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Electric Scooters in Austin


Silky Johnston

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17 hours ago, gsoda3 said:

was at sxsw this week.  the scooters made it incredibly convenient to get anywhere.  love them.  didn't see many people hindering traffic or doing anything stupid.  maybe if you can't see the sucker at the table....

 

something needs to be done about where scooters are allowed to be left when the ride's over.  for the most part people leave them standing upright and out of the way, but on occasion you'll see a few clustered blocking sidewalk ramps or a few haphazardly strewn on their side in the grass.  there needs to be a clear law about where you can park them and once you're done on the app take a picture of where you left it.  no picture?  you get a ticket.  the scooter in the picture is breaking a parking law?  you get a ticket.  same with those who can't abide by normal driving regulations-  drive on a sidewalk?  get a ticket.  blow through a red?  get a ticket.  

 

from a consumer standpoint i think the pros far outweigh the cons.  this would solve the last mile problem our city has with mass  (mess) transit.

It’s cute that you think the problem with the scooters is where they are parked.

they do drive on the sidewalk and run into people. They do run lights and get hit by cars. They do not obey traffic laws. Riders visit the ER every day.

The scooters suck and need to be banned and unfortunately it’s going to take a few deaths before that happens.

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20 minutes ago, justhookit said:

It’s cute that you think the problem with the scooters is where they are parked.

they do drive on the sidewalk and run into people. They do run lights and get hit by cars. They do not obey traffic laws. Riders visit the ER every day.

The scooters suck and need to be banned and unfortunately it’s going to take a few deaths before that happens.

so let's fix those problems, they're not hard to fix.  it's quite clear what laws need to be made and there's an incentive for the police to enforce them.  there is tremendous benefit to scooters.

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2 hours ago, gsoda3 said:

yes.  much more so.  now you can park at town lake and get all over from there to rainey to 6th st to east of 35 and back and forth depending on the events.  made it so much quicker than walking.  it's key when you're on a schedule.

It's also better than walking a mile in 98 degree weather

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How many people are riding around on these things over the legal limit in the evenings? Seems like pointing out the revenue potential to APD would make them get off their ass and start pulling them over for violations. 

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6 hours ago, gsoda3 said:

so let's fix those problems, they're not hard to fix.  it's quite clear what laws need to be made and there's an incentive for the police to enforce them.  there is tremendous benefit to scooters.

I am downtown at least 5 days a week.  I have never seen the police ticket or even warn a scooter rider.

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On 3/14/2019 at 8:00 PM, AustinMT said:

I have seen multiple people on scooters lane-splitting (dangerous and illegal), randomly switching from sidewalks to streets (dangerous), running lights, etc.  Of course, I see that every day since I work at Congress/Cesar Chavez.  It’s just worse this week.  Maybe if you actually lived here and dealt with it regularly....

Yeah I don't even go downtown that often any more, but every.fucking.time I do, I see numerous incidences of unparalleled scooter stupidity.

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On the way home from the Disch today me & my boy stopped and listened to a band & then walked around for a little while before going home. At 12th & Rio Grande I saw a guy riding one along 12th in the left lane with Beats headphones on. Within 15 minutes of leaving the car I saw a few people riding the wrong way on Sixth, saw several blow through red lights, & I personally got run into by this completely clueless AF motherfucker when I was crossing in a crosswalk. He was going the wrong way, coming down the hill on San Jacinto at 6th, and just rode right into a crowd in the crosswalk. I thought my kid was gonna whip his ass right there.

On the way back to the car we stopped and listened to another band for about 15 minutes. I shot all of the following in that 15 minutes. There was a lot more that I missed. That big group of about 10 guys that ran the light going the wrong way (East) had just run the red light going West as well, weaving and using 3 lanes, with one guy riding right in front of a crossing car & coming within less than a foot of being killed.

 

 

Edited by wood
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On the way home from the Disch today me & my boy stopped and listened to a band & then walked around for a little while before going home. At 12th & Rio Grande I saw a guy riding one along 12th in the left lane with Beats headphones on. Within 15 minutes of leaving the car I saw a few people riding the wrong way on Sixth, saw several blow through red lights, & I personally got run into by this completely clueless AF motherfucker when I was crossing in a crosswalk. He was going the wrong way, coming down the hill on San Jacinto at 6th, and just rode right into a crowd in the crosswalk. I thought my kid was gonna whip his ass right there.
On the way back to the car we stopped and listened to another band for about 15 minutes. I shot all of the following in that 15 minutes. There was a lot more that missed. That big group of about 10 guys that ran the light going the wrong way (East) had just run the red light going West as well, weaving and using 3 lanes, with one guy riding right in front of a crossing car & coming within less than a foot of being killed.
   

