What exactly are the downsides of owning a bike that you don't have owning a e-scooter?
1) Need to take it with you on the train/bus/car
2) Need to lock it to something secure when you leave it (especially e-bikes/scooters which are expensive)
3) Need to pick it up from the same place you left it last time.
4) Need to buy it (€1000+) and maintain it, and charge it
5) Need to store it somewhere secure when not in use
6) The parking scales really poorly: if 10 people can use a hire-bike in a day, but 1 person can use a private one, this would mean the private bikes would take 10x the amount of parking per user.
It could also be the same reasoning as a car regarding the space: a bike for 1 person takes more space than an e-scooter for 1 person.
The real problem is not the device: it's the users. People using bikes also do stupid things, but not that often. Bikes can be very fast too, with electric assist they can go faster than cars in the city, but most "problems" seen today are with the scooters. This is a sad situation, but it's some users' fault, not the operators', not the city's, ...
One way to deal with this would be to have a license to drive a scooter or bike, so that kids (and adults) are taught some basic rules and have to follow them. But I guess this is politically hard to implement, it's easier to ban.
Those places are getting more restrictive though. Some shops don't allow you to park anything inside the shop because it takes up space, some subways are banning e-scooters citing safety issues regarding not having equipment ready for dealing with large battery fires and so on.
Besides, there are foldable bikes that can take up as much space as a foldable e-scooter.
The main advantage is having it where you need it - maybe you got the metro or the bus to work and now you want to go on somewhere else. Your bike is at home. Then you want to head to a friends house, but there is nowhere safe to leave your bike but you'd be happy to leave the rental scooter outside, then two other friends want to join you on a trip to a pub, this time you have your bike but they don't, so you cycle alone and they get a cab.
I love cycling, but scooters (rental and private) def have some advantages
You can't cover partial routes with your bike and combine with other forms of transport.
Your bike requires phisical effort which might require a shower on destination.
If there's a transport strike, or it's too late for transport, rental vehicles that function 24hs save you
The close minded and privileged outlook of "just own a car/bike/get picked by someone" shows a disconnect with the reality of many people.
Not sure why you call me close minded, I never mentioned any of those "alternatives" you mention. I walk to most places I go to, as I currently live in a walkable metropolitan city in Europe.
> What exactly are the downsides of owning a bike that you don't have owning a e-scooter?
You said OWNING a bike. Now you suddenly seem to talk about rented bikes.
The argument around "rented vehicle being left anywhere" can be made for bikes. If you only argue for bikes that can be left at a station, then it's definitely worse than e-scooters. If the bike can be locked like e-scooters, without the need of an exciting station, then people will end up complaining just as much and ban them with the same reasoning.
> Not sure why you call me close minded, I never mentioned any of those "alternatives" you mention. I walk to most places I go to, as I currently live in a walkable metropolitan city in Europe.
Lol. How much and how long do you actually walk? I live in a metropolitan city in europe too (and have lived in multiple ones and travelled to many) and it can be called walkable, using the ridiculous US standards.
I love hiking and will walk long distances or, when I actually have a bike, bike longer but it's not practical in your day to day, to walk more than 2k, if you're pressed for time.
Also, if you're leaving a place in one end of the city at 2 am, when public transport options thin out, you're not going to walk 20/30km.
It's very easy to live in a well connected place and move very little and claim "I walk everywhere". It's also very selfish and lacks empathy with other realities.
But hey, it's an uphill battle to discuss things that affect real people in HN where it's all about "I'm sorted" and "The narrative says this is correct".
- requires more energy to travel longer distances.
- less theft prevention features.