How do Pittsburghers use Spin? A City Council hearing discussed e-scooters’ pros and cons

From Squirrel Hill to Beechview, if you’re a Pittsburgher, you’re likely no stranger to electric scooters. Whether they’re parked on sidewalks or zipping through Oakland, it can feel like the orange and black frames are everywhere.

But now that the pilot program allowing Spin e-scooters in the city is two years old, Pittsburgh City Council is trying to decide if the e-scooters should remain a part of the city’s future.

City Councilmember Barb Warwick (D-District 5) held a legislative hearing last week so council members could hear from the individuals who know the e-scooters and their users best to help them make an informed decision.

Who uses Spin e-scooter in Pittsburgh?

So, who is most likely to rent an e-scooter? According to Department of Mobility and Infrastructure Director Kim Lucas, if you’re between the ages of 18 and 24, childless, and a student and/or person without reliable car access, you’re very likely to ride an e-scooter. At $0.39 per minute to ride, Lucas explained, Pittsburgh’s youngest residents have felt very inclined to use e-scooters to get to work and school. They make up a majority of the 1 million rides taken in Pittsburgh so far.

“People are using it to get where they need to go,” Lucas told City Council. “And a lot of those folks are identifying as lower income. So we heard from our survey data that folks using scooters are twice as likely to ride transit daily, that people of color are more likely to use scooters regularly especially to connect to transit, and that 20% said they’re actually using transit more now that they have access to a way to get to it with spin scooters.”

Lucas added that using the e-scooters as a method of travel or using the e-scooters to get to public transportation was helping the city decrease its carbon footprint: When a person opts for an e-scooter, there’s one less car on the road, she said. (Reminder: Pittsburgh has been a frequent flyer on the American Lung Association’s worst air quality list.)

“They would have taken their car for that trip if they had not taken a scooter that day,” Lucas said. “When I hear that as the director of mobility and infrastructure, I hear that we’ve seen over 300,000 car trips taken out of our streets [and] that means less congestion, better air quality, and fewer chances of a safety incident involving especially vulnerable [person] like a pedestrian.”

Lucas also pointed to discounts available for lower-income riders or riders who live in areas with less ubiquitous public transportation as one of the program’s assets.

Over the past two years, according to the data collected by the Department of Mobility and Infrastructure, there have been almost 1 million trips on the 1,000 e-scooters present in the city. Among those trips, Lucas said, there have only been 37 reported injuries.

Rylan Seifert, a policy analyst from the Curb Management and New Mobility division of DOMI, explained that thanks to Spin’s penalties for bad actors combined with the department’s efforts to respond to the public’s e-scooter-related concerns — such as users’ haphazard parking — there’s been a decline in reports related to e-scooters.

Parking headaches and walking hazards

Spin has the ability to issue penalties, warnings, fines, and if necessary suspend users who are repeat offenders, Seifert said, and 92% of users who receive a warning don’t repeat those offenses in the future. If a resident witnesses an e-scooter being used improperly or finds one incorrectly parked near their home, after repeated complaints, they now have the option of calling the city’s 311 hotline to report it.

“We’ve worked with Spin to identify improvements [and] one of them is the introduction of scooter license plates so that it’s easier for people to call in concerns about specific scooters so that Spin in the city can follow up better streamline coordination with 311,” Seifert said. “Until recently, Spin wasn’t able to actually access 311 to close tickets, so they were responding to complaints but they weren’t getting credit for responding.”

There were still opportunities for improvement, Seifert added. One that remains a consistent complaint is the e-scooters being left on sidewalks. According to the department’s data, an estimated third of e-scooters were parked on the sidewalk instead of their designated kiosks. This can be an issue for residents with mobility issues who might require wheelchair access.

From Spin’s side of things, Jason Shaffner, general manager of the Central Region, explained that the company tries hard to encourage user accountability. While Spin doesn’t mandate helmet use, a rider must be 18 years old and pass a safety quiz before their first ride. Users are also presented with safety rules before every ride via the company’s app.

“These rules aren’t generic scooter rules,” Shaffner said. “They’re specific Pittsburgh photos of [the city], so it’s uniquely tailored to our regulations here in the city of Pittsburgh.”

Shaffner and Lucas explained that what exists between the city and the company isn’t a contract, but a permit. Similar to car rental service Zipcar and scooter rental service Scoobi, local government allows Spin to rent its e-scooters to residents at no cost to the City. Spin also counts more than 40 local employees who are correcting problems in real time, such as moving improperly parked e-scooters.

“We’re able to see scooter locations in real-time on the map, so we drive around, we fix scooters [and] whenever we get requests through 311 or through our customer support line our drivers are immediately dispatched to go respond to those requests,” Shaffner said. On average, he said, each shift touches 600 scooters.

Lawsuits and liability

Most councilmembers had a favorable response to the e-scooters and the program’s potential to keep younger residents in the city. City Councilmember Anthony Coghill (D-District 4), however, while not entirely opposed to the program, had some concerns.

His constituents aren’t fond of the e-scooters, he said, and he feels his district, which encompasses neighborhoods such as Brookline, Carrick and Mt. Washington, isn’t designed for the e-scooters to be properly used: “The main complaints are [that they’re left] on sidewalks, somebody comes by in a wheelchair, and now he or she has to make a call and try to have a thing removed,” Coghill said.

Coghill added that he’s frequently received calls from disgruntled residents who’ve had e-scooters left on their lawns. And as District 4 lacks bike lanes, where e-scooters are required to ride, he expressed concern over the riders’ safety on multiple fronts. While Coghill was relieved there haven’t been any major accidents, from blind spots to winding roads, the potential for fatalities in his district feels abundant, he said.

Another cause for concern for Coghill is the potential for lawsuits. Since the Steel City has no shortage of potholes, Coghill wondered if the city could be liable should a rider crash due to a poorly maintained road.

“There’s a financial risk to the city of Pittsburgh that we can be sued,” Coghill said. “If a person suffered serious injuries or died will Spin be taking responsibility still or will Spin say, ‘No, you want to sue the city because their street’s not properly maintained’?”

Shaffner mentioned that the company had insurance and users agreed to a waiver, but Coghill remained concerned. Still, he stressed that he didn’t want to see the program shut down — simply that he felt the e-scooters benefited some areas more than others.

“I think they’re really great in certain districts, I think they’re right for a certain demographic,” Coghill said. “I think in my district, I would really prefer to see them consolidated.”

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To see how residents are feeling about the e-scooters, stay tuned, because Technical.y’s going to be recapping the public hearing that followed this session. Tell us: How do you feel about the e-scooters? Do you want them to stay? Do you feel they’re more headache than they’re worth? Let us know: pittsburgh@technical.ly.

Atiya Irvin-Mitchell is a 2022-2024 corps member for Report for America, an initiative of The Groundtruth Project that pairs young journalists with local newsrooms. This position is supported by the Heinz Endowments.