Flipping The Bird

How e-scooters devolved from popular to problematic — and how they might find their way back.

- Jessica P. Ogilvie

The waterfront in Venice, California is nearly a mile from Abbot Kinney Boulevard, the area’s upscale shopping drag that lures both locals and tourists with farm-to-table eateries and storefronts selling vegan ice cream and eco-friendly apparel. It’s too short a distance to drive but too far to comfortably walk in flipflops while carrying a bag of beach gear. So when, on a hot summer afternoon, Adeline Weh discovered an electric rental scooter that could whisk her from sunbathing to window shopping, she snatched it up.

“It was cool because I could park by the beach, scooter to Abbot Kinney, eat, shop and scooter back to the beach,” says the 24-year old graphic designer. “You don’t have to look for parking twice. It’s a lot easier.”

Weh is one of millions of people nationwide who have embraced electric rental scooters over the past year. After appearing seemingly overnight on city sidewalks throughout the country in late 2017 and early 2018, the devices are now available in dozens of municipalities in the U.S. and abroad. Deployed by a handful of start-up tech companies, the e-scooters rent for an average of $1 to start the vehicle and an additional 15 cents per minute.

But in the short time they’ve been on the road, rental scooters, which are dockless (meaning they can be picked up and dropped off anywhere users want) and controlled by smartphone apps, have become lightning rods of controversy. Those who love them swear by their efficiency; those who hate them argue they’re neighbourhood nuisances. Meanwhile, city officials, many of them blindsided by the sudden invasion, are rushing to enact regulations as it becomes apparent that scooters, following the success of Uber and Lyft, will continue to disrupt the industry of short-distance urban transportation.