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

Lime and Bird are growing rapidly

futureengine.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

81–90 of 488 posts

Re: Lime and Bird are growing rapidly

#81

Post by bllguo »

dboon wrote: post #43
dvt wrote: post #28

I cannot stand the Limes and Birds around Santa Monica. I walk out of my apartment, and the streets are littered with them. It's annoying when walking, it's even more annoying when jogging, and riders are constantly riding them (without helmets) on sidewalks even though we have bike lanes. They're even a nuisance when driving. I'm hoping for some legislation that will ban them -- I might set up a grassroots campaign…

I was actually in Santa Monica / Venice area for the first time a few weeks ago. I was /floored/ with how many scooters there were. I live in Atlanta and find them to be super awesome and unintrusive, but I could understand how the sheer quantity could put you off of them. At least realize that they aren't so ridiculously overpopulated in other places -- it's probably the tourists that make it financially worth it to…

I know bird is hq'ed in santa monica, so that would partly explain the numbers

Re: Lime and Bird are growing rapidly

#82

Post by briandear »

hocuspocus wrote: post #23
askaboutit wrote: post #7

Stand up scooters feel so unstable. Why not just add a seat and allow a seated scooter that’s foldable. The problem with last mile transport is that the laws in many countries need electric bikes to have peddles and peddle assistance. Just let people have a certain power and max speed and they will drop the car and replace it with a powered scooter. Aka, China.

*Pedal. Some EU countries have already announced that scooters will soon be treated similarly to e-bikes, i.e. max 250W and 25km/h for the ones that don't need registration and plates. While more expensive and less portable, a bike is a lot safer and more versatile.

A bike is safer? Definitely need some citations for that. Versatility is debatable. I can fold my scooter and put it under my table at a restaurant or toss it into the trunk of a car. Scooters are also extremely low maintenance: no flat tires, no need to carry a pump or patch kit.

Re: Lime and Bird are growing rapidly

#83

Post by ip26 »

vinceguidry wrote: post #40
hocuspocus wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

*Pedal. Some EU countries have already announced that scooters will soon be treated similarly to e-bikes, i.e. max 250W and 25km/h for the ones that don't need registration and plates. While more expensive and less portable, a bike is a lot safer and more versatile.

I feel far less safe on a bicycle than I ever do on a Bird/Lime-style scooter. Main reason is I can go a lot slower, bicycles have to maintain a certain amount of inertia and that seriously affects riding habits. If I'm coming up on an intersection I can slow down a lot but if I'm riding a bike, I'm incentivized to blow through. With a scooter, I can go at a safe speed around pedestrians on sidewalks and stop abruptl…

Bikes handle a lot better at speed & tend to have better brakes. Of course, if your speed is low, that doesn't matter.

Re: Lime and Bird are growing rapidly

#84

Post by e40 »

cortesoft wrote: post #68
fourmii wrote: post #50

These scooters and scooter companies seem pretty divisive, especially on HN. I understand they're operating in grey areas, I guess kinda like Uber before them, but they are causing (I think) positive disruption. I personally love these scooters. I'm living in Australia now where we don't have them. But last month I took a 3 week road trip from LAX to DC and back so I could hit cities I hadn't been to before. And in m…

I think the big issue that most people have with them is the large externality of having scooters littered around the sidewalk. In a lot of places in West Los Angeles, you are having to step around them constantly if you walk down the street. People literally just drop them in the middle of the sidewalk, because there is no incentive for them to not do that. This means that everyone who doesn't use the service has to…

I don't so much mind them littering the sidewalk as them being ridden on the sidewalk. They are extremely dangerous for pedestrians. Should I step around that dog poop, I might be hit by a scooter coming up from behind me. I have had close a dozen close calls when I was walking in a straight line. I walk 4 miles/day on sidewalks with these things.

Re: Lime and Bird are growing rapidly

#85

Post by skksjsnaahs »

vinceguidry wrote: post #40
hocuspocus wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

*Pedal. Some EU countries have already announced that scooters will soon be treated similarly to e-bikes, i.e. max 250W and 25km/h for the ones that don't need registration and plates. While more expensive and less portable, a bike is a lot safer and more versatile.

I feel far less safe on a bicycle than I ever do on a Bird/Lime-style scooter. Main reason is I can go a lot slower, bicycles have to maintain a certain amount of inertia and that seriously affects riding habits. If I'm coming up on an intersection I can slow down a lot but if I'm riding a bike, I'm incentivized to blow through. With a scooter, I can go at a safe speed around pedestrians on sidewalks and stop abruptl…

I understand it sucks to stop at a stop light on an analog bike, but why on an ebike? You get help starting up again, like an escooter.

