Alayne McGregor
Updated November 19 to include a link to the city survey on the e-scooter pilot.
The three companies which rented e-scooters in Ottawa this summer, all want to return next year after what they describe as a highly successful first season. But their riders have left a bad impression with some Centretown residents.
The e-scooter pilot, which ran from July 16 to October 31, attracted more than 60,700 unique riders making more than 221,600 trips, according to the city. Riders could choose among three companies – Bird, Lime, and Roll – and book and pay for the scooters using their smartphones.
The pilot ended up covering the Ottawa’s central neighbourhoods, from Island Park Drive/Westboro to the Rideau River, and from the Ottawa River to Lansdowne Park. The area was slightly expanded during the pilot. The scooters were electronically prevented from being ridden on NCC paths or roads.
The most popular area for e-scooters was Centretown.
“Centretown was the hub of all [e-scooter] traffic,” said Austin Spademan, Bird’s assistant general manager for Ottawa. “It was the central meeting point and the glue between all the different communities.”
The most common complaints about the scooters were their risk to pedestrians: would users ride them on sidewalks or leave them blocking sidewalks?
High-speed weaving and buzzing
The BUZZ asked its readers what they’d seen, and we received only critical emails.
For example, Diane Bassett recounted how in mid-October she was buzzed by an e-scooter rider on the Metcalfe Street sidewalk, who passed her very closely without slowing.
“Then just as quickly, the young man crossed in front of me, and went onto the road, obliviously, going against the traffic. He continued for a short distance, and then repeated exactly as he had done with me, with another person, going onto the sidewalk, behind the individual, buzzing them from the right, crossing in front of them, back onto the road, and then continued south for a short distance. Only to repeat the sequence of ‘zig-zag’ events, two or three more times.”
Daniel Coates said he had similar experiences of e-scooter riders aggressively travelling at high speeds “weaving into and out of pedestrian traffic, with absolutely no notice or warning,” adding to the problems he already faced with cyclists on sidewalks. He was also concerned at a lack of police enforcement.
Lisa Freeman said she supported e-scooters in theory as another semi-active transport option. “In practice, though, I was mostly impeded and endangered by them. I was optimistic and excited about the idea, but I don’t think it worked, and don’t want to see it for another season.
“I mostly cycle and walk, and in the cycle lanes the people on scooters are less predictable than people on bikes. This makes them dangerous to pass, and also makes intersections more challenging as people using them would often stop and hop off, or enter on one from a crosswalk, without warning. When walking, many many times the scooters were left blocking my path, which is a challenge as I use walking aids. … This would make it impossible to pass for those with carts, strollers, or wheelchairs!”
Addie Crawford said she recently saw two scooter riders coming straight at her on the sidewalk on Bank Street (see her letter on page 2).
And Brian Goldstein sent The BUZZ a photo of a scooter parked in the middle of a sidewalk on Lisgar Street on October 21. Goldstein said this was a very common sight in Centretown and was a hazard for those with poor eyesight. He said he also saw a large percentage of e-scooter riders using sidewalks.
A great year for the e-scooters
The BUZZ interviewed representatives from all three companies. All said they were very happy with their 2020 results.
“In a word – it was stellar!” said Austin Spademan, Bird’s assistant general manager for Ottawa. “We were floored at the demand from the residents of Ottawa. The usage, even in a time when there wasn’t much in-office work, was outstanding. It felt like overnight it became part of the city’s cultural fabric.” Bird Canada had the highest e-scooter usage in Ottawa, with about 40,000 users making 160,000 trips.
Jonathan Hopkins, the director of Strategic Development, Canada & NW US for Lime, said the scooters had been “fabulously popular” in Ottawa, and above the usage in other cities.
Roll didn’t launch until the end of August, but co-founder Arda Ertürk said overall the response exceeded their expectations.
Spademan said the scooters attracted three types of riders: commuters into downtown; people shopping at restaurants and stores in local business districts; and recreational riders and tourists. Each group comprised about one-third of Bird riders. Roll and Lime reported similar usage.
All three companies touted their scooters as a green alternative to private car use. But Ertürk was blunter: “People are afraid of getting on the bus or train, but this provides a really great opportunity to commute while practicing social distancing.”
The scooters were still being used by commuters during the cold snap in October when overnight temperatures dipped to -10C, Spademan noted.
Alternative parking places?
