will the scooters have enough power to get a rider up a hill bc everyone thought the assisted power bikes would & they don’t or is this another down hill only transport that will choke the DT corridor bc no one can ride them uphill?

The solution to “the final mile” has been right beneath us this entire time. It’s called “legs.”

Too much work? Yeah, we should let Silicon Valley disrupt our sidewalks instead.

Or - and stick with me here - we could, I don’t know, fully fund our transit system and walk.

Durkant needs to scoot on out of city hall. An embarrassment to west coast mayors.

Scooters are a bigger menace to pedestrians and bigger assholes that even bicyclists.

HEADLINE: Atlanta City Council aims to beef up scooter regulations as injuries abound

SubHead: Grady Memorial Hospital has treated hundreds of scooter-related wounds

By Sean Keenan@ThatSeanKeenan Feb 21, 2019, 9:43am EST
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....And while it may feel like the ubiquitous, rentable e-scooters have been here forever, they haven’t even been roaming Atlanta for an entire year yet.

Already, the Atlanta City Council is considering another piece of legislation that could reinforce the new regulations.

.... a serious uptick in scooter-related injuries at local healthcare facilities like Grady Memorial Hospital. (Personal injury law firm John Foy & Associates claims that Grady alone has treated roughly 360 scooter-related injuries.)

This week, Atlanta City Councilmember Dustin Hillis introduced a resolution that would request scooter-related injury data reports from hospitals, urgent care facilities, and other healthcare institutions.

...the legislation would call for heathcare institutions to submit data regarding “the number of incidents within the designated timeframe, type of incident, injuries sustained, number of people involved and if the incident was a fatality” on a quarterly basis....

Such data from healthcare providers “would better position us to ensure that scooters are not just an innovative transportation solution, but a safe one as well,” said Atlanta City Council President Felicia Moore, who drafted the legislation, in a statement.

How safe is that e-scooter? Atlanta hospitals asked to tally injuries
News March 11, 2019
By Raisa Habersham, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

The Atlanta City Council is pushing for new regulations on electric scooters that they hope will lead to more safety requirements for the popular — but some say dangerous — mode of urban transportation....

.....Grady Memorial Hospital, the largest hospital in Georgia, estimated it receives between 80 and 100 scooter-related injuries per month, ranging from serious head injuries to broken limbs.

According to a Consumer Reports magazine study ... at least four scooter-related fatalities were confirmed nationally.

I don't like everything Durkan does. But I'm glad she came around to the wave of the future.
Now I can't wait to see them try to enforce the helmet law that has never been enforced.
And watch them try to prevent scooter riders from doing stupid things.
This oughta be good

@1. I rode them in Long Beach and loved it. However, on hills they are pretty slow. On steep hills they won't work, but they are light enough to carry.

@7: “... the wave of the future.”

I weep for the future ...

@1 you won't be able to go from downtown to capitol hill on one. I mean you could, but it'd be pointless.

@3 Seattle's been electing mayors by identity rather than ability for a while. Seem to be a few embarrassing mayors in a row.

RE: safety - they aren't especially safe. Not because scooters are inherently unsafe, but because of their odd control systems, which require two hands on the bars at all times. This makes it difficult to carry anything (even something nominal like a handbag) while riding one. This means riders need to focus solely on piloting the damn thing and aren't as free to survey their surroundings.

So I rode one of these things in Tacoma a couple weeks back. I wasn’t impressed. They can provide Segway-like fun for tourists, and when they finally arrive in Seattle I might grab one and scoot along the waterfront on some sunny day, but anybody who expects them to have real impact on the efficiency of Seattle transit is fooling themselves.

Durkin will insist they stay off sidewalks, which means you’ll have to use them on our crappy streets, with cars zooming all about. They’re not super stable, and God help you if you hit a pothole (we have a few!). Going uphill? Good luck. You’ll have to manually push it if there’s any kind of grade, and these things aren’t light (you certainly wouldn’t want to carry it as somebody else commented).

They also aren’t cheap, because navigating all the above slows you down significantly. I’d guess the average ride will take at least twice as long as it would on a bike (which is probably why Lime markets them so aggressively). Parking one also sucks. Lime makes you take a picture and send it to them to ensure it’s somewhere they deem acceptable before they’ll lock the scooter and stop charging you. Phone dies while you’re on a ride? You’re shit out of luck until you can go back and take the photo. In every way I can think of, the e-bikes are superior. The Uber/Jump bikes in particular (which, unlike Lime’s bikes or scooters, are free to unlock) will cost you half as much, and get you where you’re going faster and safer.

@10

I have to wonder if you understand how the word "rate" is normally used.

@8 - " On steep hills they won't work, but they are light enough to carry."

It's hard to imagine that hippsters who are too lazy to walk are going to walk uphill carrying scooters.

Lake Union doesn't have enough junk in it, so bring on the scooters!

@13 I imagine they'll be very popular among transit commuters. I live in the bay and they're very popular near BART station. I typically bike, but the scooters are more convenient and more fun than bikeshare. They'll be popular in the south end and capitol hill.

Every. SIngle. One. of these I encounter on the sidewalk will be removed. At least this time, they will be relatively light enough to toss in the street. Try and stop me. I "remove" bikes almost every single morning on the few blocks I walk to work from the bus stop. If they are ruined, well, I didn't put them where the disabled and/or elderly can be burdened with them. I just try to help the best I can. I love dragging bikes off the sidewalk. I can't wait to throw scooters in the street.