Electric scooter “mayhem” sounds like when cars were introduced
qz.com
qz.com
They look fun, they seem more flexible than the hard-wired go-bike stations, and they don't seem super expensive.
It's pretty obvious that our cities are broken, and SF needs help in particular. I've worked at companies that had to choose between being near bart or near caltrain to provide a shorter commute to different employees. The time it took to walk across soma was non-trivial and annoyed people. Ultimately the caltrain commuters used foot-powered scooters.
As for the self righteousness of "only peds belong on sidewalks", I get tired of that. Being in traffic is exceedingly dangerous, and apparently as long as someone else's life on the line you're good with it. If "sidewalks" were a lot larger, then there would be more ability to mix traffic. See: the embarcadero.
Let's work on our cities and have some fun doing it!
But it's a stupid comparison for safety. Colliding with a scooter will rarely be fatal, regardless of the 3x. But cyclist often get killed.
There's a LOT more energy being transferred into whatever the car hits both because it's going much faster and because it's much heavier.
I know its a hard statistic for bikes to swallow. There seems to be no winning for them. But that's my whole point.
Seems fucked up.
The risk of a pedestrian fatality posed by a collision with a car travelling 30kmh is closer to the risk from a car going 5kmh than that of a car going 50kmh.
Look at the chart here:
http://www.victoriawalks.org.au/safe_speed/
The risk from speed is non-linear.
Risk the pedestrians in speed zone greater than 30kmh, because risk of fatal injury is far lower.
Anyway, the pedestrians don't risk either now. So saying "Folks should be comfortable adding a reasonable risk of death, since it could be far worse!" is not compelling.
Nothing self-righteous about that.
Sidewalks are -- as the name itself suggests - meant for WALKING on the SIDE of the road, not for riding scooters and other vehicles which pose a danger to other people walking. Only exception being people on wheelchairs, but they aren't driving at break-neck speeds like an electric scooter rider, or a bicyclist.
We do not have "rads" anymore, we have "roads." "Road" is derived from "rad" but they are two different words with different meanings.
A sidewalk is a walking area on the side of a road, and that meaning of the word has not changed. Bikes, for example, or prohibited from sidewalks in most Western jurisdictions (lack of enforcement notwithstanding), and essentially all Western jurisdictions prohibit motorized vehicles from sidewalks. In both cases, it is because the sidewalks are meant for "pedestrians", i.e., people walking.
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/when-pedestrians-r...
The same "children cycling on the road" argument (which is only dangerous if the cars on the road are going faster than the children) can be applied to children walking on the sidewalk where people cycle at full speed.
2) Cars pose a risk to cyclists, even if cars are going the same speed, which is a fictional scenario, as many motorists don't go the same speed as cyclists and instead overtake them dangerously ASAP.
3) The risk posed by cycles to pedestrians is far less than the danger posed by autos to cycles.
Sidewalks weren't invented to get people off streets, either.
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/when-pedestrians-r...
Now: should our transportation infrastructure support cars? Yes. Society moves on. Should it also support bicycles and low-speed electric vehicles? Also yes.
It's not drivers who say this, but the Law. Ever heard of 'Jaywalking' Tickets?
I strongly disagree with this. I've owned an electric scooter for over a year now and I learned real fast that it's super dangerous to ride on the sidewalk.
The problem with pedestrians is that they are not looking out for scooters. People will wander into your path and depending on how fast you're going you may collide.
Also you can't see people walking out onto the sidewalk from doorways and recessed building entrances and around corners. I see people on those scooters going full speed on sidewalks and if someone happens to suddenly walk out doorway they're getting hit.
When people walk out onthe street they should look both ways for cars before stepping on the road. In my opinion it's ridiculous to expect people to peer out of doorway stoops and look for people on scooters barreling down the sidewalk.
That said, Jesus Christ people. Take out your headphones, put your phone away, and freaking pay attention to your surroundings. People wander around like they're the baby from the Popeye cartoons expecting everything else to miraculously flow around them.
Forget about bikes and scooters, it's rude to other pedestrians who may be walking faster, running, or actually paying attention to what they're doing if you're meandering back and forth across the sidewalk and can't even hear someone say "Excuse me". The sidewalk is for walking, yes, but that doesn't mean it's for the exclusive use of any one individual.
But riding on the sidewalk really does mean that the burden of taking care of pedestrians is all on me. And when I've thought those kinds of thoughts, I have to recognize that it feels very similar to the arguments I hear from motorists when they try and put the burden of safety on cyclists who are legitimately on the roads. If I'm not supposed to be somewhere, it's a bad attitude for me to even start down the road of thought that blames the pedestrians for my treatment of their safety.
