SCOOTERS: White Center arrivals; Seattle discussion details

Suddenly, scooter-sharing is front and center, after a while on the back-burner.

WHITE CENTER PILOT PROGRAM BEGINS: We were in White Center as Lime delivered its first scooters this morning, on the first day of its pilot program, following Friday night’s announcement. More on our partner site White Center Now.

Meantime, Seattle is suddenly gearing up for its own launch, and we know more about the West Seattle component:

SEATTLE DISCUSSION WEDNESDAY: That is a page from the slide deck accompanying the agenda for Wednesday morning’s City Council Transportation Committee meeting, at which the city’s long-proposed scooter pilot will be discussed. Though it’s been in the works since long before the West Seattle Bridge closure, it’s now being partly spun as a WS mobility solution. The discussion of the overall plan and accompanying legislation is set for the committee’s 9:30 am Wednesday (August 19th) meeting; the agenda’s cover page explains how and when to sign up for public comment, as well as how to watch/listen to the meeting. The slide deck linked above, meantime, answers some FAQs such as where you can ride/park them.

69 Replies to "SCOOTERS: White Center arrivals; Seattle discussion details"

  • Matt August 17, 2020 (1:43 pm)

    We don’t get a new bridge but we get scooters? Seems like a fair trade. 

    • WSB August 17, 2020 (2:36 pm)

      There has been no decision yet on bridge replacement vs. repair. That’s due in fall.

    • Henrythepainter August 17, 2020 (7:39 pm)

      Sad !!!  But funny 

  • Igor Duckman August 17, 2020 (1:50 pm)

    Scooters? Bicycles? The year is 2020 and instead of getting serious proposals and real solutions to transportation issues in this city, we’re getting scooters as a straight face alternative for the West Seattle transportation debacle?It’s now been 5 months since the bridge closure. Has anything been done at the W Marginal / Highland Park intersection to solve its gridlock? Has the completely pointless and unnecessary one lane reduction at the Duwamish Cultural Center been reversed? Has anything been done on Spokane St under the west part of the bridge in order to expand the number of lanes before the 5-way intersection?Is the high bridge in danger of an immediate collapse? If not, then why can’t it be used for emergency vehicles and buses only, leaving the draw bridge open to general traffic? If yes, then no traffic should be allowed on the draw bridge either…But no, all we get is social engineering pipe dreams of scooters and bicycles in the city on hills where it rains 6 months a year, with an aging population.

    • WSB August 17, 2020 (2:35 pm)

      Many of those points have long since been addressed. One example: The short lane reduction at the Longhouse is not “pointless.” It’s part of a safety project that has more components which will take a while.

      • PJ August 17, 2020 (3:28 pm)

        Safety? Safety for whom?  For the non-existent throngs of people crossing back and forth on West Marginal in front of the cultural center?  How about the safety of drivers and passengers that is threatened by the sudden and pointless throttling of the lanes on West Marginal?

        • WSB August 17, 2020 (3:36 pm)

          No throngs crossing the street right now because the pandemic has put events and programs on hold. Scroll down this page to read about the safety project.
          https://www.duwamishtribe.org/advocacy

      • Igor Duckman August 17, 2020 (3:43 pm)

        With all due respect, this type of a dismissive answer is typical for the political class that treats the voters as the semi-literate lumpen-proletariat that can only be ruled by a decree and/or opportunist populists. Please don’t regurgitate their talking points, especially not with a Seattle-universal “safety” panacea. You are the West Seattle Blog, not Fox News for the City Council or the SDOT.As for the points that have been “addressed”, that will sure come as great comfort to all those stuck in the W Marginal rush hour. Sure, you may be there for an hour each way, but the points have been addressed, so there… and while you’re there, think about how safe you are in your one lane, with a 25 mph speed limit. Also, here’s a scooter in place of a bridge that by now would have been demolished and built from scratch if we treated it as a real emergency and opened a bidding process to foreign builders without unreasonable bureaucratic obstacles.The only part of your reply that rings true is “will take a while”.

        • WSB August 17, 2020 (4:18 pm)

          @Igor – Answering with information (on something we have reported on multiple times) is not dismissive. It’s factual. You might not like the answer, but it’s the truth – the change there is part of a safety project, and the city has said it’s not going to be reconsidered. Doesn’t mean that’s the final word, but it’s where things stand.

