News of a class action lawsuit leads the headlines in the Wild West of mini mobility devices.
Some people return from vacation daunted by the task of catching up on email. In 2018, the challenge is catching up on scooter news.
Of course, I am exaggerating a little, at the risk of detracting from the importance of the evolution of urban mobility and the political backlash—some warranted and some uncritically supportive of the car-centric status quo—surrounding electric scooters.
An emerging legal backlash, as reported by Peter Holley, compelled another appearance of the Planetizen Scooter Media Brief. More than one transit observer took to the Internet to describe this lawsuit and the regulatory limits being placed on scooters around the country as existential threats to the business model of shared dockless electric scooters.
Below follows the rest of what I've noticed this month, even with some vacation mixed in there. Please add more in the comments if you spotted any breaking news or hot takes that I missed.
National News
- Class-action lawsuit accuses e-scooter companies of ‘gross negligence’ (The Washington Post, Oct, 20)
- Scooter companies may have found a loophole in cities' limitations (CNN Business, Oct. 15)
National Commentary
- The Lime-S Generation 3 scooter makes headway down the wrong road (AndroidPit, Oct. 22)
- New Tech, Old Questions: An Analysis of the Sharing Economy by Transit and Planning Expert Christof Spieler (OffCite, Oct. 17)
- Tiny Vehicles and the New Safety in Numbers (Streetsblog USA, Oct. 9)
- The Man Behind the Scooter Revolution (CityLab, Sept. 26)
Local News
- Lime is building its first scooter “lifestyle brand store” in LA (TechCrunch, Oct. 22)
- Lime launches its electric scooters in Memphis without a permit; city threatens to remove them (Memphis Business Journal, Oct. 19)
- 'There's no respect,' TriMet disability advocates weigh in on e-scooters (The Oregonian, Oct. 16)
- Is New York City ready for the e-scooter revolution? (Curbed New York, Oct. 15)
- Here’s how to park your scooter in SF (Curbed San Francisco, Oct. 15)
- SF judge denies Lime’s request to block electric scooter deployment (TechCrunch, Oct. 12)
- E-scooters to return to SF streets on Oct. 15, but only in a handful of neighborhoods (San Francisco Examiner, Oct. 10)
- False alarm: e-scooters won’t hit Philly until 2019 (PlanPhilly, Oct. 2)
- New Yorkers jumping on e-scooters in growing numbers — city officials consider legalizing them (New York Daily News, Oct. 1)
Local Commentary
- Why New York City Should Welcome Electric Scooters on Its Streets (New York, Oct. 22)
- Electric scooters are good for the environment (Environment Texas, Oct. 12)
- Are electric scooters worth the headache? (The Denver Post, Oct. 2)
- Readers respond: E-scooters steal sidewalk rights from children, elderly and disabled (The Oregonian, Oct. 1)
Scooter Media Brief: Safety, Security, and Business Models Raise Concerns
Recent news has revealed some cracks in the pavement below the speedy wheels of electric scooter share.
Scooter Media Brief: A Fork in the Road for Scooters
A few milestones stick out from the rest of the scooter news from January 2019.
Scooter Media Brief: The Dawn of the Age of Scooters
Electric scooter rentals will never be new again.
The state-sanctioned urbicide of Austin
People don’t kill cities. Freeways do.
US to reduce Colorado River water deliveries to Mexico
A new Colorado Treaty amendment reduces Mexico’s Colorado River water allocation by 250,000 acre feet.
New Jersey’s second-largest city bans standalone data centers
Jersey City will continue to allow co-location facilities, such as those meant for research institutions that store their own data.
Amtrak not solely to blame for New Jersey commuter rail's unreliability, report finds
A new study from the Garden State Initiative found that NJ Transit’s budget grew 20% across a 4 year period, but reliability declined significantly over the same period.
EPA erases limits on planet-warming pollution from power plants
Under Monday’s plan, power plants would still have some limits on how much mercury, arsenic and other contaminants they can emit.
Phoenix announces new on-demand transit service, more frequent RAPID buses
Both new services will launch in October, and are part of Phoenix's Project Effective Access Solutions for Easing Congestion.
FREE Course: Walkable City 1: Why Walkability?
After describing his path towards focusing on walkability as the essence of good planning, Jeff Speck marches through his five principal reasons for making more walkable places.
Reinventing Malls: Planning Alchemy—Turning Gray Fields Into Gold
The course focuses on the opportunities and imperatives that shape reinvention of mall sites.
Eagle County Government
Harvard University Graduate School of Design
Nashville Planning Department
The Architects Foundation
University of Cincinnati Online
The Pocatello Development Authority
The Urban Renewal Agency of the City of Pocatello
Journal of the American Planning Association