Being in a public space necessarily means exercising a degree of care and consideration for other people. From everyone.
No, because the law states that a bike on the road with cars is equal to other vehicles and has no higher priority in regards to right of way.
In contrast, a biker on a sidewalk is not considered equal to a pedestrian. In fact, it is illegal in most cases, but probably not illegal or dangerous enough to warrant strict enforcement.
I consider pedestrians to have just the responsibility of paying attention to their surroundings to not inconvenience other pedestrians, not bikes or scooters.
I feel much safer in an environment where there are clear rules of engagement that are, by and large, respected.
(Anecdote: my most recent crash was with a scooter, the rider of which was very inexperienced in traffic and reacted to a tight spot by doing exactly the opposite of what they teach you in driver's ed. Feel free to guess whether this was on the road or on a bike path...)
In Washington State this depends heavily on municipality and you need to know exactly which cities you're riding through. State law only says that you have the same duties and rights as a driver when on the road, and that you have the same duties and rights as a pedestrian when on the sidewalk. When I rode to work I checked all three of the cities I rode though and they all allowed bicycles on sidewalks.
I generally choose whew to ride based on the density of traffic. If nobody is on the sidewalk and the sidewalk is in good condition I'll ride on the sidewalk.
> I consider pedestrians to have just the responsibility of paying attention to their surroundings
This is what I'm talking about. Many people cannot even be bothered to do that. If you aren't going to take an interest in your own safety, why should anyone else? The sidewalk is not the place to zone out and lose yourself in your Twitter feed.
The thing is, I have more trust in my ability to watch out for pedestrians than I trust drivers to watch out for me.
Fun fact: After I started wearing a reflecting vest when riding my bike, I think drivers have treated me much more considerately. Maybe they are not so bad after all and just did not see me as easily before.
Yeah. I bike on the sidewalk sometimes, but when I do I consider it 100% my responsibility to avoid pedestrians. They're not expecting me and they have no reason to look out for me; it's my job to go slow, watch entrances, and not scare people by blowing past 6 inches away from them.
I bike on the road. I expect cars to look out for me. Nonetheless, I take measures to make it easy for them to do that. I wear reflective gear and have lights at night. I bike in an easily visible space. I signal where I'm going and move in a consistent, predictable manner.
There's absolutely no reason that someone on a sidewalk shouldn't expect that another person, whether walking or on a bike, might also need to use the sidewalk and to leave space for them to do so, or at a bare minimum, maintain a modicum of awareness so that you can see or hear someone else approaching.
You expect cars to look out for bicycle, and should yourself look out for pedestrians.
I live in Copenhagen, on a road that's a pedestrian zone shopping street. It is absolutely unreasonable to expect pedestrians to look out for cyclists - I'm in their space! So on the last 100m of my journey home, I must cycle at half speed or even walking speed, depending how busy it is.
If cyclists stopped being careful, cycling through the pedestrian zone would eventually get banned, like it is in Britain. (Or else enforced, I don't know if its already banned.)
Because you're on a road. If you don't do those things, you may die. Pedestrians don't expect to get hit by vehicles on the sidewalk to the same degree. I'm a fast walker, I somewhat know your pain, but you're not entitled to tell people how to walk around, unless it's putting other pedestrians in danger.
Is cycling on the sidewalk legal in your location? It isn't in most places, as far as I know.
Besides the point isn't that cyclists in these spaces shouldn't have to look out for pedestrians, it's that pedestrians make it hard even for other pedestrians to navigate and that perhaps an inequitable share of responsibility for observing one's surroundings exists.
Most of my walking is near store fronts and it is exceedingly dangerous to blow by open doors at the clip I see these cyclists doing. It is so frustrating to me to watch this.
Pedestrians aren't going to change, they never have and it's just silly to assume they will. That's why I'm a tedious vehicular cyclist. Road is best, fastest, safest, and least infuriating.
I guess I'd have to be a vehicular scoot. Vrimmm!
It now kinda freaks me out to be back in the US... realizing that everyone involved in traffic has their own assumptions of what is supposed/going to happen and won't necessarily be looking around all the time at what's actually going on, and I have to guess and premeditate that for everyone.
It's not a big problems when density is small and there is only one significant traffic element (cars) that's relatively predictable, but if the US is going to scale it's cities they're going to have to figure out how to deal with how to increase traffic density, and it doesn't seem very feasible to add more car roads and sidewalks in metropolitan areas (let's not touch on subways for the moment because that's what communism or Euro-effeminism or just too damn hard or whatever).