          • Elton August 18, 2020 (11:09 pm)

            Projecting much, Igor? WSB is not using opinionated language – if SDOT (I assume) and the Duwamish Tribe calls it a safety project it’s a safety project. You can argue that it doesn’t make you feel safer, that doesn’t mean that WSB should call it random-project-that-Igor-doesn’t-like instead of a safety project. To call it something different would be WSB editorializing.

    • Jort August 17, 2020 (3:12 pm)

      Um, it’s literally impossible to “solve” gridlock. Scooters and bicycles are, indeed, an alternative transportation method that has worked in countless cities all around the world, and they will work in Seattle, too.

      • Eddie August 17, 2020 (4:28 pm)

        Look up the definition of “gridlock”. We are no where close. 10 or 20 or 30 minute delays in slow traffic are not “Gridlock”.

    • miws August 17, 2020 (3:25 pm)

      Igor Duckman, What is pointless and unnecessary about making access for pedestrians safer? What is pointless and unnecessary about making a change that the peoples who originally occupied this land had long lobbied for? —Mike

      • Igor Duckman August 17, 2020 (4:22 pm)

        MIWS: one of the reasons we have a majestic traffic gridlock in this city is this insistence on “safety” at the expense of everything else, but OK, let’s play: how exactly is anyone safer with two lanes merging into one? And who? I’ve yet to see a pedestrian around there. If you’re projecting some major future pedestrian traffic, fine, let’s build a pedestrian overpass. One lane instead of two makes as much sense as scooters as a mode of mass transportation.

        • WSJ August 17, 2020 (4:26 pm)

          Please tell me more about the “gridlock” in Seattle.

        • Ice August 17, 2020 (7:15 pm)

          It’s 2020 and your assumptions about how traffic works are based on 1920 logic.

    • WSJ August 17, 2020 (4:25 pm)

      “Send the buses over the broken bridge” pretty much makes the rest of your comment worthy of laughter.

      • Igor Duckman August 18, 2020 (11:00 am)

        Before you die of laughter, you might want to educate yourself about how bridges work. Around 70-80% of the bridge load is the bridge itself, while the remainder is the live load, i.e. vehicles. In the case of the WS bridge that has structural cracks, the experts have apparently decided that it is not in danger of imminent collapse. Therefore, a couple of buses per hour will add maybe 0.1% points to the 75% of the load the bridge already supports. Like I said, it is either the case of imminent structural collapse, in which case everything below it in the 500 yard radius should be evacuated immediately (including W Marginal and lower bridge), or no such danger, in which case a few buses per hour mean nothing.But sure, let’s go with scooters instead. That’s a much more sensible solution. Maybe throw in roller-blades, idk…

    • Question Mark August 17, 2020 (5:01 pm)

      Scooters take up less of the road than a car. So more people can flow in the same space. 

      • The King August 17, 2020 (5:37 pm)

        They’ll be a great way to spread germs too!! Yay…..no thanks. 

        • Don’t knock it till you try it August 17, 2020 (8:23 pm)

          Surfaces are not the main way covid spreads, and adults should hopefully be able to manage not touching dirty surfaces and then their face. Riding a scooter in the open air would seem to be safer than riding the bus during a pandemic.

    • Tim August 17, 2020 (5:19 pm)

      I have to add regarding pulling out of the Long House, what happened in the attached video has happened to me leaving their facility. Also once making a right  someone was speeding and tailgated me all the ways down West Marginal because they were put out. That’s two for two pulling out.  I started parking across the road to conduct my business at that site.  That’s also fun to run across.  

  • me August 17, 2020 (2:04 pm)

    We need bikes and scooters that older people can ride, I don’t know what that would be except it should be something easier to keep balanced.

    • WSB August 17, 2020 (2:33 pm)

      The slide deck has a page addressing that.

    • West Seattle since 1979 August 17, 2020 (4:36 pm)

      Those adult tricycles might be a good idea. I wonder if many people would use them though. 

