City Council approved to extend the E-scooter Pilot Program, keeping the scooters in downtown Phoenix for another six months.
The council originally approved the first Pilot Program in the formal meeting on Jun. 26, 2019, with a 9-0 vote. Later in September 2019, Downtown Phoenix Inc. and the Phoenix Community Alliance hosted an e-scooter launch, where community members could test the scooters, learn about traffic laws and ask the vendors Spin, Lime, and Bird questions about e-scooters.
At the launch, Chief Marketing Office of Downtown Phoenix Inc. R.J Price told Downtown Devil that the scooters would aid in downtown’s growing population and popularity.
See related: Scooter launch event celebrates beginning of pilot program
Councilman Michael Nowakowski in the June formal meeting also said that downtown Phoenix is growing and that he hoped the program could eventually spread “through the city of Phoenix.”
Since September 2019, downtown Phoenix has added e-scooters to the mix of public transportation. Spin, however, is the only vendor out of the original three to stay with the program.
Despite only having one vendor, the city was still able to collect data from the recorded Spin rides.
“During the pilot, staff has collected performance data, which includes fleet information, ridership, violations, program fees and revenues, public and stakeholder comments, and general observations to assess user demand; monitored vendor operations; and evaluated the impacts to the City,” according to the formal agenda from Wednesday’s meeting.
It is also stated in Wednesday’s agenda that the city has had positive feedback about the program and e-scooters from the downtown community.
“There really haven’t been accidents where multiple people are getting injured downtown on these scooters,” said Samantha Jackson, the Downtown Phoenix Partnership Director of Strategy & Community Relations. “I think we are pretty thankful that (the program) has gone as smoothly as it has…people have been really mindful about how they ride the scooters.”
In addition, Jackson said, people have been calling to ask for more scooters to be parked outside of their buildings downtown. Having transportation to meetings or something as simple as lunch has been beneficial to downtown, she said.
Along with the positive feedback over the last six months, however, Jackson said people still raised concerns through phone calls or at community meetings about the program’s boundary limits.
“I know we have had a lot of questions from people who live in the neighborhoods that technically aren’t supposed to have scooters in those neighborhoods, but there are people who are in those neighborhoods who want access to the scooters,” Jackson said.
According to the formal agenda, the extension will not have many changes compared to the original program. The boundaries will remain downtown, from 7th Avenue to 7th Street and from Buckeye Road to McDowell Road.
But, the city will “re-open the permit application process to allow new vendors to apply for the Pilot Program,” according to the agenda. Jackson also said the extension will have new parking stations that will charge the e-scooters while they are parked.
For now, downtown community members can continue to use the e-scooters for the next six months and the city will continue to collect more data.
“I think it has been good use…I think it’s been kind of adopted by our community and people are using it, Jackson said. “Are they using them like crazy? Not quite yet. I think the numbers could probably grow a little bit.”
Contact the reporter at ldiethel@asu.edu.
Lisa Diethelm is the Politics editor for the Downtown Devil while she studies at The Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication in downtown Phoenix. She grew up in California and started her journalism career in high school.