It's pretty easy to fit more people on those streets, all ya have to do is:
1. Slow down 2. Look around 3. Take a bit of the chip off the shoulders
Which I feel like all pretty much fly in the face of everything back-to-back World War champions cherish (and great prospects for this upcoming season!).
But I think the point of the article was "look both ways before you cross the street" was total bullshit when it was introduced... and now it's dogma. I don't necessarily wish metropolitan progress and growth on Americans, but I guess I kinda secretly hope for it.
If you are riding a bicycle on the footpath and hit a pedestrian, it is your fault and you are going to be on the hook for a large amount of money. It's the same if cars hit a cyclist or pedestrian.
It's arbitrary but it also makes it safe to cycle because cars are vigilant to not hit pedestrians (contrast with western countries, my experience is in NZ where car drivers bully cyclists)
Parent said that cyclists who hit pedestrians are automatically liable, then turned around and called bicycling "safe." That's a bizarre interpretation - with that law, Japan is messaging that Japanese people ought to stay far, far away from bicycling unless they have particularly extreme appetite for risk.
To answer your question, modern cities need some method of transportation faster than walking. At speed, injuring the pedestrians who get in your way is an inevitability. Either you have a tax on the unlucky (and unable to afford real estate in the pedestrian core), or you give at least one such method immunity. In Japan, that method is trains. Japan takes the pedestrian victim-blaming even further than necessary in this case, and bills their families for the cleanup costs.
Found this: https://www.cycling-embassy.org.uk/wiki/dutch-cycle-because-...
It is compulsory in some places in Japan. ¥4,000 ($40) per year pays out up to 3 billion yen ($3,000,000) in case you hit someone.
As they should be everywhere. What seems crazy, though, is the belief that every collision is necessarily an instance of a poor driver committing poor driving, with no reference to how a reasonable person would have handled the situation differently.
Well, that's the point. You are supposed to be riding or driving at a speed that you can safely stop if you need to. This is the same in every country, right?
> Japan is messaging that Japanese people ought to stay far, far away from bicycling unless they have particularly extreme appetite for risk.
Bicycling to work or school is very common here
> Japan takes the pedestrian victim-blaming even further than necessary in this case, and bills their families for the cleanup costs.
They sue for damages because they have to arrange buses for tens of thousands of people. It's not cheap
If you're on a 45mph road and someone puts themselves in your path 10 feet ahead, no, we don't say that you should have actually been going 5mph just in case something like this was going to happen. You're required to yield at crosswalks, but there's an expectation that mutual acknowledgement between you and the pedestrian happens at a reasonable distance before the pedestrian enters the roadway. Similarly, if someone enters an intersection on red, you have a duty to try and avoid the crash, but if it's too late, that's on them.
This is why roads should be designed not to cause such a situation. If you have a pedestrian path really close to a 45mph road the design is bad. I'm not aware of anywhere having such a high speed road where a pedestrian could walk along side it (in Netherlands). Usually it's more closed off with pedestrians being banned.
Solution: _don't cycle on the bloody footpath_; that's not what it's for. Cycle in bike lanes, or, if unavailable, the road.
Which one are you saying should be responsible here?
This change prevented loads of accidents. Before if a cyclist did something wrong the general thought was "cyclist should've paid attention". But an accident is caused by 2 people, so it makes sense that the one who can cause the most damage is fully aware of that.
Liable? That's why cars have mandatory insurance. The amount of damage which can be done is way higher than e.g. 2 cyclists hitting each other.
That's a pretty crucial distinction from strict liability, and is much closer to what we have in the US (at least on paper, you have a duty to avert a collision if you can, regardless of right of way).
Unless you mean the most trivial sense of "you could have avoided the accident by not driving."
"Needs to watch out for" is quite different from "is always at fault if it collides with."
I don't understand your comment of "strict liability" btw. It's not black/white situation. However, in general they rule against the car. As result, people on bicycles abuse this (especially in Amsterdam). But there's the benefit of a super huge bicycle usage, so although it's not perfect, it seems worth it.
The individual you are replying to was saying that comments here made it sound like strict liability for drivers and cyclists. That even if you were driving as carefully as possible, if a cyclist suddenly appears from behind a bush and cuts exactly in front of your car while you were doing 80 km an hour and you did everything humanly possible to stop and avoid him, you would still be at fault. He's saying later comments seem to suggest otherwise.
The solution is consideration and attentiveness from pedestrians, people riding scooters, and people riding bikes.
If I ride my bike on the street, I pay attention to the rules of the road as well as possible dangers. These include cars ignoring the right of way, pedestrians walking onto the street suddenly between parked cars, and people opening car doors.
If I ride my bike on the sidewalk, I ride slower, and am attentive to people walking unpredictably, coming out of doorways, or coming around corners full speed.