  • Pam August 17, 2020 (2:13 pm)

    These are totally dangerous. From what I have read many people end up in the hospital due to injuries. If I’m not correct a person whose on tv just broke his back due to driving one of these electric scooters.So, please be safe if you rent one of these and remember that they are pedestrians 🚶‍♀️ walking with young children and dogs. And leave them in a responsible place when you are done riding them.

    • Steve August 17, 2020 (2:40 pm)

      Absolutely! This makes accessibility even worse for those with mobility issues. Judging by how reactive our city has become, it’s going to take quite a few head injuries (if not deaths) before safety measures are enforced.  

    • AMD August 17, 2020 (3:11 pm)

      No activity is completely injury-proof (450 people a year die falling out of bed).  Cities all over the United States have these already, and have for a long time without real issues.  This includes cities with bad traffic, high population density, hills, and rain; Seattle is not special.   If the scooters are fine everywhere else, there’s no reason to believe they won’t be fine here too.  If there does end up being a problem here, the issue is Seattleites, not the scooters.  But I don’t think we’re THAT bad.  Seriously, it will be fine.

      • Calires August 17, 2020 (5:16 pm)

        Actually, numerous cities worldwide have banned them for safety reasons.

    • Jort August 17, 2020 (3:13 pm)

      Pam, if you think these scooters are dangerous, just WAIT until you hear how many people are killed or seriously injured by people driving automobiles in America. Spoiler alert: it’s among the highest in the developed world. 

      • WSJ August 17, 2020 (4:27 pm)

        But she read that someone fell off one once!

      • Dunno August 17, 2020 (7:00 pm)

        OK, I’ll bite.   What’s the percentage as it correlates to riding these scooters and driving a car.   .ol   You are classic Jort!   Always entertaining.

    • aa August 17, 2020 (4:07 pm)

      I believe it turned out that Simon Cowell was riding an e bike that can go 60 mph

    • Don’t knock it till you try it August 17, 2020 (4:51 pm)

      Scooters are not more dangerous than cars on roadways.  Sadly many people have a false sense of security with cars, and a fear of trying new things.

      • wsguy123 August 17, 2020 (8:39 pm)

        My concern is pedestrians getting hit by scooters or pets/dogs but yeah you are right, a vehicle will do more damage to a body. My biggest concern is for the welfare of the scooter rider who will have no protection (except for maybe a helmet) from a collision with a vehicle or a bicycle/electric bike traveling at a high rate of speed. People have been killed or seriously injured in other cities when these things have been rolled out.

  • buttercup August 17, 2020 (2:54 pm)

    The person on TV was Simon Cowell and he was riding an electric bike not a scooter. Are these allowed to be driven on sidewalks? Are they supposed to wear helmets? What’s the top speed and can they be adjusted to maintain lower speed? Read stories of problems in other cities and amount of accidents and injuries.

    • WSB August 17, 2020 (3:40 pm)

      Lots of answers in the slide deck for those with questions: Re: sidewalks, no, unless they are part of a bike route.

  • candrewb August 17, 2020 (2:54 pm)

    Rode these on a work trip to Long Beach. I was a convert. Useless for going up hills though.

  • Eddie August 17, 2020 (3:09 pm)

    Keep them out of the bike lanes. All we need is more clueless people jacking around like 12 year olds instead of proceeding in a predictable and safe manner.

  • Todd August 17, 2020 (3:12 pm)

    Dont need Scooters , change Roxbury back to 4 lanes and Fix the holes on Roxbury NOW

    • Jort August 18, 2020 (10:19 am)

      Yeah, that’s not happening, even if you put “NOW” in all capital letters. Sorry!

  • Bob11 August 17, 2020 (3:28 pm)

    If you work anywhere other than downtown, bikes and scooters are not a safe, or reasonable option. Trying to commute by bike to the industrial area south of the bridge makes me feel like I’m in some post apocalyptic movie.  Every day on the way home, the lower bridge is loaded with cars making me feel like a complete idiot for riding a bike.  If I do drive to transport a large item, so many people just drive to the front of the line on W Marginal and park with their turn signal on until someone lets them in.  I am completely astounded by how many of my neighbors in West Seattle are complete jerks. I  am so disappointed in my neighbors and the town in general.  Maybe it’s not depression if it turns out you are surrounded by A-Holes.

