The Transportation and Mass Transit Megathread

[PaulChinetti]

Bird does this red "geofencing" in the app. But they've been gone since it showed up on the map. So I'm not entirely sure what it means.

Kinda defeats the purpose because who wouldn't want to take one downtown?

[SoundScan]

If other cities across the U.S. are any indication, the enforcement won't come from traditional law enforcement but from vigilantes.

[12Mouth]

I don't think this problem is ever going to be solved by enforcement alone (and perhaps not enforcement at all). People are riding on the sidewalk because they don't feel safe riding in the street. If we somehow force them to ride in the street, cars will start getting pissed off.

We have an infrastructure problem that hasn't really existed before. Nashville has cyclists (I am one) and bikeshare riders, but there really aren't enough of us to cause a major headache for motorists or pedestrians. The positive changes that Nashville has made over the past few years have been nice, but don't seem to be driven by current demand.

E-bikes and scooters will completely change this equation, and people will start getting injured if we don't radically re-think the use of public space and design protected and dedicated areas for sub 15mph transportation options all over the USD. As soon as we do that, (most) riders will get off the sidewalks.

[smeagolsfree]

8 hours ago, nashville_bound said:

............ yep

 

According to the agreement if I am not mistaken, leaving them on the sidewalk is grounds confiscating them. It is going to be the same ole same ole. It will be even worse when Bird hits the stret again too. I hate thes things.

[PaulChinetti]

This is what Lime says about leaving them. 

[PaulChinetti]

And Bird. 

But that above picture is better than some. It’s not the end of the world in my opinion. 

[smeagolsfree]

But they are in the right of way. Thats the point. A sidewalk is a right of way.

[Dale]

Interesting article on how America killed transit. Spoiler Alert: it wasn't Republicans ...

"What happened? Over the past hundred years the clearest cause is this: Transit providers in the U.S. have continually cut basic local service in a vain effort to improve their finances. But they only succeeded in driving riders and revenue away. When the transit service that cities provide is not attractive, the demand from passengers that might “justify” its improvement will never materialize."

https://www.citylab.com/transportation/2018/08/how-america-killed-transit/568825/

[SoundScan]

Good article, thanks for posting. TL;DR conclusion basically being: Go Big or Go Home on transit funding.

"The only way to reverse the vicious cycle in the U.S. is by providing better service up front. The riders might not come on day one, but numerous examples, from cities like Phoenix and Seattle, have shown that better service will attract more riders. This can, in turn, produce a virtuous cycle where more riders justify further improved service—as well as providing a stronger political base of support."

"A focus on improving local service is all the more important in an era where the White House and Congress are not very favorably disposed to transit, and well-funded lobby groups like those of the Koch brothers are spending millions to fight transit infrastructure spending. Even if the money to build new light rail lines isn’t coming from Washington, states and local governments absolutely can afford the comparatively small annual expenditure to run buses reasonably often, all day, every day, so that transit is a viable mode of transportation for all kinds of trips—not just 9-to-5 commuting. That has been proven around the world to be the way to attract riders to transit."

[Pdt2f]

13 hours ago, Dale said:

Interesting article on how America killed transit. Spoiler Alert: it wasn't Republicans ...

"What happened? Over the past hundred years the clearest cause is this: Transit providers in the U.S. have continually cut basic local service in a vain effort to improve their finances. But they only succeeded in driving riders and revenue away. When the transit service that cities provide is not attractive, the demand from passengers that might “justify” its improvement will never materialize."

https://www.citylab.com/transportation/2018/08/how-america-killed-transit/568825/

Thank you for posting this. It kind of brings up the question I had for lots of people who opposed the transit referendum for reasons of big-government: “who do you think built these interstates you’re so in love with? You think they just spring out of the fine Tennessee soil?” 

[Dale]

9 hours ago, Pdt2f said:

Thank you for posting this. It kind of brings up the question I had for lots of people who opposed the transit referendum for reasons of big-government: “who do you think built these interstates you’re so in love with? You think they just spring out of the fine Tennessee soil?” 

That's not exactly what I got from the article. I got: (1) cars (2) the way Americans took to cars.

[e-dub]

In doing my rounds this morning, I noticed a couple things:

 

1. It seems Bird is going after the Downtown market. I saw WAY more Birds than Limes Downtown.

2. Lime appears to be focusing on the Gulch and Downtown.

3. Lime is clobbering Bird. I saw lots of Birds parked... but far more Limes in use.

[volsfanwill]

http://Bird Cages: Tactical Urbanists Spray Paint Parking Spaces for Electric Scooters https://99percentinvisible.org/article/bird-cages-tactical-urbanists-spray-paint-parking-spaces-for-electric-scooters/

 

Interesting article. "bird cages" haha

[Pdt2f]

4 hours ago, e-dub said:

In doing my rounds this morning, I noticed a couple things:

 

1. It seems Bird is going after the Downtown market. I saw WAY more Birds than Limes Downtown.

2. Lime appears to be focusing on the Gulch and Downtown.

3. Lime is clobbering Bird. I saw lots of Birds parked... but far more Limes in use.

I saw a Lime in front of Olmsted on 5th at like 1 last night. Seems like that’s the perfect market for those, besides tourists: downtown residents who are just popping across downtown to pick up some food or something. 