I would like for pedestrians to behave more responsibly, both on the sidewalk and on the street. I am doing my part. No one is "king of the road/sidewalk". You can't put all the blame on any on party. Everyone needs to adjust their behavior for a safe society.
What speed do you travel at? Max, average, and typical speeds?
In fact, for example in Paris (where I live), there is a lot of dedicated lines for bikes, and there are also dedicated bus lanes that bikes can take. When I commute by bike, I think only 1/3 of the road is actually in the main traffic.
Also as a pedestrian, bikes and scooters are a bit of a nightmare. Personally I instinctively rely on hearing when crossing a street, and because bike and electric scooter move silently it's not difficult to miss them, specially as there are also smaller than cars, so also more difficult to see.
As someone who uses electric skateboards and scooters fairly regularly, I disagree. Bicycle lanes are the most appropriate place for them.
Supposedly Steve Jobs predicted the Segway would cause cities to be "redesigned". He was wrong, but I don't think he was far off. The rising popularity of light electric vehicles may actually prompt cities to build more bike lanes to accommodate them.
"The number of pedestrians fatally or seriously injured in collisions with cyclists has doubled since 2006"
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/10/07/number-pedestria...
In 2016 three pedestrians died in such incidents across Great Britain while a further 108 sustained serious injury.
But note, none of these deaths occurred on the pavement:
In 2016, 43 pedestrians died in collisions involving a vehicle on the footway or verge. None of them involved a cycle.
-- https://www.cyclinguk.org/campaigning/views-and-briefings/pe...
So the city passed a new law last year to start transitioning them back to the road.
There's a great YouTube channel, BicycleDutch [1], that goes into some detail about the Dutch approach to thoroughfares. They almost always build three spaces: a road for cars, a path for bicycles, and a sidewalk for pedestrians. This results in a huge number of people using bicycles to get around; in Amsterdam 30% of people always commute with a bicycle and over 40% usually do.
Of course, it generally wouldn't be practical for an American city to just convert all its roads to also include a separated bike path. Instead they could look for areas where a bike path could be built without costing too much, drawing political ire, or significantly interfering with current use. Railroad tracks are good opportunities. As an example, Minneapolis converted an unused railroad corridor to a separated bike path, called the Midtown Greenway [2]. As of 2016 34,000+ people used it daily [3]. Portland, OR, has converted two former railways into bike paths, the Springwater Corridor trail [4] and the new Trolley Trail [5]. We have plenty of other separated paths here as well.
Where there just isn't enough horizontal space, a more radical approach would be to build an elevated bike path over a few major thoroughfares (i.e. main downtown streets) or freeways that connect commuters to other separated or multi-use paths. Xiamen, China, built an elevated cycle path -- really more of a bicycle highway -- last year [6]. Dallas [7], Phoenix [8], and Detroit [9] have all built parks over freeways that contain some mixed-use paths, though not always with transportation in mind.
Ultimately bicycles/scooters/etc. don't really fit well into the current American infrastructure, but it seems like a solvable problem.
1: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC67YlPrRvsO117gFDM7UePg
2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midtown_Greenway
3: http://www.minneapolismn.gov/www/groups/public/@publicworks/...
4: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Springwater_Corridor
5: https://ncprd.com/parks/trolley-trail
6: https://www.mnn.com/green-tech/transportation/blogs/china-cy...
7: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Klyde_Warren_Park
Makes sense.
Bicycles and scooters being driven on sidewalks tend to not do that.
It's worth remembering that peds (otherwise known as "people") used to be able to roam the street freely. Can't find the source now (at work) but in the 1920's a judge in New York bemoaned the then-ridiculous idea that cars would mean children could no longer play in the street, which of course they had every right to do.
If people have bicycles or scooters on sidewalks, they should be walking them, not riding.
It should be pretty clear that both car lanes and pedestrian paths are both unsafe for scooters.
Add a bike path, just like e.g. The Netherlands, Denmark, etc. The bike path is generally designed for up to 25-30km/h. Certain scooters and electric bikes may go above that. In Netherlands scooters and electric bikes are divided into 2, ones which can reach up to 25km/h and ones which can reach up to 45km/h (above is not allowed). This with different regulation for each.
There might be a case for adding yet another special path, e.g. scooter path for traffic up to 45km/h.
Way more people can travel around on a bike path than a car lane (occupies more space while often just having 1 person).
If you ride your scooter capable for going 50km/hr that fast on a road in a 30km/hr zone, you are speeding. Perhaps the same should be true if you are riding your scooter too fast in a bike lane. It should definitely be true if you are riding your bike or scooter on a sidewalk too fast or recklessly.