  • Alex August 17, 2020 (4:27 pm)

    Would have liked to see more detail behind the audited parking program and what’s in place to incentivize users to park where allowed instead of sidewalks, driveways, grass and private property.   I admit I am not seeing the vision of using a shared scooter to get off the peninsula.   Are we supposed to drive to a corral, park and then take a scooter down Highland or Myers Way? 

  • Marc August 17, 2020 (4:35 pm)

    After several weeks seeing more and more folks driving cars on the lower bridge, I took a gamble and did as well. This was around 3pm, no police present, and quite a few drivers in front and behind me.It saved me at least 30-45min going to North Admiral.I don’t think police is there until 4pm earliest, or in the morning you can safely go before 7am.

  • skeeter August 17, 2020 (4:52 pm)

    Oh heck yeah!!  I’m probably gonna head down to White Center today or tomorrow and give those scooters a ride.  I’ve used the Lime scooters in Oakland and Tacoma and I think they are a hoot!  I’ll probably start commuting on them once they are allowed in Seattle.  

  • flimflam August 17, 2020 (5:04 pm)

    those scooters will be perfect once the rains begin :)

  • HP August 17, 2020 (7:35 pm)

    Think I read that Evel Knievel’s son was going to jump over 10 buses in Vegas using an e- scooter. Seriously though, how the heck can one ride outside of the W. Seattle/Seattle bubble on one of these things. They’d find you mid April halfway over Snoqualmie Pass; snowboard still strapped on your back. These are not even remotely a solution to any percentage of commuting, let alone 1 – 10 percent….

  • CarrieP August 17, 2020 (8:07 pm)

    So many angry, whiny people with their minds made up. 🤷‍♀️

    • X August 18, 2020 (8:14 am)

      Eh, the earth revolves around them.

  • wsguy123 August 17, 2020 (8:35 pm)

    When scooters were launched in Everett last year, a news station reported on it. The reporter said these were not allowed on the sidewalk as video behind him showed people riding scooters on the sidewalk. They aren’t allowed on the sidewalk here but who’s going to enforce it (rhetorical) when people do ride on the sidewalk. You know they will ride on the sidewalk. There’s all sorts of laws, rules broken here on a daily basis, at least that’s what I see and what I have read in the comments.

    • newnative August 18, 2020 (8:46 am)

      It’s confusing to me, if you can’t ride it on a sidewalk and it’s too dangerous to ride it on a road, then where should you ride it and how conducive will it be to actually connect people? I read the instructions, it says you’re to ride on streets with 25mph limits. But why do scooters have to stay off of sidewalks, while cyclists don’t? In Europe, people rode these everywhere but mainly in the bike lanes. Lime App instructs Florida user to break the law

      • chemist August 18, 2020 (2:09 pm)

        Scooters have to stay off the sidewalks because it’s the law for safety of vulnerable sidewalk users like pedestrians with their leashed dogs.  Modifying Jort’s term, Scooter Brain Disease is when folks only focus on moving their own body on a scooter and ignore the external threats to others.   I am perplexed why this meeting is even happening to approve fees and modify laws when so little is published about the proposed scooter permit.  Will there be a public comment period on the proposed permits before it goes out to vendors for bid?

  • KBear August 17, 2020 (8:56 pm)

    I’m guessing the jerks who continue to complain about the lane reduction by the Duwamish Longhouse are the same (racist) jerks who never stopped for pedestrians before the safety improvements.

    • Smittytheclown August 18, 2020 (7:11 am)

      So now you are a racist if you dislike a horrible road design?  Thinking the term needs to be used less liberally.

  • Joe Z August 17, 2020 (9:13 pm)

    If there was a safe spot to ride them on the street then people wouldn’t have to ride them on the sidewalk.

  • X August 18, 2020 (8:16 am)

    I enjoyed them in Spokane. Mostly kids, young people riding them. 

  • JenT August 18, 2020 (8:19 am)

    Scooters are at best a nuisance and at worst resulted in deaths and injuries in cities across the US and even globally when they were introduced a few years ago.  There was a lengthy news cycle from 2018-2019 about these stupid things, covered by outlets from The Guardian to Forbes to NPR to local TV stations in cities from Austin to San Diego to Paris to London.  The resulting backlash from scooters littering city sidewalks and causing so many injuries was people dumping them in Lake Merritt (Oakland), the Willamette (Portland), Lake Travis (Austin), and setting them on fire in LA.   Also a really good piece on their negative environmental impact in Bloomberg.  But, sure, let’s forget about all of that and add them to the ridiculous mix of non-answers to our mobility crisis.   Makes perfect sense given the ineptitude displayed so far!

