Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The Rise of the Electric Scooter

blog.codinghorror.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

251–260 of 339 posts

Re: The Rise of the Electric Scooter

#251

Post by notatoad »

mips_avatar wrote: post #39

I recently bought a Boosted rev and have been using it for my 1.8 miles commute. I strongly disagree with the author's 15mph limit. I think 25 mph is a more reasonable limit, otherwise you have cars aggressively trying to pass you on roads. At 24 mph (my scooters max speed), the cars on my commute (25mph speed limit), still try to pass me sometimes but it's a lot safer.

my only experience with the rental scooters is the Lime ones, but i felt that a 15mph limit was if anything too high. If they had better brakes, they could go a lot faster, but with the quality of brakes that are installed anything greater than 15mph could lead to some really dangerous situations.

Re: The Rise of the Electric Scooter

#252

Post by notatoad »

impalallama wrote: post #125

As much some cities are struggling to figure out how to regulate them I think my city has basically nailed it first try. Give a license or two to certain companies to allow their scooters and other wise just use them like bikes. Keep them off side walks that are for pedestrians and otherwise use bike lanes. Just makes sense.

>Keep them off side walks that are for pedestrians and otherwise use bike lanes.

this makes the assumption that your city has a functional bike lane network, which is the problem in a lot of cities. If you have bike lanes, it's really easy. If you don't have bike lanes, suddenly you have this friction where there's suddenly a whole lot more people trying to use the streets but not in a car.

Re: The Rise of the Electric Scooter

#253

Post by rco8786 »

molodec wrote: post #180

Ok, I understand that there is a lot of benefits to electric scooters. They are fun, convenient, and allow to navigate quickly, and great for the environment, or at least better than cars. Why not driving regular bicycles? Obesity is a growing problem, because people don't exercise enough. Mechanical bicycle is a great low impact activity for modern life. Also, bicycles aren't generally allowed on a sidewalk, but I h…

Real talk - sweat. I can pop on a scooter for 20 minutes and get a cool breeze. If I rode my bike for 20 minutes I would arrive a dripping disgusting mess and would remain a stinky ape the rest of the day.

Re: The Rise of the Electric Scooter

#254

Post by asdfasgasdgasdg »

coredog64 wrote: post #248
maccam94 wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dockless and docked bikeshare programs both mitigate this issue, with trade-offs on the inconvenience of finding bikes/parking them.

Citibike in NYC is a dumpster fire. Same price as subway ride for a 30 minute ride. Each ride segment has to be 30 minutes or less or they start charging you by the minute. You can’t check out more than one bike on a single account. The full docks don’t correctly report in, meaning even though the dock is full, you can’t get a time extension while you go out of your way to return the bike.

That's the tourist price. NYC residents typically buy an annual pass for $170, which gives you free 45 minute segments.

Re: The Rise of the Electric Scooter

#255

Post by robbrown451 »

e40 wrote: post #220
molodec wrote: post #180

Ok, I understand that there is a lot of benefits to electric scooters. They are fun, convenient, and allow to navigate quickly, and great for the environment, or at least better than cars. Why not driving regular bicycles? Obesity is a growing problem, because people don't exercise enough. Mechanical bicycle is a great low impact activity for modern life. Also, bicycles aren't generally allowed on a sidewalk, but I h…

The author of the article, who is by the way the indoor enthusiasts, feels that scooters shouldn't be disallowed on the sidewalks. Pedestrians do not have lanes. Pedestrians are unpredictable. Pedestrians often step around things, like dogshit. I cannot count on my hands and toes the number of times someone > 150 LBS has whipped around me on the sidewalk. The damage they can do, should they collide with me, is great.…

I think a reasonable rule might be that you can ride them on sidewalks as long as you stay at least 25 feet from pedestrians. So basically if the sidewalk is empty, go for it. It might mean taking the side streets rather than the main ones, but that's ok.

I don't think these things coexist well with cars either. (nor do bikes, which is why I don't ride a bike in the city)

Pedestrians need to be aware of their surroundings too. (another good rule, pick up your dog shit)

Re: The Rise of the Electric Scooter

#256

Post by prawn »

pretendscholar wrote: post #99
superturkey650 wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you ever measured how fast you walk? I walk a couple miles every morning at an okay pace with my dog and I still average about 17 minutes a mile.

If I'm walking alone I do about a 10 minute mile but I think I walk fairly fast.