How fast is too fast remains to be seen.
For a typical residential street, it’s 2/3: two lanes of traffic, two lanes for parking, vs two sidewalks. All are about the same width.
That primacy of the car is what needs to change. Autonomous driving could go a long way, by allowing offside parking and increased utilization of shared cars. But even before, just inconveniencing drivers by eliminating one lane of parking would open up enough space to accommodate safe bike and scooter lanes.
Next up is the wasteland of endless parking lots the US is so fond of, and that unnecessarily decreases density to maybe a third of what’s easily possible. But it’ll take far more time to heal that particular hellscape.
Ever see an elderly pedestrian get plowed into by some 200 lb kid on a skateboard?
I used to live near and work on Mill Ave. in Tempe near ASU, which is a very congested pedestrian strip. It's also full of maniacs on bikes, scooters, and skateboards weaving in and around pedestrians at full speed, coming within inches the whole time. One false move and you'd get plowed.
Like speed with like speed, I say.
Compared to my previous city (Paris), transportation in SF is shockingly poor.
That was actually a big surprise to me. It is so much easier to plan a city built recently compared to old Europe where you have a mess of old tiny roads you can't get rid of.
So I would have expected my SF commute to be easier than my Parisian one was.
However, Paris has a great subway infrastructure (and public transportation in general) that SF sorely lack.
Everything is centered around a car-first infrastructure which has failed to scale in order to accommodate the current traffic.
I don't want to own a car and even less to commute with one.
I have done it for a couple of years, that's x minutes every day where I can't do much and have to stay focused on the road.
Subway/walking commute on the contrary are often pleasant and let me listen to podcasts and read articles (pocket is great for this).
In the end, I bought a boosted board, it is a great commute shortener.
The biggest downside is that it is pretty hard to maneuver a longboard on the very poor SF streets. Some are in great shape, but most of them around SOMA are pretty bad when you use a skate.
It would be easier if my skate had bigger wheels, like scooters have.
It looks like a great alternative, I would love to see more of these on US streets.
PS.: I think it would be hard to share the sidewalk though. Unless it is very large, like on the embarcadero, there it is not an issue.
The problem with sharing the sidewalk is that the usual eskate/scooter speed is way too fast to share the sidewalk. Sooner or later somebody will exit a building just as you pass by and you are both going to get hurt.
We either need extra large sidewalks with a space reserved to small vehicles; or streets with protected bike lanes.
Streets without a bike lane are also pretty dangerous on this kind of vehicle. I am always on my guard : if I fall, I fall in the middle of the traffic.
Also, bike lanes are poorly engineered for scooter and especially skates. They have tiny wheels compared to bikes. So you have to avoid potholes, manholes, and all kind of obstacles. Even the paint of the bike lane is an obstacle; it is often very slippery.
Some better civil engineering is needed here.
some before and after in the netherlands https://twitter.com/schlijper/status/987269913311137797
I do like roads a bit, when it's where kids can play and also have some cars at times. But the green/bike version has a lot to offer. It's relaxing just by looking at it.
These vehicles have far fewer negative externalities than cars. People don't die when they get hit by scooters and bikes. We can charge them with renewable energy. They don't take space from pedestrians as cars do.
These are a huge clear good for cities. (And yes, people should gtfo the sidewalk, companies should educate as such, and there should be tickets for people who make others less safe.)
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.citylab.com/amp/article/381...
"The recent death of Jill Tarlov, a pedestrian killed by a bicyclist in New York’s Central Park —the second such incident in two months—engendered a flurry of commentary and analysis of the dangers of cyclists determined to train for speed in one of the city’s most crowded recreational havens."
It goes on to discuss that most deaths are due to head injuries.
I've seen quite a few riders ride them on the sidewalks and 1 person even ran into a dude on a wheelchair who was trying to get onto the sidewalk after crossing the road on his wheelchair.
The last safe place for Pedestrians and disabled persons -- the Sidewalk -- is under attack.
The startups that have created this nuisance also park these scooters on the sidewalk, and it routinely blocks disabled people on wheelchairs from travelling safely on the sidewalk.
Everyone is looking down at their phones. If they aren't, it seems like a large amount of SF residents don't know how to walk on sidewalks appropriately (stick to one side of the road when someone is coming the other way, don't walk 6 abreast, etc.).
I have seen so many people bump into each other and get into accidents simply walking. I wouldn't mind scooters on the sidewalk because then people will actually be forced to be aware, instead of walking around like mindless zombies staring at their phone and bumping into poles
"Petextrians" bumping into each other isn't anywhere near as dangerous as motorists with easy access to heavy vehicles driving near sidewalks.