[Neigeville2]

11 hours ago, Dale said:

That's not exactly what I got from the article. I got: (1) cars (2) the way Americans took to cars.

You mean the way Post-War  Americans took to debt.  But if you didn't get the failure of public transit to keep up service levels you kind of missed the point of the whole article.

[smeagolsfree]

Walking downtown yesterday I will have to say there is no difference with Bird and Lime from what is was before the ban. People riding them on the sidewalks and parking them on the sidewalks. 

 

Ask me if I get out of their way.......well no. I have the right of way as a couple were riding right toward me and wanted to use the handicap crossing.  Coming at me at 15 mph, they just had to wait on me.

[Guest]

metro/cops are going to have start writing tickets and pulling over riders to have any effect....also I am sure several SUI (scootering under the influence)  infractions are occurring ...saw several yesterday. ha

[12Mouth]

20 minutes ago, nashville_bound said:

metro/cops are going to have start writing tickets and pulling over riders to have any effect....also I am sure several SUI (scootering under the influence)  infractions are occurring ...saw several yesterday. ha

I think this could have a marginal effect, but so many riders seem to be tourists (and likely first time riders with no clue) that I'm skeptical that this will help significantly.  Maybe if they are just downtown and are really loud about the ticketing? But they would need to be doing this constantly and indefinitely. As I have said before, infrastructure is the solution. I was in downtown Indianapolis before they temporarily banned  Lime and Bird and everyone (literally all demographics kids to senior citizens) was riding these on the protected multi use paths that they have all over the city (which run parallel to sidewalks all over downtown). I was walking all over the city and never felt threatened as a pedestrian. In areas where multi use paths did not exist, the sidewalks were super wide to accommodate. I'm sure we have significantly higher pedestrian density in certain areas, but maybe we need wide scooter/bike lanes protected by planters on Broadway. The more infrastructure we can create to make it easy for scooter riders, the more we can contain them. 

Regarding parking/blocking sidewalks, here is a bill amendment idea - what if we create street parking areas for bikes and scooters around the city in key spots and require sharing companies to add a parking surcharge of a few bucks to all riders in certain areas (particularly downtown) that don't choose to park in one of the designated areas? You could apply the charge as soon as they are within a certain geofenced area, and the tech is there to show that you are in a designated parking area (i.e. scan a code on the ground with the app to trigger the refund).  I think that if the price was right to properly incentivize, people would park in the proper area and walk a block to save a few bucks.

I haven't fully thought this through, so I await your constructive criticism. 

[smeagolsfree]

Indy has a lot of protected bike lanes in the downtown area which is great, however Nashville does not have that luxery as Indy is on a grid  with wide roads and Nashville is not. When I was up in Indy over Memorial day, there were few if any people I saw riding Birds. Lots of folks on bikes, but Nashville has 10 to 20 times the number of tourist on any given day.

I walked almost 10 miles in one day there and no issues except with the ocational bike. Almost saw a biker get hit by someone pulling out of a parking lot.

[12Mouth]

35 minutes ago, smeagolsfree said:

Indy has a lot of protected bike lanes in the downtown area which is great, however Nashville does not have that luxery as Indy is on a grid  with wide roads and Nashville is not. When I was up in Indy over Memorial day, there were few if any people I saw riding Birds. Lots of folks on bikes, but Nashville has 10 to 20 times the number of tourist on any given day.

I walked almost 10 miles in one day there and no issues except with the ocational bike. Almost saw a biker get hit by someone pulling out of a parking lot.

Understood, but they didn't launch in Indianapolis until June, so you would have missed them. They were absolutely everywhere in June until they were kicked out. I'm just saying that ticketing scooter riders will probably not work very well, so we can choose to either embrace them, through some combination of regulation, enforcement, and infrastructure build out, reluctantly live with them while they fly down the sidewalk, or kick them out.  Our grid is certainly more challenging than Indy's, but we also choose to give cars a lot of space (either for parking or driving). I think that giving cars this much space, particularly for street parking, is a poor use of resources.

