After all of the excitement, press and controversy surrounding share e-scooters, I finally decided to give these scooters a try almost three months after they first began to appear in San Francisco. Upon their roll out, it was very hard to avoid the coverage this category of micromobility garnered regarding a number of different topics.
In particular, the press focused on the clutter that shared e-scooters created when users didn't properly park them or when vandals had strewn them across sidewalks haphazardly. I can understand the concern on both sides of this issue. On the one hand, tipped over e-scooters or e-scooters blocking access to a sidewalks is a real issue. For those who have trouble walking, this is a genuine problem if they cannot safely walk or wheelchair on a sidewalk . On the other hand, this shared form of transportation can help those commuters who live in the middle of transportation desserts. Additionally, those bad actors associated with improperly parked and damaged shared e-scooters can be addressed by the scooter operators themselves with some time and effort. Nevertheless, the merits to both sides of this issue can be discussed another day.
In the shared e-scooter game, I am a bit late. Even before, I picked up a Spin scooter (amidst a number of other shared e-scooter operators), I was hesitant to give it a try due to the numerous reports I read about shared e-scooter's association with head injuries and other types of harm that emergency rooms reported seeing amongst shared e-scooter users. With that said, as a millennial who has had some experience riding scooters as a teen, I was confident that I would pick up riding an e-scooter pretty easily. Prior to my first trip on a shared e-scooter, I regularly commuted around the city using mass transit, Uber, Lyft and Bay Wheels, a docked bicycle share service with docking stations located all over the city.
On the day of my first shared e-scooter trip, I had trouble finding an Uber or Lyft and the Bay Wheels docking station closest to my home was empty --- a problem that is to be expected with these types of services during rush hour. It seemed almost certain that I was going to be late to an appointment I had made. Luckily for me, a Spin scooter was laying on the ground a few feet away and I decided on the spot that this was the time to download the Spin app and give shared e-scooters a try.
The download was very quick and after inputting some information into Spin's mobile app, I was able to unlock the scooter laying at my feet. I stepped on the scooter, gave it a push while pressing the throttle located on the handlebars and whoosh! I was zipping down the street before I knew it. It took a few moments to get my bearings, but once I did, what a thrill!
Once I arrived at my appointment, I locked the e-scooter with the Spin mobile application and left the scooter in a properly designated parking spot. Overall, my experience was great. If you get a chance and think you would feel confident riding an e-scooter in the city, give it a Spin!
Image by Spin
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