They could easily take half the cars off the road and transform downtown.
They're more convenient and a fraction of the cost of an uber, and they're fun to ride.
People should not be riding them on the sidewalks, i'm expecting that to change quickly.
They are indeed fun to ride but with the Uber's subsidized price, Uber still ends up being cheaper for a commute within the city. Especially with pool.
CA Law: "An operator of a motorized scooter must be at least 16 years old, possess a valid drivers license or instruction permit, and wear a helmet.
A motorized scooter may be operated on a bicycle path, trail or bikeway, but not on a sidewalk. On the roadway, it must be operated in the bicycle lane, if there is one. On roads without bicycle lanes, motorized scooters may operate where the speed limit is 25 mph or less, and shall be ridden as close to the right hand curb as possible, except to pass or turn left."
If someone rents a car and then parks it on the sidewalk, the renter (not the rental company) gets the ticket.
Why should scooters be different? If scooters start getting tickets for being parked in stupid places, then those tickets will get passed on to the riders, and they will stop it. If riders get tickets for riding on the sidewalk, they will stop it. Etc.
The existing laws are sufficient to cover this situation, they just need to be enforced.
CODE TEXT
VEHICLE CODE - VEH
DIVISION 11. RULES OF THE ROAD [21000 - 23336] ( Division 11 enacted by Stats. 1959, Ch. 3. )
CHAPTER 1. Obedience to and Effect of Traffic Laws [21000 - 21296] ( Chapter 1 enacted by Stats.
1959, Ch. 3. )
ARTICLE 4. Operation of Bicycles [21200 - 21213] ( Article 4 added by Stats. 1963, Ch. 479. )
21202.
(a) Any person operating a bicycle upon a roadway at a speed less than the normal speed of
traffic moving in the same direction at that time shall ride as close as practicable to the
right-hand curb or edge of the roadway except under any of the following situations:
(1) When overtaking and passing another bicycle or vehicle proceeding in the same direction.
(2) When preparing for a left turn at an intersection or into a private road or driveway.
(3) When reasonably necessary to avoid conditions (including, but not limited to, fixed or moving
objects, vehicles, bicycles, pedestrians, animals, surface hazards, or substandard width lanes)
that make it unsafe to continue along the right-hand curb or edge, subject to the provisions of
Section 21656. For purposes of this section, a “substandard width lane” is a lane that is too
narrow for a bicycle and a vehicle to travel safely side by side within the lane.
(4) When approaching a place where a right turn is authorized.
(b) Any person operating a bicycle upon a roadway of a highway, which highway carries traffic in
one direction only and has two or more marked traffic lanes, may ride as near the left-hand curb
or edge of that roadway as practicable.
(Amended by Stats. 1996, Ch. 674, Sec. 4. Effective January 1, 1997.)
A motorized scooter is a two-wheeled device that has handlebars, a floorboard designed to be
stood upon when riding, and is powered by a motor.
The Vehicle Code (VC) does not require registration, license plates to be displayed or the
scooter to be insured. Local authorities can regulate the registration for these scooters
pursuant to VC §21225.
Even though insurance is not required, owners of these scooters should contact their insurance
company to determine if coverage is available.
An operator of a motorized scooter must be at least 16 years old, possess a valid drivers
license or instruction permit, and wear a helmet.
A motorized scooter may be operated on a bicycle path, trail or bikeway, but not on a sidewalk.
On the roadway, it must be operated in the bicycle lane, if there is one. On roads without
bicycle lanes, motorized scooters may operate where the speed limit is 25 mph or less, and shall
be ridden as close to the right hand curb as possible, except to pass or turn left. VC § 21226
(D) prohibits alteration of motorized scooters.Why don't we have similar helmet laws for drivers and pedestrians?
The scooters are much needed, obviously. But, as usual, the media and city are crying about it and all you read in the news is "scooter mayhem" like this is the scooter apocalypse. Find something else to write and worry about, Jesus.
This is another case of Silicon Valley looking at using more tech to solve a societal and political problem. However, unlike Tesla/Uber/Waymo et al, it's a little more grounded.
Imagine if real self locking bicycles were somehow theft proof and private citizens started putting their bicycles willy nilly everywhere. That is the only new issue that is generated by these companies, and creating more parking for bikes and other low speed vehicles is the eventual solution.
The fact that these dockless bike companies have effectively created the 'theft proof' bike is pretty amazing on it's own.
Bicycles can be parted out if they're expensive, or re-sold on Craigslist very easily. Many less people are in the market for these things, so it's probably just not worth the risk + small expected profits to steal them.