  • drahcir61 August 18, 2020 (8:42 am)

    I’m not sure I could stay balanced on a motorized scooter so I’d need to rent two, one for each leg.

  • Jort August 18, 2020 (10:24 am)

    Truly the insidious rot of Car Brain Disease is on full display in this thread. Only with CBD would somebody view an electric scooter as such an imminent, destructive threat to the very fabric of society. The only topic that all Americans, left and right on the political spectrum, seem to agree on, is the supremacy of the personal automobile and the urgent requirement to defend that lifestyle from any perceived threat. The way people talk, you’d think we are at the precipice of a shutdown of civilization as we know it when speed limits are lowered, or a bike lane goes in, or some parking spots are removed, or somebody has to pay a few bucks for parking, or folks can zip around the neighborhood on a scooter, or somebody has to stop for a pedestrian on 35th, or …. ok, the list could go on forever. Thankfully, it seems the younger generation is less prone to infections of Car Brain Disease than the ones before them, so perhaps we’ll see improvements.

  • anonyme August 18, 2020 (12:50 pm)

    Actually Jort, you’re not entirely correct.  I’m 69 years old and have never owned a car, nor ever suffered from “CBD”.  This was a deliberate decision, and although it’s been somewhat inconvenient, I’ve survived just fine without a car.  And I do agree with most of your examples; I’d be fine with cars being banned altogether in more areas.  But I also think that scooters are a terrible idea, at least in the way this ‘plan’ is being implemented.  If all of downtown was closed to cars and open only to bicycles and scooters, that would make sense to me.   Scooters as a commuter option from West Seattle to downtown is just dangerous and nonsensical.  And there are already too many threats to pedestrians as it is without adding scooters to sidewalks, which is exactly what will happen.  Seattleites drive like idiots regardless of the mode of transportation, so I’m not expecting sober, adult behavior once they start riding toys.

    • Don’t knock it till you try it August 18, 2020 (8:51 pm)

      Scooters could be useful as part of a commute. For example, one could scooter from WS to the water taxi, and walk/bus/share bike/light rail from there.

      They aren’t meant to be a major transportation solution, but they can help to get somewhere faster than walking. And they are fun (at least for some), which is an incentive to people using different modes of transportation.  

  • Don_Brubeck August 18, 2020 (1:02 pm)

    There is no “gridlock” at the Duwamish Longhouse and T-107 and Herrings House Park. There are people driving 50 mph so they can get to the back of line at Highland Park Way two seconds faster than the next guy, to sit in a 10 to 15 minute traffic jam.  85 percentile speed is over 44 mph there, measured just recently by SDOT. The Duwamish Tribe welcomes the whole community to events all year, using the longhouse & cultural center and the parks and river across the road. It will not hurt drivers to slow down and stop for people crossing the street. Please take care.

    • heartless August 18, 2020 (8:32 pm)

      This is all correct (or OK, as the modern kids would say).  I only wish more people recognized that the truth exists, and it matters.

      Regardless–well put.

  • Christine Erstad August 18, 2020 (1:16 pm)

    I saw a lady fall off one of these scooters yesterday. She wasn’t hurt but they seem dangerous to me. She got up walked away and left it on the sidewalk.

  • dcn August 18, 2020 (3:08 pm)

    Scooters will be allowed on all streets that have speed limits of up to 25 mph. That is going to be nearly every street in Seattle, except for major highways. So people will be allowed to scooter on Highland Park Way, Olson Place, etc. What could go wrong? 

  • Scooter Hate August 18, 2020 (6:22 pm)

    These stupid rental scooters will soon be littered all over our sidewalks, bike paths,  and wheelchair ramps. I’m all for chucking every single one into the Sound. Useless garbage and pretty much hated everywhere they show up.  

  • anonyme August 19, 2020 (8:29 am)

    Please don’t throw them in the Sound.  Recycle them into parts for the new bridge.

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