How Do E-scooters Fit Within the Transportation Landscape?
October 18, 2023
I just arrived in San Francisco for the Micromobility America conference, where I’ll meet entrepreneurs, advocates, and policymakers working on decarbonizing our transportation sector via human and electric powered, small vehicles.
Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI) released a new report, saying that “even under the most ambitious emissions-reduction scenarios (with electrifying vehicles), the United States must also reduce vehicle miles traveled (VMT) by 20 percent before the end of the decade to stay on course for a 1.5 degree C future.” It goes on to recommend e-bikes as the key solution. As much as e-bikes are getting the deserved attention, and I’m a happy, proud owner of a cargo e-bike, I’d like to take a step back and look at how e-scooters can fit in with this larger, crucial transition to EVs and biking, walking, and transit in the U.S.
Currently, e-scooters do not neatly fit in the category of “active transportation” or “active mobility,” and the urgently needed local and state incentives under the “e-bike” tag do not yet consider e-scooters.
Even though everyone I know who has ridden an e-scooter has loved it, the reality is that across the wider public, there are still mixed reviews and controversy with regards to e-scooters; are they safe for riders and pedestrians? Are they really that sustainable?
A lot of this pause and concern from policymakers and administrators is largely attributed to the poor and unannounced rollout of shared e-scooter programs in cities and campuses around the country several years ago. Shared e-scooters are still widely available in many major U.S. cities, but there are more bans in place than there were prior to 2020 and stricter requirements for operators competing for limited permits in these cities, has led to consolidation and profitability challenges.
I believe that e-scooters as a force for reducing emissions and congestion deserves a second look from state and city policymakers. When it comes to addressing safety and sustainability, e-scooter design has evolved into larger, safer, and more durable vehicles as compared to the initial models deployed on city streets, starting in 2017. A recent study in the UK discovered that emissions were reduced by 45% when trips were replaced by shared e-scooters. Still, personally owned e-scooters are much more sustainable, due to a longer lifespan and zero emissions for rebalancing scooters.
Ultimately, we need to figure out ways to reduce car use as cities become more congested, and there is a growing need to reduce emissions and improve air quality. More space is being redesigned for people walking, biking, and rolling which can be further activated if financial incentives are enacted beyond e-bikes and are also applied to e-scooters - enabling more of these micromobility options for people to buy, rent, lease, or share.
Contrary to the marketing from the auto industry, not being dependent on driving a car in a major city is increasingly becoming freedom. Especially for the younger generation, there’s much less interest in driving, as they grow up with the increasing capability to have micromobility vehicles as options to move around their community and experience the freedom that they provide.
There is no single solution for solving the reduction in VMT (vehicle miles traveled) in cities, but as the RMI report discovered, if 25% of short vehicle trips (5 miles or under) shifted from cars to e-bikes in the 10 largest cities in 2024, it would be estimated as the equivalent of removing 388,000 vehicles from the road, or put another way, “avoiding 4 natural gas plants over the course of a year.”
E-scooters can and should be a part of reducing car trips as well, potentially shifting a group of people that prefer not to bike, and instead use a scooter. The following 3 strategies for including e-scooters in the mix are crucial:
Incentivizing the purchase and lease (subscription) of e-scooters
Building secure parking and charging access in buildings for e-scooters and e-bikes
Expanding partnerships with employers, real estate developers/owners/landlords, hotels, campuses, and other private property owners to host and make e-scooters and e-bikes available to employees, residents, and guests.
As bicycling data continues to improve, we should also ensure that e-scooters are being counted as well. Digital traffic counters are not able to distinguish e-scooters in comparison to bikes and e-bikes, so when conducting research on the potential for transportation emission reduction, the category should be broadened from bikes/e-bikes and active transportation to include e-scooters and other forms of micromobility.
Nonetheless, it's encouraging to see the growth in trips taken by bicycle in the U.S. (37% increase from 2019 to 2022), especially in the largest cities - New York City seeing close to a 100% increase, and Chicago and Los Angeles seeing over 50% increases in the last 3 years. I expect we'll see continuous growth in most major cities in the coming years and hope that all of the policy levers and incentives, and creativity is used for getting people on more bikes, e-bikes and e-scooters.
