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Was the $5B that VCs plugged into escooters worth it?

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Re: Was the $5B that VCs plugged into escooters worth it?

#51

Post by analognoise »

birdyrooster wrote: post #40
e40 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with that. The problem is people. > 50% of the people I saw using the devices were on the sidewalk. And many of them that I conversed with (in a calm tone) who I told to use the street said "but it's too dangerous out there!" My retort that them being on the sidewalk was too dangerous for me fell on deaf ears.

Just yell at them and make being on the sidewalk more dangerous than the road. I throw shit in front of them or kick them off of their stupid looking scooter. Shows them. They won't try that shit in front of my home again. Best thing is that your jury will never find you guilty because that shit is annoying.

I can't tell if this is sarcasm anymore.

Re: Was the $5B that VCs plugged into escooters worth it?

#52

Post by Mikho »

In reality, scooter sharing should be rather a loss leader for a bigger business to retain customers but it's not viable for it to be an independent business. When the Bird scooter sharing service just emerged, I wrote an article where I calculated and described unit economics of scooter rides based on charging cycles [1]. The business is just not sustainable unless scooters are made like tanks and can sustain heavy damage. They are usually not. Chana's big piles of thrown away rental bikes should have taught us something.

1. https://medium.com/13-notes/unit-economics-of-the-bird-scoot...

Re: Was the $5B that VCs plugged into escooters worth it?

#53

Post by e40 »

yrro wrote: post #21
e40 wrote: post #14

I know two people who were seriously injured on them. One required facial reconstructive surgery and the other had a broken arm. Both happened soon after they became ubiquitous. I also had many close calls as a pedestrian. Some could have been very serious had I not jumped out of the way. Perhaps 5 or so of those. From my perspective they are not worth it.

How fast do they go where you are? In the UK there are various hire schemes trialling their use. Riders must have a driving license and they are limited to 15.5 mph (depending on area, in Oxford for instance they only go up to 12.4 mph). And they are not allowed on pavements, only streets!

I would say about the same (15 mph), but maybe a little faster. The problem with mixing pedestrians and scooters is the former don't have lanes and the amount of momentum a 200 lb person has going 10 or 15 mpg is considerable. The people I saw riding on the sidewalk had no problem zipping through pedestrian traffic.

Re: Was the $5B that VCs plugged into escooters worth it?

#54

Post by taylodl »

e40 wrote: post #19
panick21_ wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They need to be on bicycle infrastructure. That said, if they remove cars from the road they are worth it.

I agree with that. The problem is people. > 50% of the people I saw using the devices were on the sidewalk. And many of them that I conversed with (in a calm tone) who I told to use the street said "but it's too dangerous out there!" My retort that them being on the sidewalk was too dangerous for me fell on deaf ears.

Where I live it's illegal for adults to ride scooters (or bikes) on the sidewalk and thanks to everybody riding scooters on the sidewalk the police have begun enforcing the law. People don't want to ride the scooter in the street with traffic so scooter riding has dropped tremendously.

Re: Was the $5B that VCs plugged into escooters worth it?

#55

Post by rhaway84773 »

e40 wrote: post #19
panick21_ wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They need to be on bicycle infrastructure. That said, if they remove cars from the road they are worth it.

I agree with that. The problem is people. > 50% of the people I saw using the devices were on the sidewalk. And many of them that I conversed with (in a calm tone) who I told to use the street said "but it's too dangerous out there!" My retort that them being on the sidewalk was too dangerous for me fell on deaf ears.

The danger to pedestrians from 20lb scooters is very obviously a small fraction of the danger to scooters from 2ton cars.

But that being said, if there isn’t sufficient bicycle lane infrastructure for the scooters to use then the city in question shouldn’t be allowing scooters in the first place. Neither roads with car traffic nor sidewalks are suitable places for them.

Re: Was the $5B that VCs plugged into escooters worth it?

#56

Post by rhaway84773 »

panick21_ wrote: post #49
em500 wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the Netherlands, the country with maybe the best biking infrastructure in the world, escooters are banned from public roads (including bike lanes), because the authorities consider them too dangerous.

I know that this is the case in Netherlands. I think they are over reacting to those and under-reacting to cars. As long as the speed is sufficiently limited, they not more dangerous then bikes.

eScooters are significantly more dangerous to riders than bikes. They have much smaller tires so they’re far more susceptible to falling because of small imperfections in the roads. They are not as easy to balance as bicycles. They are harder to see. They are harder to control. They are harder to slow down rapidly unlike a bike.

There’s a whole host of fundamental physical reasons why bikes are just much safer.

Re: Was the $5B that VCs plugged into escooters worth it?

#57

Post by panick21_ »

rhaway84773 wrote: post #56
panick21_ wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know that this is the case in Netherlands. I think they are over reacting to those and under-reacting to cars. As long as the speed is sufficiently limited, they not more dangerous then bikes.

eScooters are significantly more dangerous to riders than bikes. They have much smaller tires so they’re far more susceptible to falling because of small imperfections in the roads. They are not as easy to balance as bicycles. They are harder to see. They are harder to control. They are harder to slow down rapidly unlike a bike. There’s a whole host of fundamental physical reasons why bikes are just much safer.

For the rider, but I don't think they are more dangerous to the other people.

Re: Was the $5B that VCs plugged into escooters worth it?

#58

Post by kevviiinn »

uoaei wrote: post #34
nasmorn wrote: post #4

It is just really expensive to ride. I use it sometimes where there are no good public transport options and it is like half a cab fare. I can’t see them maintain a market if they increase prices. Maybe if we had longer lasting batteries they could drop the prices since they would not need to be charged so often. But as it stands it is either a curiosity or replacing something already expensive like a taxi for a smal…

The system makes sense in well-planned (dense, accessible) cities. Most American cities -- indeed, most cities designed primarily after the invention of automobiles -- do not fit this definition. A classic XY problem. The issue is not the cost, it is what the built environment demands.

Why don't you just buy your own scooter?

Re: Was the $5B that VCs plugged into escooters worth it?

#59

Post by kevviiinn »

rhaway84773 wrote: post #55
e40 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with that. The problem is people. > 50% of the people I saw using the devices were on the sidewalk. And many of them that I conversed with (in a calm tone) who I told to use the street said "but it's too dangerous out there!" My retort that them being on the sidewalk was too dangerous for me fell on deaf ears.

The danger to pedestrians from 20lb scooters is very obviously a small fraction of the danger to scooters from 2ton cars. But that being said, if there isn’t sufficient bicycle lane infrastructure for the scooters to use then the city in question shouldn’t be allowing scooters in the first place. Neither roads with car traffic nor sidewalks are suitable places for them.

20lbs scooter + 200lbs human traveling at 20kph

It'll do some serious damage

Re: Was the $5B that VCs plugged into escooters worth it?

#60

Post by Macha »

mc32 wrote: post #24
SilverBirch wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it's just the batteries, the whole economic model makes no sense. First, they're expensive - they need to be built for commercial use, so they're $500+ each. Second, demand is massively inefificent, a hundred thousand people want to travel from the train station to their office in the morning, and then back in the evening. Either you pay someone to keep riding the scooters back to the train station in t…

There is something I don't understand. Why are people throwing these things into the river, so to speak? The more you break these the more units will have to be bought and the more expensive the ride becomes and the more resources "energy" is necessary to keep the system going --which seems ironic since riders are the ones who opt to ride in order to use fewer energy resources to begin with...

I was under the impression that the river throwers were not the riders. Annoyed locals trying to hurt the company, teens looking for tiktoks, etc.
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