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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

#211

Post by edaemon »

splurge100 wrote: post #92

All of the commenters saying e-scooters shouldn't be allowed on sidewalks are right. Sidewalks in most densely populated US cities are too narrow and busy to safely allow a human gliding along at 15 mph within ~2 ft of a doorway where another human may be exiting, or past blind corners. The bigger issue is that e-scooter parking is fundamentally broken right now. Despite being told not to, users still park them in th…

I think a better, albeit more difficult and expensive solution, would be to implement space for scooters and things like them. In the US we only have two spaces: the sidewalk and the street. Adding a third space for bikes, scooters, and other small personal vehicles would go a long way to promote safety and efficiency.

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

#212

Post by dublidu »

m4x wrote: post #200
splurge100 wrote: post #92

All of the commenters saying e-scooters shouldn't be allowed on sidewalks are right. Sidewalks in most densely populated US cities are too narrow and busy to safely allow a human gliding along at 15 mph within ~2 ft of a doorway where another human may be exiting, or past blind corners. The bigger issue is that e-scooter parking is fundamentally broken right now. Despite being told not to, users still park them in th…

Scooters seem unnecessary in densely populated cities. Most high-density areas have good public transport within a few minutes walk of your destination, and the footpaths are too busy to ride a scooter on anyway. They are much more useful in medium-density cities and suburbs where the roads and footpaths are less busy and public transport is not as effective. I love using my scooter for commuting and errands in my lo…

You’ve clearly not lived in San Francisco. My 3 mile commute takes 45 minutes by bus. It’s only a 30 minute bike or scooter ride.

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

#213

Post by conanbatt »

splurge100 wrote: post #92

All of the commenters saying e-scooters shouldn't be allowed on sidewalks are right. Sidewalks in most densely populated US cities are too narrow and busy to safely allow a human gliding along at 15 mph within ~2 ft of a doorway where another human may be exiting, or past blind corners. The bigger issue is that e-scooter parking is fundamentally broken right now. Despite being told not to, users still park them in th…

Easy, allow scotters to park on the street like cars, problem solved for everyone.

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

#214

Post by twoheadedboy »

justchilly wrote: post #179
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…

The old Bird and Lime scooters had 250W motors. The new Skip scooters have 350W (plus suspension which is nice). The skips can get to a walking pace up to ~10% grade, but grind to a halt anywhere near Nob/Russian Hill. You need at least 750W to do the trick. They also all have just a single break, which makes going down those hills dangerous.

What about Jump bikes? Because they go up hills pretty easily. Not the steepest ones but I get around pretty well with them in my neighborhood, which has lots of hills.

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

#215

Post by mikepurvis »

m4x wrote: post #210
mikepurvis wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Cars seem unnecessary in densely populated cities. Most high-density areas have good public transport within a few minutes walk of your destination, and the roads are too busy to drive a car on anyway." FTFY

Cars address a different set of requirements. You use one when you need to transport many people, heavy cargo, tools, etc. A scooter does not solve any of those problems. A scooter does allow a single person and their possessions to travel at faster than walking pace without getting sweaty. In the CBD that is not necessary, since public transport works so well. In the suburbs a scooter is more effective.

Sure, but look at your typical freeway rush hour traffic jam— how many of those vehicles really have multiple people or heavy cargo?

The point is that for short commutes and as a last mile solution to extend the coverage of public transit, scooters are amazing. And a rental system means they can stay downtown instead of needing to take up space both ways on the mass transit vehicle.

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

#216

Post by nrb »

m4x wrote: post #200
splurge100 wrote: post #92

All of the commenters saying e-scooters shouldn't be allowed on sidewalks are right. Sidewalks in most densely populated US cities are too narrow and busy to safely allow a human gliding along at 15 mph within ~2 ft of a doorway where another human may be exiting, or past blind corners. The bigger issue is that e-scooter parking is fundamentally broken right now. Despite being told not to, users still park them in th…

Scooters seem unnecessary in densely populated cities. Most high-density areas have good public transport within a few minutes walk of your destination, and the footpaths are too busy to ride a scooter on anyway. They are much more useful in medium-density cities and suburbs where the roads and footpaths are less busy and public transport is not as effective. I love using my scooter for commuting and errands in my lo…

High-density areas typically have bike lanes for scooters to use.

The problem of getting ~3 miles in a city like SF (SoMa to Mission) involves a 10 min walk to a train, and several more minutes walking once you get off the train, or walking to a bus stop and waiting 10+ mins there, with another walk to your destination. 10-15 minute car or scooter trips easily become 45+ min public transport trips.

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

#217

Post by alwaysreading »

mjg59 wrote: post #180

Of the scooter companies that have launched in the Bay area, Spin were by far the least technically advanced - the scooters were basically unmodified Xiaomis, to the extent of still having power buttons. Rather than an integrated location and management system, location data came from a off-the-shelf GPS tracker spliced off the battery lines. Since the scooter control board had no cellular link, there was no mechanis…

I'm pretty sure these are the scooters that Spin uses: https://amzn.to/2JRji76

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

#218

Post by iknowstuff »

sonnyblarney wrote: post #51
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…

No, I don't think this is a transition. What we're likely seeing is M&A people caught up in the hype and trends. In some ways, it's worth spending some amount as a hedge against something happening, but I don't believe these scooters will represent any meaningful change ... personally I think they are kind of a fad. The logistics, cost, narrow use cases of all of it just don't work out well enough. Truly - what % of…

>Truly - what % of people could actually commute using these things? It's very small. Of those, who would actually do it? In winter? Up and down hills? Are they a little bit too old for this, or maybe not so open minded?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2RQrKP9a0XE

Potentially: Everyone, winter to summer (look up his other videos), up and down hills (they're electric, hills don't matter), regardless of age. America is not the only country in the world, but even the US has cities far denser than the spread out, gridlocked hell of LA like San Francisco or NYC.

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

#219

Post by tigershark »

dublidu wrote: post #212
m4x wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Scooters seem unnecessary in densely populated cities. Most high-density areas have good public transport within a few minutes walk of your destination, and the footpaths are too busy to ride a scooter on anyway. They are much more useful in medium-density cities and suburbs where the roads and footpaths are less busy and public transport is not as effective. I love using my scooter for commuting and errands in my lo…

You’ve clearly not lived in San Francisco. My 3 mile commute takes 45 minutes by bus. It’s only a 30 minute bike or scooter ride.

I don’t think that bus can ever be defined as “good public transport” in a dense metropolitan area. Trains or light rails are probably what gp was speaking about.

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

#220

Post by travisoneill1 »

andrewljohnson wrote: post #61

There I was, sitting at the busy intersection of Sacramento and Ashby in Berkeley, when I saw two boys that couldn't have been more than 8-10 years old fly by on Bird Scooters. And I thought to myself, some kid is going to die. And lots of people do die on these things: https://www.google.com/search?q=bird+scooters+deaths These scooter companies suck, I wish they'd all go away. If they weren't all going for hypergrow…

If you're not riding around on dangerous wheeled objects as a kid, you're doing it wrong. Worry about the adults.
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