KCRag Forum

KCPowercat wrote: ↑Mon Aug 13, 2018 8:02 pm Let's put in more mobility lanes if we are super concerned.... Riders will use them.

Like everything else, enforcement is key.

Yes let's risk rank pedestrian dangers and start enforcing highest risk ones.... Scooter enforcement should come around 2023.

KCPowercat wrote: ↑Mon Aug 13, 2018 8:22 pm Yes let's risk rank pedestrian dangers and start enforcing highest risk ones.... Scooter enforcement should come around 2023.

I hear ya, but if there's zero enforcement for riding on sidewalks there WILL be backlash when these operators expand. It's happened everywhere else.

KCPowercat wrote: ↑Mon Aug 13, 2018 8:22 pm Yes let's risk rank pedestrian dangers and start enforcing highest risk ones.... Scooter enforcement should come around 2023.

The changes needed for one group aren’t exclusive from others.

Call scooters a catalyst for general change. They’re highlighting how a lack of effort to provide the third tier of road space properly is coming back to bite the city. Banning doesn’t solve the overall problem.

Like it’s fair to put scooters in the streeet but in the bike lane would be better. But a good bike lane comes with a skinnier road and we don’t want road work signs in the sidewalk or bike lane after that plus there’s a lot of people focusing on bad utility box displine and street tree space. So providing better and wider sidewalk designs with bump outs and extra width can give extra space for all those things without hurting peds.

Then you focus on real protected bike lanes and cycle tracks and force wheeled users into them.

And after that, you add extra on street parking to reduce parking lot needs by moving from four lanes to three lanes with a row of parking.

Used the scooters a few times last week.
Since I never bike downtown this was really my first time being in the street and bike lanes. We need more bike lanes!

While I have almost been hit by scooters twice so far as a pedestrian, I am not 100% convinced that the scooters should be forced into the streets at all times. There are plenty of streets which felt too busy and car filled to allow for safe scootering. I think it’s unfair of us to ticket people for riding on sidewalks but not provide a safe alternative for them. I’d rather see a transition once we build more bike lanes and install more traffic calming measures. Additionally, many sidewalks are empty during the day and at other odd hours.

On another note...
How many Birds does KC have so far? It still doesn’t feel like we have enough to truly serve as a transit method.... Also, it doesn’t seem like many Birds if any are avalible at night. Is that the same in other cities?

DaveKCMO wrote: ↑Mon Aug 13, 2018 10:30 pm

KCPowercat wrote: ↑Mon Aug 13, 2018 8:22 pm Yes let's risk rank pedestrian dangers and start enforcing highest risk ones.... Scooter enforcement should come around 2023.

I hear ya, but if there's zero enforcement for riding on sidewalks there WILL be backlash when these operators expand. It's happened everywhere else.

I don't understand why these scooters create such vitriol? I mean we all know how poor the pedestrian experience has been in kc...i just can't wrap my head around what makes scooters the straw that breaks the camels back.

In some ways I like they are making people respect sidewalks and pedestrians but in other ways I feel like it would be a complete joke to enforce some sort of penalty on people riding in the sidewalk when we have had bikes on sidewalks (including kcpd) for decades, sidewalks broken, closed, etc etc.

What I could get behind is a comprehensive enforcement package for all types of pedestrian dangers. Construction sign blocking ADA ramp or sidewalk? Fine. Closed sidewalk without permit? Fine. Let's do it the right way, not look like we are singling out one thing.... Because it's new and confusing to some.

Would like to see enforcement of sidewalks along streetcar and wherever there are bike paths but otherwise rider etiquette should be to stay off busy sidewalks or if people seen walking up ahead (or ride very slowly). Mixed feelings about making Main through downtown a red zone but riders should use Walnut or Baltimore instead of Main, easy enough to get on Walnut/Baltimore and streets much more scooter friendly.

Bird expansion happened. Well over 200 on map this morning, but hard to tell how many. W39th has a lot along the stretch this morning. Surprising that Armour has zero nests. Where's Lime?