Re: Lime and Bird are growing rapidly

#86

Post by jjxw »

whymsicalburito wrote: post #70
cortesoft wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bit of a selection bias... you are much more likely to notice the ones that are in the same spot day after day, and not notice the once that are in constant use. This is the average revenue, I am sure there are some that generate a lot less/barely any.

Even with some of them being in constant use, the math still doesn't work out.

Pricing for Bird looks like $1 to unlock and $.15 / minute to ride. I think it's not unrealistic to see utilization of at least 5 rides per day for $5 of revenue + average of 15 minutes per ride for the other $11 to get to $16 / day.

It's likely that there's a few that are much more highly utilized to balance out those that are not utilized at all.

Re: Lime and Bird are growing rapidly

#87

Post by L_Rahman »

cortesoft wrote: post #68
fourmii wrote: post #50

These scooters and scooter companies seem pretty divisive, especially on HN. I understand they're operating in grey areas, I guess kinda like Uber before them, but they are causing (I think) positive disruption. I personally love these scooters. I'm living in Australia now where we don't have them. But last month I took a 3 week road trip from LAX to DC and back so I could hit cities I hadn't been to before. And in m…

I think the big issue that most people have with them is the large externality of having scooters littered around the sidewalk. In a lot of places in West Los Angeles, you are having to step around them constantly if you walk down the street. People literally just drop them in the middle of the sidewalk, because there is no incentive for them to not do that. This means that everyone who doesn't use the service has to…

Functionally this is the easiest problem in the world to solve. It's the same solution for scooters and dockless bikeshare.

Take two parking spots in each block. Put beacons on the corners or some kind of signaling tape around the whole thing. Only let users drop off rides inside that spot. Bonus points for having non-locking racks to help organize.

People get to litter their car on the side of my road, often in the bike lane for free and everyone walks around like it's okay. It's not. Neither are the scooters on the sidewalk. We know how to solve both problems. Parking spots for dockless transit and banning cars from transit and pedestrian rich neighborhoods.

[edit] I removed a line saying I was annoyed that people kept complaining the scooter parking situation. Those complaints point out a very real problem with scooter deployments and that we have a solution for it that is difficult to get passed doesn't make the complaint less valid.

Re: Lime and Bird are growing rapidly

#88

Post by bb2018 »

fourmii wrote: post #50

These scooters and scooter companies seem pretty divisive, especially on HN. I understand they're operating in grey areas, I guess kinda like Uber before them, but they are causing (I think) positive disruption. I personally love these scooters. I'm living in Australia now where we don't have them. But last month I took a 3 week road trip from LAX to DC and back so I could hit cities I hadn't been to before. And in m…

I could not be more upset that people who have stated progressive goals such as cutting down on fuel and providing cheap public transportation are against these. They are an absolutely great alternative that makes these goals possible without having to completely overhaul city designs. The only externality really seems to be they are parked in random places - but I don't see how that is any different than cars parked on streets which are actually much more disruptive. Now more people can get to work or do errands cheaply without the need for a huge car or spending extra time with consolidated public transporation.

Re: Lime and Bird are growing rapidly

#89

Post by foob »

cortesoft wrote: post #68
fourmii wrote: post #50

These scooters and scooter companies seem pretty divisive, especially on HN. I understand they're operating in grey areas, I guess kinda like Uber before them, but they are causing (I think) positive disruption. I personally love these scooters. I'm living in Australia now where we don't have them. But last month I took a 3 week road trip from LAX to DC and back so I could hit cities I hadn't been to before. And in m…

I think the big issue that most people have with them is the large externality of having scooters littered around the sidewalk. In a lot of places in West Los Angeles, you are having to step around them constantly if you walk down the street. People literally just drop them in the middle of the sidewalk, because there is no incentive for them to not do that. This means that everyone who doesn't use the service has to…

Yeah, I think this is a fair assessment. Companies like Citibike and Zipcar provide similar benefits, but they do so by isolating their pickups to designated areas where they presumably have approval to operate. These scooter companies use the sidewalk like they own it, and that's pretty obnoxious if you want to use a sidewalk for walking. The big complaint that most people have isn't that scooters are displacing driving, it's that they're using the sidewalks as free scooter storage and externalizing the cost of that to everyone else.

Re: Lime and Bird are growing rapidly

#90

Post by pfisch »

Uehreka wrote: post #27

I live in Baltimore and these things have been awesome. Over the summer and early fall, I used them a lot for trips that were between 3-15 blocks. They were usually less than half the price of a Lyft, were fun to drive, don't directly use fossil fuels and were usually available (in one app or the other) within a block or two of my house. I used them to meet friends for brunch, to pick up my car from getting worked on…

"don't directly use fossil fuels"

Looks like Maryland uses a significant amount of coal to power their grid, so is this even a good thing?

Post reply on HN