Spend 20 minutes downtown on any given day, and you’ll see all of that idiocy. It’s SOP.
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Why are Austinites such fucking pussies??? If you see a scooter rider blatantly violating the rules of the road, how hard is it to shout at the top of your lungs, “Get off the fucking sidewalk!!!!!!’?

I run around Memorial Park in Houston. Every so often, there’s some clueless person riding their bike on the jogging trial, where bikes aren’t allowed. When this happens I shout out, “NO BIKES ON THE JOGGING TRAIL!!!!!”. Then they get off the trail and all is well in the world.

Bernard

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It'd be real easy to fix this issue.   Either make them road vehicles, make all scooters licenses and insured as motorcycles and all users must have a motorcycle license .  OR make them like electric wheel chairs, only on sidewalks but their speed must  be governed to walking  speed. 

OR the obvious answer  is a extensive gondola system.

 

Has one of these hit a cop car yet?  Or a state Congessmans car?  

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10 hours ago, Bernard said:
 

Why are Austinites such fucking pussies???

Bernard

 


I think the majority of people bitching as if the sky is falling because of scooters are people who live in the burbs and only go downtown a couple times a year... and are mostly repeating what they hear their neighbors say (who also barely ever go downtown).

I work downtown and see the reality of it every day. Between my building and the one across the street there are typically ~40 scooters parked along the sidewalk- mostly orderly enough although there's always a stray or two that have been blown over by the wind or just left on unstable ground and fallen over. The city painted designated areas for scooter parking where I work on 2nd street a month or so ago and most people leave them within those boundaries.

As for riders acting recklessly, on regular days it's not any different than cyclists have always been downtown. With SXSW there are many more scooters and people downtown than the rest of the year typically and it is certainly pushing some limits, but overall it's not nearly as bad as some here are making it out to be.

My co-workers and I use them occasionally to go to lunch or get drinks somewhere a little farther than our immediate area (2nd Street District), and like Mycoxaphloppin said, it's much quicker and better than walking when it's 98 degrees outside if you're only going 6-10 blocks away or something similar where taking an Uber makes little sense.

 

Edited by KaiserSoze
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I work downtown. Every day I see multiple incidents of scooter jackassery. My favorite is the rider popping out of a covered construction walkway and damn near taking out pedestrians at the corner who can't see them coming. I really wouldn't have as much of a problem with them if APD would crack down on the morons using them improperly. 

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On 3/17/2019 at 1:54 AM, Bernard said:

 

Why are Austinites such fucking pussies??? If you see a scooter rider blatantly violating the rules of the road, how hard is it to shout at the top of your lungs, “Get off the fucking sidewalk!!!!!!’?

I run around Memorial Park in Houston. Every so often, there’s some clueless person riding their bike on the jogging trial, where bikes aren’t allowed. When this happens I shout out, “NO BIKES ON THE JOGGING TRAIL!!!!!”. Then they get off the trail and all is well in the world.

Bernard

I used a polite version of this approach when some dumbass came up behind me on the sidewalk. I knew he was there, but intentionally didn't get over for him to pass. When he finally got a chance to go by, I politely said, 'you're not supposed to ride on the sidewalk.' He said something about how he couldn't ride in the street so he had to ride on the sidewalk. I chased him down, tackled him and beat the shit out of him.

Nah, he wasn't going too fast, was under control, and actually had a point about being safer on the sidewalk than on the street, so I let it go.

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23 hours ago, Deej said:

These scooter folk better be glad Gabrielle Nestande isn't out cruising the streets.

Curiosity hit me recently... she ended up marrying her bf at that time and they have kids. He's in commercial real estate in Austin. Gotta admit, it's kinda a stomach punch seeing the fbook profile pic with her little family living their best land life riding around on a boat knowing the backstory and the fact the victim was robbed of her life. 

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23 hours ago, KaiserSoze said:


 

 


I think the majority of people bitching as if the sky is falling because of scooters are people who live in the burbs and only go downtown a couple times a year... and are mostly repeating what they hear their neighbors say (who also barely ever go downtown).
 