It's not real theft & vandalism-proof, but it effectively is.
Someone with a car can kill 10 people and himself-herself.
Someone with scooter will most likely die in an impact with most vehicles. It is most likely someone can break a leg, than have thousand deaths per year. But hey, humanity has proven common sense wrong befoe.
I could care less if they want to ride in the street without a helmet. Good luck with that.
But yes, arseholes are arseholes wherever they might be. It's not limited to people on smaller lower-powered wheels.
On a sidewalk, a safe stopping distance is about 1 meter. Because of the small angle, safe speed for scooters and skateboards is about the same as walking.
Also, the small non-pneumatic wheels are easily stopped by cracks and small objects.
They are far less safe than bicycles, which are excluded from sidewalks, and riding them on roads with vehicle traffic is suicidal. I guarantee that this will be born out by accident data soon.
I’ve spent years of my life on the road by my own power, and I am certain that I would be dead many times over if I were on a scooter instead of a bicycle.
When the streets of SF are wide open because the cars got kicked out, ride whatever you want. Until then, ride a bike. Ride a big long frame with steel-spoked wheels. E-bike if you must, and don’t mind me trying to keep up with you with an aging meat motor.
The safe stopping distance depends on your line of sight around corners - if you're riding far enough from entrances and exits, at an appropriate pace, the stopping distance can be either greater or smaller provided you anticipate enough.
> Also, the small non-pneumatic wheels are easily stopped by cracks and small objects.
But much less so than normal kick scooters or skateboards. Skateboards are a worse in that regard, and scooters much better with the wheels being larger and in-line.
> They are far less safe than bicycles, which are excluded from sidewalks, and riding them on roads with vehicle traffic is suicidal. I guarantee that this will be born out by accident data soon.
It depends on whether you take them on a daredevil mountain descent at peak hour or not. If you want to look at the data, you might realise that while sidewalk riding in San Francisco is prohibited (but not well enforced, perhaps because police have better priorities), it is permitted in the states north, Oregon and Washington State. It's also permitted in many places around Australia - in fact, often times, where a shared path ends and a footpath begins is a blurred line. Where sidewalk/footpath riding is permitted, cyclists are largely as safe around pedestrians whether the pedestrian is on the footpath or the road.
> I’ve spent years of my life on the road by my own power, and I am certain that I would be dead many times over if I were on a scooter instead of a bicycle.
Many times over, only if you don't learn from the first instance. Not everyone proceeds forth with the same unchanged attitude after their first early mishap.
> When the streets of SF are wide open because the cars got kicked out, ride whatever you want. Until then, ride a bike. Ride a big long frame with steel-spoked wheels. E-bike if you must, and don’t mind me trying to keep up with you with an aging meat motor.
The best way to encourage rider uptake is to build the appropriate balanced infrastructure - that will mean taking away "free" on-stree car parking spaces along with other measures. America's experiment with "vehicular cycling" has long failed and people are simpy no longer riding, but instead spending more time on the sofas and chairs. That's the greatest health burden right now going forward.
The electric scooters are a symptom of a larger problem, not the cause.
But am I the only one that has a problem with the complete hubris shown by these companies. Raise $100M, buy thousands of $500 Chinese scooters, drop them on the city sidewalks and hope everyone just deals with it.
Why can you disrupt life in a city just because you have a lot of VC money? What about when all the competitors come and we're drowning in low quality scooters?
And let's not kid ourselves that these scooters will even remain loved. Right now they're unsustainability cheap and vulnerable. Bird and Spin are undoubtedly bleeding money. When they come back and triple the prices and change the model we'll see we've sold our sidewalks for nothing.
I bought an electric scooter for $300 (Segway ES1). It costs near nothing to charge.
These scooters make back their money in a mere 40 hours of use. A 1 week car rental would have to cost $35,000 to have the same profit margin.
While they don't blink at the costs of car registration, fuel and maintenance cost (not to mention initial outlay), a few hundred dollars on a bicycle or scooter is seen as quite a leap of faith because they're unsure about whether they can adapt to fit it into their lives.
Anglophone societies are very blinkered into thinking that car is king.
1) ride in the street, not on the sidewalk. The only thing that should be on sidewalks are people walking and wheelchairs (disabled people walking). 2) park it next to an area where people expect bikes to be parked, like a bike rack or parking meter or street post. but not next to a fire hydrant, someone's home/garage, in the middle of the walkway, etc. I've seen all three of those.
If you don’t know about the terror of cars being introduced this 99pi episode is pretty good.
https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/episode-76-the-modern...
The proliferation of private automobiles is a net negative for the world, so if these scooters displace (i.e. take away space from) cars, they're good. If they displace, hassle or inconvenience pedestrians or cyclists in any way, they're bad.