[Pdt2f]

1 hour ago, 12Mouth said:

Understood, but they didn't launch in Indianapolis until June, so you would have missed them. They were absolutely everywhere in June until they were kicked out. I'm just saying that ticketing scooter riders will probably not work very well, so we can choose to either embrace them, through some combination of regulation, enforcement, and infrastructure build out, reluctantly live with them while they fly down the sidewalk, or kick them out.  Our grid is certainly more challenging than Indy's, but we also choose to give cars a lot of space (either for parking or driving). I think that giving cars this much space, particularly for street parking, is a poor use of resources.

Either that or people will take it upon themselves to simply launch the scooters into the closest dumpster or river whenever they come across them. 

[Mr_Bond]

8 hours ago, smeagolsfree said:

Walking downtown yesterday I will have to say there is no difference with Bird and Lime from what is was before the ban. People riding them on the sidewalks and parking them on the sidewalks. 

 

Ask me if I get out of their way.......well no. I have the right of way as a couple were riding right toward me and wanted to use the handicap crossing.  Coming at me at 15 mph, they just had to wait on me.

Several times today I've seen scooter drivers moving slowly down the sidewalk, just a bit faster than a walk, and being courteous about it.  These don't bother me like those throttle-wide-open daredevils flying through The Gulch.

[fishsticks176]

Their first day back, I saw two wipeouts on scooters from people trying to hop curbs, I saw several driving down the middle of the road, and I almost hit one while making a turn—they shot out from a crowd of people without even pausing before flying through the crosswalk in front of me. In general I love the idea of these scooters but the problem is people in general, whether they are on scooters, on foot, or behind the wheel. I was stuck in traffic downtown a couple weeks ago, moving about five mph, and a drunk tourist was weaving his way through the traffic on foot, stumbled, and ran head-first into the side of my car. I see groups of dozens of people just congregating in the street, five feet off of an empty sidewalk. Last night I watched a rogue bachelorette run into the middle of their intersection at 5th and Demonbreun and begin “directing” traffic like a police officer while her pals stood on the sidewalk laughing at her antics. The amount of jaywalking downtown is starting to drive me nuts—a couple weeks ago I was held up for twenty minutes at a light because of a steady stream of tourists who refused to heed the traffic signals and continued to walk across under a green light, backing traffic up for blocks. When I finally got to the light, I rolled down my window and explained, “You guys HAVE to obey the pedestrian crossing signals! You’re backing traffic up for blocks!” and was met with the entire crowd of literally about fifty people shouting “F*ck you!”, and one clueless rube saying “it’s a crosswalk!” I’ve been a downtown pedestrian myself, and I’m from NYC originally—I understand timed, responsible jaywalking, and this is not that. I know I don’t even have to go into how bad the drivers can be downtown. I watched two pedestrians get hit at low speed on Saturday because the driver was turning left while texting. Gangs of teenagers speeding through red lights on quads and dirt bikes. I took a video (which was kind of funny, actually, while still being ridiculously annoying) of two cars who stopped in the middle of 2nd ave, got out and danced for a few minutes while flipping off the countless cars that they had trapped behind them. There was a wide open road in front of them and they intentionally trapped everyone else at a stand-still for five minutes. 

Im torn on this issue. While I love that Nashville is a place that people want to visit, and while I love the growth that our tourism has caused in our city, the relatively recent availability of low-budget tourism has really enabled an element of people who, as that HuffPo article put it, “Come to this city, throw up on it, and leave”. As an occasional Uber driver, I’ve had a handful of tourist groups literally say to me, “We’re gonna f*ck this place up! No one knows me here, I don’t give a f*ck!” 

Many prominent tourist destinations around the world are following Bhutan’s example of controlling the destruction of tourism by capping the number of tourists or imposing fees simply for entry and/or on a per-day basis. We have similar systems for many parts of our national parks, but no such systems for urban environments. I’m not advocating for putting a cap on the amount of tourists let in or for imposing fees in an attempt to secure a higher class of tourists—I just think that it’s interesting (and concerning) that this is a problem felt the world over, and that we’re witnessing a very very small slice of it here at home. I mean, we don’t have people scratching their names into Stonehenge or doing Yoga on a holocaust memorial or toppling ancient rock formations, but we do have tourists breaking into the houses neigjboring their AirBnBs and climbing La Musica and disrespecting our neighborhoods, streets, and businesses.

 

I don’t know, rant over, I guess. My point is that the scooters themselves are not the issue, just another expression of the issue, which is a complete lack of respect and responsibility for one’s environment and which I’m sure is magnified by the anonymity enjoyed while on vacation away from home.

[FrankNash]

New Orleans, Miami, Key West, and Nashville are party towns where chaos is part of the allure. 

[smeagolsfree]

What ya want to bet Lime and Bird are banned again. There was an article on News2 tonight saying what I have been seeing. This is from a hotel manager. We just have too many visiting idiots for these things to work here.