 

I live within half a mile from downtown and drive downtown frequently for Uber/Lyft (or myself) and I hate them. They drive stupid and their shit's all regarded. You're right, they are similar to cyclists. But these are the same reason I hate cyclists who don't know wtf they're doing. I actually appreciate when a scooterist uses the bike lane and controls themselves. When they don't, I hope that they diascooterf. There are a significant amount of scooterists who don't know or care about wtf they're doing, thus, the reaction.

Honestly I drive under the assumption that all other drivers are idiots, which keeps me safer, so it's not much of a change. But the part that pisses me off is that when you drive a car like an idiot we might dent each other's cars and be in for a headache/$$, ride a bike/scooter like an idiot and the idiot is dead and/or in the hospital and that's a much bigger ordeal. The stakes are higher, so I wish they would use the scooters/bikes with the appropriate amount of discretion, but a lot of times they don't, so I react with my own discretion.

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2 hours ago, BurdineBandit said:

I live within half a mile from downtown and drive downtown frequently for Uber/Lyft (or myself) and I hate them. They drive stupid and their shit's all regarded. You're right, they are similar to cyclists. But these are the same reason I hate cyclists who don't know wtf they're doing. I actually appreciate when a scooterist uses the bike lane and controls themselves. When they don't, I hope that they diascooterf. There are a significant amount of scooterists who don't know or care about wtf they're doing, thus, the reaction.

I always use the protected bike lane on 3rd Street for my east/west trips in downtown. Every now and then a cyclist gets their panties in a wad when they see us using scooters in that lane. 

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On 3/17/2019 at 12:12 PM, KaiserSoze said:

I think the majority of people bitching as if the sky is falling because of scooters are people who live in the burbs and only go downtown a couple times a year... and are mostly repeating what they hear their neighbors say (who also barely ever go downtown).

... it's not nearly as bad as some here are making it out to be.

 

Yeah, except it is. First, off, I'm not parroting my neighbors, whom I can't remember ever talking about this. I go downtown enough to see how it really is, and not just during SXSW. Literally every time I go downtown even just for a few minutes, I see multiple dumbasses doing incredibly stupid, dangerous shit. Cyclists do stupid shit too? Oh, ok, so then we should compound that problem by allowing many more people on scooters to do even more stupid, more dangerous shit, right? I've gone on plenty of rants about cyuclists around here, esp the downtown nimrods, and I'm a cyclist myself. You're not getting anywhere with that argument.

These scooters would be just fine with effective regulation, corporate responsibility, and some common sense being exercised  by the riders ... but I'm not holding my breath for any of those.

Edited by wood
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wow wtf i am visiting austin from out of town and these things are everywhere

 

people are riding them all over the sidewalks too. like 6 people in a row, very few on the roads. the kicker is the police are just standing on the corner of 6th and congress watching em fly by. isn't riding the scooter on a sidewalk illegal? honestly they've replaced segways

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3 minutes ago, htownjd said:

wow wtf i am visiting austin from out of town and these things are everywhere

 

people are riding them all over the sidewalks too. like 6 people in a row, very few on the roads. the kicker is the police are just standing on the corner of 6th and congress watching em fly by. isn't riding the scooter on a sidewalk illegal? honestly they've replaced segways

Yes, it's illegal to even ride a bike on the sidewalk. It's just not being enforced. Dunno why. It's clearly a problem. Segways shouldn't be there either. They're fucking huge.

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18 minutes ago, wood said:

Yes, it's illegal to even ride a bike on the sidewalk. It's just not being enforced. Dunno why. It's clearly a problem. Segways shouldn't be there either. They're fucking huge.

I actually witnessed an officer yell at a scooter rider last week for riding on the road.  He told him to get on the sidewalk.   

Part of the problem seems to be that sidewalk riding is legal on some downtown streets and not on others.  Its too confusing and you cannot expect out of town visitors to know which sidewalks are OK and which are not.  

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9 minutes ago, Ollie Slatt said:

I actually witnessed an officer yell at a scooter rider last week for riding on the road.  He told him to get on the sidewalk.   

Part of the problem seems to be that sidewalk riding is legal on some downtown streets and not on others.  Its too confusing and you cannot expect out of town visitors to know which sidewalks are OK and which are not.  

I doubt it's legal anywhere. A lot of the cops probably don't know either. I got pulled over downtown once for turning left on red, which is perfectly legal if you do it right, and I did. I told him the law and, very much to my surprise, he was like "OK, cool. Thanks! Have a nice day."