I don't hold out a lot of hope for them to change the world per se. I mean sheeeit, people trying to ride bikes at 15mph (which were the original reason for paving roads, no less) have been fighting for a space that's not filled with 40mph cars or 3mph walkers for years and getting mostly nowhere. To properly integrate scooters you would need basically a two-lane bike lane - one lane for bikes (10-25mph) and one for scooters (less than that, I assume). In a lot of places the automotive demographic has such a stranglehold on the polity, we can't even get a one-lane bike lane.
The only way it would work is if they end up being ragingly popular... like maybe if something like 1/3 to 1/2 of all trips started being done by scooter, that would get the attention of the scooter-lane-planners. Though there is still the problem of "where does the capital come from?" when every municipality is seemingly always broke ever since 2008...
For stability reasons the sweet spot is about 10-15mph, which is the speed of a typical bicycle rider. Bike riders should see them as allies in getting better bike infrastructure, because they are pretty much equivalent.
The truth is that on a miles-travelled basis, early gains were greatest, followed by a remarkably steady rate of halved risk roughly every 20 years, starting around 1925 and continuing to present.
The chart below begins in 1921. I recall one I'd found previously dating to ~1910 showing an even more pronounced early decline, halving in ten years, before the 20-year trend was established.
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_otfwl2zc6Qc/TIp8lXB5h2I/AAAAAAAAOW...
A lesson on seeveral grouds: perception/impressions vs. reality, the power of gradual improvement, diminishing returns, underappreciated early gains, and the power of standardisation, regulation, and liability.
Which may also relate to the scooter debate.
It's another tragedy of the common.
BTW "sidewalks" are also known as "footpaths" and "roads" as "carriageways" in countries that speak British English.
> But cities are moving quicker this time. Austin and San Francisco have seized dozens of them. San Francisco has sent a cease and desist letter (paywall) to one company decrying the scooters as a “public nuisance” and “endangering public health and safety.”
Good. It's a shame that we weren't able to do the same with cars before they ruined North American cities.
A parked car doesn't suddenly get spooked and lash out with its hooves does it.
The banana skin (and the inevitable slip that followed) was a euphemism for slipping on horse manure in the street.
1. https://www.citylab.com/transportation/2012/04/invention-jay...
2. https://usa.streetsblog.org/2017/09/11/where-jaywalking-is-n...
3. https://www.mnn.com/green-tech/transportation/blogs/on-a-sus...
~~~
Hello,
My name is Nate Matherson, and my company runs The Student Loan Report.
We created The Student Loan Report in 2016 as a source for news on the student loan industry, financial aid, and scholarships. At the time, we were building a marketplace for student loans, LendEDU, and felt we could contribute to the conversation. Especially because each of us had deep and personal experience finding student loans from trustworthy lenders. Personally, I graduated from college with over $50,000 in student loan debt. Today, I am still working to repay the majority of that debt.
As we prepared to launch The Student Loan Report, we debated who should author it, and felt that it was really a blend of our personal experiences and perspectives that would create the best source material, so we created a pen name of “Drew Cloud,” and conceived a background that we felt personified a lot of the perseverance we hoped to inspire with The Student Loan Report. When we pictured what Drew Cloud looked like, we pictured a friend of ours from college, so we used his photo (with his permission) to round out the pen name.
We used this character of “Drew Cloud” as the primary author of the site -- a shared pen name through which we could share experiences and information related to the challenges college students face while funding their education. There were also other pen names used to publish content on the site. The thoughts, stories, and opinions come from the actual experiences of our team. We have always held ourselves to high standards of content quality -- all of the data we published on The Student Loan Report was vetted, accurate, and licensed from the related polling companies.
Now that you have that background, and now that I have been able to reflect on how we got here, I want to apologize for a couple things:
(1) We never disclosed that “Drew Cloud” was a pen name that (represented a group of us writing these posts. I really regret that. (We are proud of our personal backgrounds and where they have brought (us today. We should’ve chosen to be clear about who was authoring the (posts. We have made a change on the site, effective immediately, to (use each author’s real name for every post. We will also (retroactively notate posts by Drew Cloud.
(2) We have always worked to keep editorial separation between The (Student Loan Report and our other site, LendEDU.com, which is our (main business. However, there have been nine Student Loan Report (articles that mention LendEDU. We now realize that we should’ve had a (disclosure that the sites were owned by the same company.
We are deeply sorry for any confusion or frustration our readers may feel. Please reach out to us at hello@studentloans.net with any questions or concerns about past content.
Source: https://studentloans.net/ (homepage)