient, and a prime commercial real estate, it feels like a dwarven city from a RPG game :). IMHO such labyrinth could never be retro fitted if it wasn't planned beforehand though.

Re: Ford Buying San Francisco-Area E-Scooter Startup Spin

#106

Post by goobynight »

the_watcher wrote: post #6

I used Bird, Lime, Lyft, and Jump scooters over the weekend in LA and they were great for getting around when I'd have otherwise considered driving (over a 45 minute walk). I tried a Skip scooter again when I got back to SF, and once again, it simply could not handle a minor (for SF) hill. I don't know what the solution is, since it seems like a bad idea to power them more to handle hills given the dangers that would…

You can increase power or at least torque while limiting top speed, especially since I think it's an electric throttle. Maybe they can tune the throttle mapping

Re: Ford Buying San Francisco-Area E-Scooter Startup Spin

#107

Post by aqme28 »

djrogers wrote: post #80
wafflesraccoon wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personal anecdote, cyclists blow through stop signs because the infrastructure isn't built for bicycles. Having to come to a stop and then start up on a bicycle is the hardest part and cyclists hate it. Source: Commuting to work on a bicycle for years.

Uhh, so how exactly would you reccomend building the infrastructure to support the use case of 'never having to stop'? Intersections are a thing, and bridges/overpasses are very expensive - especially if you start demanding them at literally ever one.

Here's a simple fix https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Idaho_stop

Stop signs become yield signs for cyclists. Red lights become stop signs.

Re: Ford Buying San Francisco-Area E-Scooter Startup Spin

#108

Post by nradov »

floatrock wrote: post #29

What you're seeing is car companies trying to transition to "mobility" companies -- the difference being the former is a manufacturing company with 3% margins and the latter being a services company with much fatter margins. Autonomous car fleets are the main "mobility services" prize of course -- all the major OEMs have autonomous research labs -- but you're seeing more interest in scooters and bikes (there was a he…

There's no reason to think that future margins for mobility services will be any higher. With few barriers to entry, margins will be driven down close to 0%.

Re: Ford Buying San Francisco-Area E-Scooter Startup Spin

#110

Post by porphyrogene »

Matthias247 wrote: post #97
notatoad wrote: post #22

>They belong in the bike lane (which should exist in the first place) the problem is the existence of bike lanes. If public officials start saying "scooters belong in the bike lane", then they have to confront the fact that their cities have no cohesive network of bike lanes that can actually support a real journey. This has been acceptable up until now, because cyclists are weird and it's okay to tell them to just r…

> because cyclists are weird and it's okay to tell them to just ride in amongst trucks travelling 40mph when a bike lane abruptly ends No, they are not weird! They do it because that's the only way to ride a bike in most of todays cities. Weird are general the car drivers who get upset every time they see a bike, and can't wait to overtake them with far less than a minimal safety distance.

I think he was speaking from what he perceives as the perspective of civic decision-makers, e.g. "Cyclists are weird, we don't need to think about the efficacy of bike travel in our city." Otherwise his comment doesn't really make sense.

This whole thing reminds me of the Portlandia take on this issue. Everyone just hates the other group because they are serving their own interests. No, "general car drivers" are not weird and that contentious attitude is ridiculous. Not everything has to be a dichotomous issue.

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