The best place for these scooters is the bike lanes. They aren't a perfect fit there either, but that's best place in terms of the smallest speed differential and least amount of disruption & danger to themselves & others they'd create.

Edited by wood
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I was on 6th street yesterday and there was a group of 3-4 kids on scooters driving on the street, occupying 2 lanes.  And they were driving very slowly to clog up traffic.  I don't understand how anyone could be that stupid; seems pretty dangerous to me.

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24 minutes ago, wood said:

I doubt it's legal anywhere. A lot of the cops probably don't know either. I got pulled over downtown once for turning left on red, which is perfectly legal if you do it right, and I did. I told him the law and, very much to my surprise, he was like "OK, cool. Thanks! Have a nice day."

The best place for these scooters is the bike lanes. They aren't a perfect fit there either, but that's best place in terms of the smallest speed differential and least amount of disruption & danger to themselves & others they'd create.

It's legal if the speed limit on the street is 25 mph (or you can use a dedicated bike lane).  Problem is that many of the riders don't understand that if you are on the street (and not in a bike lane), you have follow the same rules as cars, motorcycles, bikes on streets, etc.

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16 minutes ago, AustinMT said:

It's legal if the speed limit on the street is 25 mph (or you can use a dedicated bike lane).  Problem is that many of the riders don't understand that if you are on the street (and not in a bike lane), you have follow the same rules as cars, motorcycles, bikes on streets, etc.

What's legal? I meant that I doubt riding on the sidewalk is legal anywhere. Sorry that wasn't clear.

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14 minutes ago, Deej said:

Yep.

f642611102dffc099ea4f8d8892439a9.jpg

Thanks for that. So it's ok to cycle on sidewalks most places, except most of downtown, which is where the scooters are running amok on the sidewalks, streets, bike lanes, etc. Is there even any law relating to the scooters? I can't imagine they'd be legal on sidewalks that can't be used by cyclists.

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That also begs the question: Why do we need all these bike lanes if it's legal to ride on the sidewalk?

Some of y'all might remember big Blake Brockermeyer that played on the Horns OL back in the 80s. Once me & him nad another kid were walking to class at ECJ when this dumbass rode by us on the sidewalk, too close. Blake just reached out his big paw and grabbed the back of the bike's seat as it passed, stopping it dead in its tracks. Just gave the kid a look and said "No bikes on the sidewalk". Kid looked like he'd seen a ghost. /csb

Edited by wood
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3 minutes ago, Deej said:

I thought I read they are legal/illegal wherever bikes are legal/illegal.

Maybe. I haven't seen that. But if true, that rules out sidewalk use in pretty much the entire area where they're being used the most.

 

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Just now, Deej said:

It does. The speeds they are capable of should be reason enough to keep them off the sidewalks in areas of heavy pedestrian usage. 

Absolutely. They really should be used nowhere other than bike lanes and slow streets.

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9 hours ago, KaiserSoze said:

I always use the protected bike lane on 3rd Street for my east/west trips in downtown. Every now and then a cyclist gets their panties in a wad when they see us using scooters in that lane. 

I think it's the most logical thing, and it makes me 10x more confident driving next to a scooter when it's in the bike lane, bc then I know the rider understand it's not fuckin' 'nam out here and is trying to follow some kind of order. 


Off Topic/related: I work on campus and the drive home on Dean Keeton usually has some employees cycling home too (east bound), I swear 90% of these guys are fuckin' pros. They use the lane, use their hand signals if they're switching lanes, look over their shoulder and wait for cars to pass before cutting across traffic, etc. Downtown just seems like it's Mexico City-style free for all. 

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Cut across 6th on the way home from the Disch again tonight. We were met by a dumbass coming right at us head-on in our lane before we even got to San Jacinto. He swerved to the other lane and just kept on going east as we passed.

Anyone who says there's not much of this shit happening either has an agenda, isn't paying attention, or is fucking blind.

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  • 1 month later...
1 hour ago, wood said:

 

I remember the helmet law for bicyclists in Austin. That was a whole lot of fail.

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While annoying, this may be Darwin's greatest achievement and a shift to ensure the survival of humans as a species. Not sure we should stop morons from killing themselves. The downfall of our society now is that we take measures to protect the dumbest of the species whereas these people did not survive and drag down the group in previous generations. I applaud the scooters and the idea of letting dumb people exterminate themselves for the greater good. At least they died while having fun whipping around at 20mph. Win-Win.

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