Bird Rides is one of the few companies that use scooters as a convenient and environmentally friendly way to travel through American cities. The company began offering its products on July 2 for use in and out of towns.
“It’s going well, and we are happy to bring environmentally friendly micro-transport options to the community,” said Courtney Black, a spokeswoman for Bird.
Scooters are available for anyone to use and can be found at Fort Walton Beach Police Station, Brooks Street across from Fort Walton Landing, Ferry Park, Uptown Station, and the sidewalk in front of the Northwest Florida Daily News Building.
Their appearance as an advertisement on the Fort Walton Beach Facebook page caused widespread discussion, and social media comments (about 250 of them) were mixed. About half of the people in the know regard scooters as an interesting new convenience facility, while others believe that they are a scourge that will definitely cause personal injury and property damage, as well as an additional source of garbage.
“Come back a year later and let us see if our views on these things are still positive. Most cities that have them consider them annoying trouble,” a visitor to the city’s Facebook page Said.
Most of the criticism seems to come from people who have experience in municipal motor scooter projects. For better or worse, for residents who have never experienced so-called micro-transports, there may only be a short opportunity to form their own opinions.
This is because in just three months, a one-year pilot program designed to allow residents of Fort Walton Beach to experience micro-transportation is about to expire.
City government spokesperson Doug Rainer said: “Some companies that want to enter the city contact us and ask if we allow them to enter. Therefore, the city council passed a decree in October last year allowing the use of these Type of scooter.”
Rainer said the pilot program will expire this fall, and the Fort Walton Beach City Council will be asked to weigh the feedback from residents and suggestions from staff to decide whether to extend the pilot program—allowing scooter franchises like Bird Rides. Right to continue to operate-or prohibit them from doing further business.
The ban on the rental of electric scooters has priority. Walton County has twice extended the ban on business openings, and Panama City Beach officials have cited public safety issues as a basis for banning motorcycle rentals.
Although Fort Walton Beach maintains a strict business relationship with Bird Rides, the company recently announced that it has established a “partnership” with the city of Pensacola, which itself is launching a one-year pilot program.
Pensacola Mayor Grover Robinson said in a press release issued by Bird Rides: “We look forward to using electric scooters as an environmentally friendly means of transportation for residents and tourists to travel in our beautiful city.” We heard from residents that as our city continues to grow, people are eager to use multimodal transportation, and I think Bird scooters will make a huge contribution to our community.”
The company spokesman Blake said that the place where riders can hitchhiking is called a “lair.” Using the Bird mobile app to unlock the scooter at a price of $1, it costs 39 cents per minute, which is equivalent to $23.40 per hour.
Black said that the Bird app makes it easy to park correctly, and depending on market conditions, there may be a preferred parking area where riders can earn points by using certain spaces.
“There is no red parking area on the rider map,” she said. And, “If a rider tries to leave the vehicle in the no-parking zone, they will not be able to end the ride until they leave the red zone.”
Black said the rider does not need to return the scooter to where they got it. The rider can leave the scooter in place after reaching the destination.
“The idea is actually to connect the rider from point A to point B as seamlessly as possible,” she said. “We encourage riders to park outside the right of way to ensure that sidewalks, driveways and fire hydrants are accessible.”
Fort Walton Beach has established its own set of rules covering micro-mobile devices. They gave an overview on the city’s Facebook page.
Bird Rides prohibits multiple riders on a scooter and encourages riders to wear helmets.
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