6 mph. First search suggests Olympic race walkers average about 7.7 mph. Another site suggests power walkers max out at 5.7 mph.

Re: The Rise of the Electric Scooter

#257

Post by Camillo »

ProfessorLayton wrote: post #228
rhizome wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you need to shave 20 specific minutes off your daily activities, I suggest finding a new job.

Those "20 specific minutes" are roughly 1/4th of the average 2-way commute time in the Bay Area [1] and even more than that nationwide. I suggest getting off that high horse. [1] https://abc7news.com/traffic/study-bay-area-commutes-fourth-...

But up on the horse he is faster than a pedestrian, it's better exercise than an e-scooter, and he doesn't have to worry about stepping in the ubiquitous poop.

Re: The Rise of the Electric Scooter

#258

Post by e40 »

robbrown451 wrote: post #255
e40 wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The author of the article, who is by the way the indoor enthusiasts, feels that scooters shouldn't be disallowed on the sidewalks. Pedestrians do not have lanes. Pedestrians are unpredictable. Pedestrians often step around things, like dogshit. I cannot count on my hands and toes the number of times someone > 150 LBS has whipped around me on the sidewalk. The damage they can do, should they collide with me, is great.…

I think a reasonable rule might be that you can ride them on sidewalks as long as you stay at least 25 feet from pedestrians. So basically if the sidewalk is empty, go for it. It might mean taking the side streets rather than the main ones, but that's ok. I don't think these things coexist well with cars either. (nor do bikes, which is why I don't ride a bike in the city) Pedestrians need to be aware of their surroun…

I think a reasonable rule might be that you can ride them on sidewalks as long as you stay at least 25 feet from pedestrians. So basically if the sidewalk is empty, go for it. It might mean taking the side streets rather than the main ones, but that's ok.

Nope:

I once saved a kid from serious harm. I was waiting for my kid to come out of a martial arts test and I was waiting outside on the sidewalk. There was a class after my kid's that had lots of little kids in it. They were waiting inside, mostly. Basically, I saw a guy riding a bike down the sidewalk, about 30m away. I also saw a group of kids about to rush out the door, running. I literally just had enough time to hold out my arms and stop the bicyclist before he could get to where the kids were running. In essence, I put my body in front of him and he stopped.

The conversation didn't go well. I said he could have seriously injured the kids as they ran out of the door, 2-3 feet from him, and he decided to yell at me that he would have seen, blah blah blah.

> Pedestrians need to be aware of their surroundings too.

That means walking in a perfectly straight line and never deviating from that line unless you clear your blind spots. But, that isn't even enough. I've been hit twice, in the last 20 years, by cyclists on the sidewalk, when I was walking in a straight line. Both said: I didn't mean it. Incidentally, 100% of bicyclists, when told it's not legal to ride on the sidewalk reply to me, said "I won't hit a pedestrian" and then somethings I get the f-word yelled at me (I was very polite to start, but not at this point).

Re: The Rise of the Electric Scooter

#259

Post by 6gvONxR4sf7o »

Symbiote wrote: post #190
eldenbishop wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This exactly: bikes require planning and strategy and are not good for improvisational day-to-day things like you described. Bikes make walking easier but all other forms of travel like bus, train or taxi/uber/cars more difficult or impossible.

In Copenhagen it's often the opposite: the rest of the group came by bike, they're within 20m of the current bar, the person on foot will have to turn up later. Or we all walk. (Also, the suburban trains and taxis carry bikes for free.)

Is that the case in the winter too? I just started bike commuting in SF and have been wondering how it works in bike oriented colder countries when it starts raining/snowing.

Re: The Rise of the Electric Scooter

#260

Post by egypturnash »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #133
egypturnash wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you actually live in the city the grocery store is not gonna be a huge schlep the way it is in the burbs, and this may be coloring how you think about those changes. When I was in Seattle I had a Safeway two blocks away and a Trader Joe’s three away. Very walkable distance, so I didn’t keep more than a few days worth of stuff in the kitchen as a rule; walking for six minutes each way is really not a hassle at all.…

That's all true, though I usually stop at a grocery store on my way home, so I'm not spending a lot of travel time. Honestly the worst part of grocery shopping is getting out of the store with your stuff, because of checkout lines. I suppose if you're not stocking up though, you may be able to get away with express laning it more often than I do.

Pretty much every time, yeah. I stop at the grocery store on my way home too.
Post reply on HN