Reports of accidents involving electric scooters have begun to surface locally as the City Council contemplates how to regulate the shared vehicle services.
Pending a vote slated for Oct. 4, the City of San Antonio wants to set a minimum age for riding e-scooters and restrict where they can be ridden, among other possible regulations.
To date, local e-scooter traffic incidents haven’t been serious enough to warrant much news coverage, but last week a woman was transported to the hospital after losing her balance, falling, and sustaining cuts to the head, according to the San Antonio Fire Department.
Nicholas Ramos said he was struck by an car while riding an e-scooter Thursday, and the driver fled the scene. Ramos said he was riding down Broadway Street when he was clipped from behind by a car. Ramos, who was wearing a helmet, said no one was around when he recovered consciousness a few minutes later. He did not go to the hospital and was “too disoriented” to file a police report after the incident, he said.
The San Antonio City Council’s Transportation Committee met Monday to discuss recommendations that would inform a six-month pilot program for regulating e-scooters. Among the proposals were prohibiting e-scooter use on sidewalks, using bike lanes when available, encouraging but not requiring helmets, and setting the minimum age to 16. A 35 mph speed limit is also proposed.
The recommendations also seek to limit where the vehicles can be parked. For sidewalk parking, the City has endorsed a 3-foot clearance from pedestrian passageways, and 8-foot clearance for bus stop poles and shelters, and a complete prohibition against parking in commercial or pedestrian loading zones. Scooters would also need to be parked at least 8 feet away from a building entrance, according to the recommendations.
Councilman Rey Saldaña (D4), who chairs the transportation committee, said the Council is seeking a lighter approach to regulating e-scooters. The City was criticized in 2014 for its handling of transportation network companies, such as Uber and Lyft, which caused them to temporarily stop operating in the city. The City is taking the best parts of ordinances in Austin and other cities where scooters have been operational for some time and fusing them together to find a solution, Saldaña said.
“This is a good opportunity for government to step aside and allow the private sector to give us innovative solutions for a public demand,” he said. “The public is demanding a more navigable pedestrian experience.”
Scooter riders shouldn’t be banned from using sidewalks, Saldaña said, adding there are certain parts of the city where scooters should avoid roadways.
Given how young the technology is, the regulations will be “written in pencil rather than pen,” he said.
E-scooters are powered by electric motors and enabled by smartphone apps. Depending on the company, riders pay a base fee of about a dollar and then are charged for every minute of usage. For the two major operators in San Antonio, LimeBike and Bird, that fee is 15 cents per minute.
Since Bird unleashed its roughly 400-scooter fleet on downtown San Antonio in June, the City has impounded about 140 Bird scooters because they were blocking pedestrian pathways, such as a plaza, accessibility ramp, or building entrance, said John Jacks, director of the Center City Development and Operations Department.
LimeBike launched about a month later with a 345-vehicle fleet. It has had 11 of its scooters seized, Jacks said.
The Center City Development and Operations Department’s parking enforcement team has been confiscating the incorrectly parked scooters and taking them to a garage on St. Mary’s Street. From there, the companies who track their vehicles via GPS can contact the City to retrieve them.
While the City is not charging the scooter companies to retrieve their vehicles, enforcing these parking violations is costing the City time and effort, Jacks said. He said an ordinance will likely comprise a permitting system with a fee to recoup the cost of collecting unauthorized scooters when the company initially applies to be an operator and again for every time the City has to collect a scooter.
Jacks said in the future, the City may contract an organization such as Centro San Antonio to collect scooters.
“What we’re really striving toward is to not collect these – that the companies themselves would be collecting or resetting them,” he said.
Casey Whittington, government affairs representative for operator Blue Duck Scooters, said the local startup supports such regulations.
The e-scooter company, however, has a different model than its competitors for collecting the vehicles at night and deploying them again in the morning. Instead of hiring contractors, known as chargers, to reset its scooter fleet, Blue Duck’s in-house staff picks up the vehicles, inspects them for any damage, and if they are safe enough, releases them the next day.
Blue Duck has a much smaller fleet than the two companies but is aiming to roll out more as its processes are fine-tuned.
Whittington said the company has been working with local officials on crafting regulatory solutions since April and is on board with mandating geofencing, a technology that restricts parking and usage in certain areas through GPS. Certain areas such as Alamo and Main plazas would be fenced off for usage, and certain parts of the sidewalk could also be restricted for parking purposes.
“We want to be the company that’s known for talking with the City daily, which we do,” Whittington said. “We want to be known as the company that [places] more emphasis on safety, and we want to be known as the company that’s better focused on quality, which we think we are.”
David Heard, whose tech-sector advocacy group Tech Bloc played a central role in Uber and Lyft’s 2015 return to San Antonio, said he has been encouraged by the City’s approach to regulating e-scooters and hasn’t seen knee-jerk reactions to the so-far-minor incidents in town.