Many riders used the e-scooters to get to LRT stations, Pimisi being particularly popular. Next year, Spademan said, Bird would like demarcated areas near LRT stations for scooter parking because of problems with scooters blocking bus stops.
Currently, scooters are parked in the utility area between the sidewalk and the road. As an alternative, “Edmonton and Calgary have rolled out a couple dozen [on-road scooter corrals]. That’s an approach that works in the densest areas. It wouldn’t be an efficient use of resources in a residential area 5km outside of downtown,” Hopkins said.
Ertürk said that Calgary had some designated parking areas and, if Roll riders parked in those areas, they received an incentive. But “the whole point of these scooters is convenience. So requiring designated areas would be a barrier to that convenient use, but having them as an option as we did in Calgary would be a help.”
Handling complaints
Complaints came in to the operators via the city’s 3-1-1 service and social media, plus phone calls and emails. They were primarily about parking and riding on sidewalks.
By October, the majority of riders were experienced users, Spademan said, and there was a “huge reduction in instances of bad parking and complaints as a result because the users get it.”
Bird received 50 complaints during the trial, he said, mostly about parking. Most occurred in the first six weeks of the trial; they received fewer than five in October. “Our average response time [to move a scooter] once we got a tweet, was eight minutes.”
Spademan said he talked to Centretowners and heard there was a problem with sidewalk riding on Elgin. He started talking with riders, “and it was because they didn’t know, and they felt nervous driving on the road. That’s a learning thing – and so I created the Safe Streets Team.”
From Thursday to Sunday each week this summer, he said, that team walked key streets like Bank, Elgin, Wellington Street West, Preston, and ByWard. They’d talk to riders about the rules. Those who rode on the sidewalk or parked improperly would get one warning – and then they were permanently suspended from the Bird app. Thirteen businesses on Elgin wrote a letter to the city saying they’d noticed a huge improvement in behaviour after the team was deployed.
During periods of high use and in popular areas, Hopkins said, Lime had a team out on patrol, sometimes on scooters. They helped people having trouble and looked for misparked scooters. “If we get a complaint of a scooter blocking a sidewalk, we can dispatch them or someone from the warehouse.”
Ertürk said that Roll required users to make a photo of their parked scooter in order to end their trips. “We analyzed these pictures [either manually or] based on machine learning and artificial intelligence models. If we detect that it’s blocking the sidewalk, we fine the rider. And if you keep not parking properly, we ban you.”
The company also had a Roll Squad on the streets “helping people, distributing helmets, giving the proper education on how to ride and how to park.”
Roll received seven reparking requests “The reason it’s low is that our Roll squad also patrolled. They relocated many more than seven.”
Ertürk said Roll addressed sidewalk riding by educating riders through in-app messages, social media, and the Roll Squad, and working with accessibility advocacy groups like the CNIB. “The city saw sidewalk riding in some zones like Bank Street so they asked us to focus on that area in terms of our patrol team to educate riders. After a week, they received a lot of feedback from BIAs and local businesses thanking the city and the operators.”
He said they’re also working on technological solutions like alarms that would warn pedestrians if a scooter was approaching, and hoped to have these in Ottawa next year.
More scooters, wider area
All three companies were enthusiastic about returning to Ottawa in 2021, but would like to field more scooters and serve a wider area, particularly for commuters.
“In any city there will be more trips downtown but sometimes there’s even greater utility outside downtown where it’s further in between bus lines or people trying to take scooters to the O-Train [LRT stations],” Hopkins said.
“We would like to take what we learned from the pilot and use that next year,” Spademan said. He would deploy his Safe Streets team early in the spring, and inform residents of how to reach scooter providers.
Ertürk and Spademan wanted access to NCC pathways in 2021, both for recreational riding and commuting. Spademan said, “With e-scooter riders I’m finding that a big barrier is that they’re afraid to be in mixed traffic on streets. Providing a trail like the NCC Ottawa River trail is big on building up their confidence to then get into mixed traffic.”
The city says that staff will be reviewing the pilot and the feedback from all stakeholders. Spademan said the city will also be conducting a survey of both riders and general residents about the pilot, including discovering how many car trips were replaced by scooter trips.
Update November 19: The city survey is now open for comments. You can access it at s-ca.chkmkt.com/?e=212929&h=9081C326EFF17AD&l=en .
City staff will bring forward a report on year one of the pilot to Transportation Committee in early 2021.
Want to have your feedback included? Email city e-scooter coordinator Kathleen Wilker at kathleen.wilker@ottawa.ca.