KCPowercat wrote: ↑Tue Aug 14, 2018 7:10 am

DaveKCMO wrote: ↑Mon Aug 13, 2018 10:30 pm

KCPowercat wrote: ↑Mon Aug 13, 2018 8:22 pm Yes let's risk rank pedestrian dangers and start enforcing highest risk ones.... Scooter enforcement should come around 2023.

I hear ya, but if there's zero enforcement for riding on sidewalks there WILL be backlash when these operators expand. It's happened everywhere else.

I don't understand why these scooters create such vitriol? I mean we all know how poor the pedestrian experience has been in kc...i just can't wrap my head around what makes scooters the straw that breaks the camels back.

Simple math - they effect everyone. Pedestrians don't want them on the sidewalks (mostly because people like to bitch about change) and cars don't want them in the street (mostly because people like to bitch period).

In the end, I hope it's just the newness of it all and we'll figure out how to co-exist. Just like cars and bikes have. OK, bad example.

KCPowercat wrote: ↑Tue Aug 14, 2018 7:10 am

DaveKCMO wrote: ↑Mon Aug 13, 2018 10:30 pm

KCPowercat wrote: ↑Mon Aug 13, 2018 8:22 pm Yes let's risk rank pedestrian dangers and start enforcing highest risk ones.... Scooter enforcement should come around 2023.

I hear ya, but if there's zero enforcement for riding on sidewalks there WILL be backlash when these operators expand. It's happened everywhere else.

I don't understand why these scooters create such vitriol? I mean we all know how poor the pedestrian experience has been in kc...i just can't wrap my head around what makes scooters the straw that breaks the camels back.

It has to do with the speeds spaces are for. Sidewalks are supposed to be for people moving at the speed of a person, with many people standing in the sidewalk. The average walker moves about 3mph. The fastest jogger isn't moving much more than 6mph and will vary their speed naturally around people.

These scooters can go 15mph as designed. The average cycling speed is 15mph and we don't accept bikes in the sidewalk because the speed difference is scary and sometimes dangerous.

The original 1901 Connecticut speed limit inside cities was 12mph to keep cars closer to the pedestrian scale.

WSPanic wrote: ↑Tue Aug 14, 2018 8:24 am

KCPowercat wrote: ↑Tue Aug 14, 2018 7:10 am

DaveKCMO wrote: ↑Mon Aug 13, 2018 10:30 pm

I hear ya, but if there's zero enforcement for riding on sidewalks there WILL be backlash when these operators expand. It's happened everywhere else.

I don't understand why these scooters create such vitriol? I mean we all know how poor the pedestrian experience has been in kc...i just can't wrap my head around what makes scooters the straw that breaks the camels back.

Simple math - they effect everyone. Pedestrians don't want them on the sidewalks (mostly because people like to bitch about change) and cars don't want them in the street (mostly because people like to bitch period).

In the end, I hope it's just the newness of it all and we'll figure out how to co-exist. Just like cars and bikes have. OK, bad example.

Change and newness are the only things I get as for reasoning... Frustrating they use walkability as their reasoning when anybody that walks at all knows how hilarious that is considering all the dangers.

Segway tours seem to not illicit such anger.... Guess it's just the sheer number of scooters (and we haven't got started yet)

KCPowercat wrote: ↑Tue Aug 14, 2018 9:19 am Segway tours seem to not illicit such anger.... Guess it's just the sheer number of scooters (and we haven't got started yet)

12.5 mph max. probably because they're so rare and rarely seen

KCPowercat wrote: ↑Tue Aug 14, 2018 9:19 am Segway tours seem to not illicit such anger.... Guess it's just the sheer number of scooters (and we haven't got started yet)

They have also not been blocked from riding on Plaza streets and sidewalks.