“It’s always about striking a balance,” Heard said. “There have been some accidents on scooters since they’ve been here, but there will be auto accidents around San Antonio. We don’t make it illegal to drive a car, but we try to put in place licensing and permits and a legal structure that allows for some balance for getting around and safety. That’s the process that’s occurring.”
As for Ramos, he said he was back on an e-scooter Monday. E-scooters, he said, are a great innovation that has come to San Antonio. They have saved him time and money not having to park downtown, he said.
He’s not the only one he knows who has been involved in an accident with a motor vehicle. The Geekdom member said another member of the co-working space landed on the windshield of an automobile as it pulled out in front of him. Ramos said he’s hopeful the City will install more bike lanes – like the ones with green striping on East Houston and Soledad Street – for safer scootering.
“We’ve got to work with the city to improve safety precautions or [limit] street hazards,” he said.
Sidewalks are created for people to WALK on. Yesterday several of us seniors who live in a downtown senior high rise were walking on a Houston Street sidewalk and all of a sudden a a young “geek” type yelled from behind us and said “get out of my way” and bumped a 73 year old walking beside me and never stopped. Well, Councilman Saldana you are ignorant and dismissive of what happens to us seniors who are following the law. Perhaps you are getting political contributions from the scooter companies? Well we are retired and live near city hall and can assure you that we will check those that give you contributions when you run again. Meanwhile we will continue to walk downtown and if we spot a scooter on the sidewalk we knock it over if it is our way!
1. Yes, sidewalks are for walking on, but roads are so dangerous and poorly maintained in San Antonio that sometimes you have to ride bikes or scooters on sidewalks.
2. What is your evidence that council member Saldana is dismissive of senior members? Perhaps he cares about the opinions of all good constituents.
3. What is your evidence that Saldana receives contributions from scooter companies?
4. Knock over a scooter in your way? Why not just walk around it? Why the urge to destroy?
In general after having talked to people strongly against scooters both in person and online, it seems that the people that have such big problems with a minor annoyance (scooters) likely have big problems in other areas of life as well.
Pedestrians have primacy on a sidewalk. They aren’t required to “go around” a wheeled vehicle. The reverse applies.
And FYI, the most vocal groups have been the scooter companies and riders. Seniors rarely have a voice at the table. Saldaña seems to be speaking for the council when we haven’t heard from the rest of them yet, especially Treviño whose district includes downtown.
10, 15, 20, 25, 30, up to 35 mph collisions with pedestrians, on cramped or even spacious sidewalks, does not seem like a minor annoyance to me, Ramzan. But we are probably on the same page about the state of our streets and our woeful lack of bike lanes.
“The public is demanding a more navigable pedestrian experience.”
Saldaña says this but is blowing off pedestrians because of his desire to have a “light touch.” Most of the scooter riding takes place in a district he doesn’t even represent and he claims the rest of council doesn’t want a sidewalk ban. Well, let’s hear from the rest of council.
Maybe a sidewalk ban just in the urban core is the answer. That’s where the conflicts are. Otherwise, pedestrians are out of luck. See how well that works.
These are electronic devices. Every time I have seen one, it has been a rider on the sidewalk, and they have been zipping along, winding through and around pedestrians, at a dangerous speed. Electronic devices can be outfitted with sensors that are programmed. The city should consider a regulation that any company providing services must have scooters with sensors that can determine when they are on a sidewalk vs. a street and will limit the speed to a walking speed on sidewalks while allowing a driving speed (35 mph in the article is too fast for downtown) when on the street. (In the meantime, establish an ordinance that allows ticketing anyone using a scooter on a sidewalk in a way that is a danger to pedestrians–related to speed and movement through and around people.)
Do you know of any technology that exists that can tell if a scooter is on the sidewalk or the street? Current GPS doesn’t allow for such specificity, especially in areas with lots of tall buildings. You’re asking for the city to mandate non-existing technology. People ride scooters on the sidewalk because riding on the street is too dangerous and a small minority people (pickup truck drivers especially) have a bizarre hatred of scooters riding on the street and will act aggressively towards scooter riders (has happened multiple times to me while riding safely on the street).
Mostly good in the article….Policy initially in pencil, safety concerns w/o mandating helmets, learning best practices from other cities and my only observation so far — scooters blocking the sidewalks. I wonder though how to fairly enforce the last concern, if it is the rider (often first timer or just not in tune with rules) that parks scooter in a bad place?
Just don’t allow these stupid things on the riverwalk. Not enough space for scooters to maneuver around pedestrians
I agree with not allowing the scooters on the central loop of the river walk and the museum reach, but they should be okay on other parts of the river walk, especially the mission reach and make the missions more accessible to the public.
