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How data is driving new approaches to transportation

from New York Times Analysing digital streams of information from electric scooters and motor-assisted bicycles are helping solve travel congestion issues. Five seconds after a Los Angeles rider unlocks a dockless electric scooter with a smartphone app and sets off to a destination, a cityoperated databank is informed. Five seconds after the trip ends, typically no more than a mile away, another alert updates the record, noting the location. In 24 hours, the exact route is uploaded and logged for analysis. That ride to the bus stop or the convenience store, emissions-free and nearly silent, would seem to be a zero-disruption event in a sprawling city with millions of people and vehicles. Yet extrapolated over years, it foreshadows a shift of potentially enormous consequences. While the identity of that rider is unknown to the city, a stream of data from the scooter’s GPS module and cellphone link — speed, time of day, battery state of charge — flows to cloud servers an average of a million times a month during Los Angeles’s pilot program. Each trip is but a trickle of bytes, yet it is a rich resource for the planners and the policymakers who hope to tame the persistent tangle of traffic in this vehicle-dependent metropolis. That vehicular chokehold can weigh as heavily on a neighborhood dweller as it does on a road user. “Cities have to assure that their resources are used efficiently, and that includes the shared spaces,” said Stephen Zoepf, chief of policy development at Ellis & Associates, a Silicon Valley consultancy that helps cities develop transportation technology plans. “The effects of crowding, in noise and emissions, are a tragedy of the commons,” he continued, using an economist’s term for situations in which resources are depleted by those acting in self-interest rather than the general good. […]

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Electric scooters can help cities move beyond cars v pedestrians

by Alex Hern from https://www.theguardian.com The government is showing signs of legalising electric scooters on roads, but new laws should be about safety, not horsepower If there’s one thing we can all agree on, it’s that being hit by a scooter hurts less than being hit by a bike. That may sound like a strangely negative place to start, but it’s sort of fundamental to why I’m glad the government is finally showing signs of legalising the use of electronic scooters on public roads across the UK. The current state of the law is a mess. Its broad strokes are reasonable enough: powered vehicles require an MOT and registration to use on public roads, while unpowered vehicles do not. Pavements are for foot traffic only. Access requirements complicate matters, but only a little: wheelchairs, both manual and powered – legally, “class three invalid carriages” – can go on pavements, while some – class four – can go on roads as well. Then, in the 1980s, the law was modernised to support the first generation of electric bikes. Fitted with simple motors that aided hill climbs, it felt silly to ban them as electric vehicles, and so a new category – the “electrically assisted pedal cycle” – was invented, and the laws amended further in 2015 to remove weight limits, allow for four wheels and increase the maximum power of the motor. Which means, as the law stands, you can ride a four-wheeled vehicle of potentially unlimited weight, largely powered by a motor up to 15.5mph, on public roads without training, licensing or registration. But not an electronic scooter. Nor, for that matter, a 5kg, 10mph “hoverboard”, unlikely to hurt anyone save its rider. Looking at the laws from the ground up, the distinguishing characteristic should be safety, not how a

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Lyft to pull plug of e-scooter business in six cities, laying off 20 employees

The six cities are Nashville, San Antonio, Atlanta, Phoenix, Dallas and Columbus, as the media report claims. Lyft has notified its employees about discontinuing its e-scooter business in six cities, claims a media report. Also, the company is claimed to be laying off at least 20 employees from the bike and scooter team, where around 400 people currently work. The six cities are Nashville, San Antonio, Atlanta, Phoenix, Dallas and Columbus, as the media report claims. The report further quotes a Lyft spokesperson saying, “We’re choosing to focus on the markets where we can have the biggest impact. We’re continuing to invest in growing our bike and scooter business, but will shift resources away from smaller markets and toward bigger opportunities.” Addition to the 20 Lyft employees, a number of contractors responsible for scooter charging and their repositioning will also lose jobs. Previously, Lyft laid off around 50 people this year, claims the report. Lyft is not the only company to pull out from the micro-mobility segment, as earlier this year, Uber too announced the discontinuation of Jump bikes and scooters from a number of select markets including San Diego, Providence and Atlanta. Lyft currently operates its scooters in cities like Arlington, Austin, Denver, Los Angeles, Miami, Minneapolis, Oakland, San Diego, San Jose, Santa Monica and Washington DC, informs the report further.

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