KCPowercat wrote: ↑Tue Aug 14, 2018 9:19 am Segway tours seem to not illicit such anger.... Guess it's just the sheer number of scooters (and we haven't got started yet)

I've never seen any segway tours other than maybe once on the shared usage path in Mill Creek Park. I didn't know it was still a thing.
If I saw them ripping down the sidewalk everyday, It would probably 'illicit such anger' in me.

benjaminkelley wrote: ↑Wed Aug 15, 2018 10:25 am

KCPowercat wrote: ↑Tue Aug 14, 2018 9:19 am Segway tours seem to not illicit such anger.... Guess it's just the sheer number of scooters (and we haven't got started yet)

I've never seen any segway tours other than maybe once on the shared usage path in Mill Creek Park. I didn't know it was still a thing.
If I saw them ripping down the sidewalk everyday, It would probably 'illicit such anger' in me.

Spotted at the Nelson on Sunday! I believe their tour office is on the plaza across from Houston's spot.

Went to the Plaza on Sunday to run an errand and was shocked at how many people were Pokemon hunting. No wonder the Plaza has banned scooters - there were HUNDREDS of people walking around with phones (some with multiple phones) corded to an extra battery and with ear phones/buds just wandering around without any regard to other pedestrians or traffic. There's no way these people and scooters could co-exist!

I thought this craze was over?!?!

KC had a pretty active Ingress community - and nearly all of them moved over to Pokemon Go.

So while the casual players have fallen away, the dedicated players are as active as ever...and summer weekend afternoons at the Plaza is a very popular location to meet up for coordinated Pokemon-ing.

benjaminkelley wrote: ↑Wed Aug 15, 2018 10:25 am

KCPowercat wrote: ↑Tue Aug 14, 2018 9:19 am Segway tours seem to not illicit such anger.... Guess it's just the sheer number of scooters (and we haven't got started yet)

I've never seen any segway tours other than maybe once on the shared usage path in Mill Creek Park. I didn't know it was still a thing.
If I saw them ripping down the sidewalk everyday, It would probably 'illicit such anger' in me.

I'd love to see some data to prove out this irrational anger of scooters.... But in my experience I'd bet anything it doesn't exist... This is a lot of anger for nothing.

i dont really care enough about Bird/Lime scooters enough to hate or love them, but i do "get" some aspects of the hate.

i think the car-centric "GET OUT OF THE ROAD" mentality is toxic and inane. but i do think there is some merit to reflexive suspicion or derision of these "tech bro"-derived "solutions" which arguably seem to just be playthings for milennials and (in other places more than KC) exacerbate gentrification and divisions in the community. See, e.g., http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la ... story.html In places like LA and the Bay Area, there is a very strong and probably justified horror at the impact of the tech mentality on aspects of the communities in which they exist--The idea that VC-flush 20somethings are sort of taking over everything - and, in the case of these scooters, often in rather reckless fashion, like by dumping dozens of scooters in a city and then dealing with getting "permission" later.

and yeah, the apparently-common illegal and unsafe usage of the Bird scooters is an issue. yeah yeah yeah, cars are dangerous, i get that, but cars were not simply dropped off in a city for use by people with no training or information at all. bird riders are going to hurt and kill themselves, and maybe others, and regardless of whose "fault" it is, the city and others will be sued.

not to mention the fact that these scooter-share companies seem (to my jaded eye) to be little more than a temporary cash/VC grab by entrepreneurs which will almost certainly not last.

KCPowercat wrote: ↑Wed Aug 15, 2018 12:09 pm I'd love to see some data to prove out this irrational anger of scooters.... But in my experience I'd bet anything it doesn't exist... This is a lot of anger for nothing.

Here's some data for you. IT IS ILLEGAL.
It's not like saying people wearing hats backwards makes me angry "you kids get off my lawn". This is an actual infraction of the law and counter to the rules of the platform, specifically.

Frankly, I don't care for the electric scooter craze in general I think it's dumb just like segways and those 3 wheeled motor cycles, but I'm not objecting to it, I'm only objecting to the open disregard for the rules of the platform AND the legality of where they are being ridden.
I feel the same way about bicycles(especially bcycles that have an obvious sticker saying not to do it) on the sidewalk.
The sidewalk is no place for anything faster than walking speed.