Do the Mission and Museum Reach walks have markings that designate bike and pedestrian lanes? Pretty much, “slower traffic stay right” is somewhat universal, but I will vote for monies to expand and subdivide these particular sidewalks (we definitely want more natives and tourists enjoying themselves along these reaches)
Otherwise, on busily trafficked downtown streets, y’all need to join your biking brothers and sisters (and I would love to see my SA build out bigger bike lanes, with dedicated flyover bridging)
Treat ’em like bicycles, to be operated on the street and in bike lanes, and only allowed access to a sidewalk when maneuvering to its parking destination. Make the burden of proof lay on the scooter operator, if a collision between it and a pedestrian occurs.
I’m definitely willing to vote for more bike lanes. Eventually, we might have dedicated lanes and flyover bridging for bicycles and these scooters (mopeds and motorbikes still stay with the other big vehicular traffic)
35 mph is way too fast, especially for “last mile” transportation. How about 20 mph, with mandatorily-rented, reflective-taped helmets, lotsa reflective tape on the steering column and driving board, and large turn signals?
And friggin bells or even horns!
It appears that it will be inevitable that pedestrians will get hurt by reckless scooters drivers . Who will pay for the medical bills ( or worse yet funeral expenses) to treat those hurt or killed? The driver, the scooter operating company , or the one hurt? Where are the personal injury lawyers? We have not heard from them. We are waiting for their input.
I’ve taken over 60 rides on the scooters here and in San Diego. They can’t go faster than 20 MPH. I agree that they should not be ridden on the sidewalks. They should be afforded the same rights to the streets as bikes.
The scooters on sidewalk makes walking on one dangerous. I have a senior dog with a mind of his own. Living downtown for 7 years, skateboarders and sandwich delivery bikers used to be a menace. The scooters riders present a whole new echelon of outright, proven catastrophe for peds AND their animals on leashes obeying all laws. We stop suddenly and the scooter riders can’t pivot or break fast enough and everyone collides. It’s maddening and it must be regulated!
I live downtown and cannot stand the lack of consideration by the people on these scooters. I walk the riverwalk daily and every day someone “scoots” their way oblivious to others walking the narrow sidewalks. I refuse to move and force them to stop and slow down. One day these scooter users will fall into the river. Also they are just parked at random sites, in the middle of sidewalks, doorways, bus stops, park grass, and on and on and on. I get the fad and the excitement, yadi yadi, but the lack of respect and consideration has gone out the window with these scooters. They currently are an eyesore and dangerous to the casual walker.
Dear Coumcilman Saldana: Why do you think they call them sideWALKS? I guess we should no be surprised that a guy who couldn’t even get his own South San ISD voters to for his school tax bond issue doesn’t know that a narrow downtown sidewalk is meant for WALKING!
Gosh, would it be totally crazy to have considered these things and looked at other cities and CREATED THE RULES AND REGS FIRST? BEFORE ALLOWING THEM ONTO BUSY SIDEWALKS……..OR STREETS?????
Sounds like “ambulance chasers” heaven coming to SA vs. the City’s tax money (ours) They need a little bell or beep to warn people from behind too. and parking rules for sidewalks. They should not be allowed on River Walk.
They should be dealt with like any other motorized transporation device: on the road.
In my view, ANY wheeled transportation device outside of those required for disabilities should use the bike lanes and roadways. Motorists who do not respect bike lanes/bikers’ rights on raodways should be heavily fined. Skate boarders, skaters, scooters (motorized or otherwise), bikes, should be similarly fined if using the sideWALKS. We need to separate foot and wheeled traffic.
i am a former sapd bike patrol instructor, an i am trying to understand why san antonio‘s city manger & this city council would have really bone headed this! now there 4 company’s rooted in san antonio to date!
im concerned about wheel chairs an people walking on city sidewalk an being shoved off sidewalks due to the types of people that try to ride them!
there are some really considerate people operating them property, while some of the people suffering from SPS,well they cause issues in neighborhoods, and leave these damn things all over the sidewalk, i am awaiting a new power chair, so i have up use crutches when i go out.
they block the sidewalks when the „“bird“ crap is all overthrow place, and i even was transported via ems to an area er due to falling an banging my head on concrete!
this city has done some dumb things in the past like putting the st marys strip in just to these wants be like austin, now there severely disrupting neighborhoods around st marys! then in 18, once again san antonio officials allowed these scooters in to san antonio, so they could be like austin!
what’s up with this city??? i can only see the people who run san antonio have a very poor outlook of san antonio!
it seems people in office are ashamed of the city of san antonio, an of it’s people!
if they want to be like austin, change the name of this city to the city of wants be austin # 2 or south austin ( way south) !!!‘
it’s ashamed the people on power want to be like another city, well move to austin an get out of san antonio!
our people are austin wants bees, with no regard for the citizens in the area they target, just like they did b 4 they built the alamo dome!
and the meeting on october 4 did not do anything to regulate these scooters!
like they put the cart before the horse!
i hope they will have another meeting to resolve this issues, before the next two years pass by, like this city’s in charge including council personal n city manager!!!