Dockless Scooter Pilot Program Begins

Launch of 2022-2023 Dockless Scooter Pilot Program at Zillman Park, 2180 S. Kinnickinnic Ave. Photo taken Sept. 2, 2022 by Sophie Bolich.

Love them or hate them, dockless scooters have once again hit the streets of Milwaukee, under close supervision by the City of Milwaukee Department of Public Works (DPW) for the city’s third scooter pilot study.

Mayor Cavalier Johnson announced the launch Friday at an event in Zillman Park, welcoming representatives from the three selected operators, Lime, Spin and Veo, then donning a helmet and taking one of the scooters for a trip around the block.

The study was unanimously approved by the Common Council in June. The program aims to solicit feedback on and evaluate the effectiveness of dockless scooters in Milwaukee. The 2022 approval lasts through the end of 2023. At that point the city could legalize the scooters on a permanent basis, or conduct a fourth pilot study.

Lime launched its first wave of scooters Thursday and Spin is expected to follow suit within the coming days. Veo, a new addition to the program this year, will deploy scooters later this month. The electric scooters, with a top speed of 15 miles per hour, can be rented with a smartphone application.

In response to questions about the timing of the scooter launch with summer ending and winter a few months away, DPW Senior Transportation Planner Kate Riordan said that each operator has a severe weather plan in place, but that she expects to see “good ridership” in the coming months.

“We will evaluate the weather along with our partners and the operators and determine what’s appropriate,” she said. “We did have some snow in the first pilot study, so we learned how to deal with that.”

Operators are also required to install adaptive scooter models for people of all abilities, which allow riders to sit while they operate the scooter.

Sidewalk riding is prohibited and operators are required to have a plan to address this. Each operator uses a slightly different technological approach to detect if riders are using the sidewalk. A third-party consultant found that, in 2021, 25.5% of all riders observed over three visual monitoring periods were riding entirely on the sidewalk.

The scooters are able to be parked on sidewalks, but are required not to block the sidewalk. There are also 100 designated parking corrals painted throughout the city on automobile parking spaces, and DPW is using funds from previous pilot studies to install parking rails, similar to bike racks, throughout the city.

Similar to the 2019 and 2021 pilots, this year’s program allowed a maximum of three scooter companies. Lime and Spin are returning participants. Bird, the electric scooter company led by former Lyft COO Travis VanderZanden, operated in Milwaukee in previous years but did not bid for this latest round.

Another company, Blue Duck, bid for the program but did not meet the requirements said a city representative. The company has Milwaukee ties and earlier this summer applied for an occupancy permit to open a storefront on Wisconsin Avenue. For now, Blue Duck will have to wait as only the three selected operators are permitted to deploy scooters.

Like previous pilots, DPW will receive data on a monthly basis, including complaints and crash information.

In 2021, DPW reported that people took 481,706 rides on the electric scooters, an average of 2,452 rides per day over the five-and-a-half month pilot study, which was up from 350,130 rides in 2019.

The 2022-2023 pilot retains the seven zones established in the 2021 pilot. A map of the zones is available on the DPW website.

Urban Milwaukee previously reported that there were 15 scooter crashes reported to the Milwaukee Police Department, the majority of which occurred in an area bounded by W. Locust St. and W. Lisbon Ave., between I-43 and N. Sherman Blvd. None were reported Downtown or on the Lower East Side. In one of the crashes, one rider ran into another head on. At least two crashes occurred because riders were improperly using the sidewalk and then re-entering the street. Many crashes, based on one-sentence descriptions, were the fault of motorists.

Photos

Jeramey Jannene contributed to this article