Title
Downtown Shared Electric Scooter Pilot Program Update
Description
This report provides the Transportation, Infrastructure, and Innovation Subcommittee with a summary of the first six months of the Downtown Shared Electric Scooter Pilot Program.
THIS ITEM IS FOR INFORMATION AND DISCUSSION.
Report
Summary
On June 26, 2019, City Council unanimously approved the Downtown Shared Electric Scooter (eScooter) Pilot Program, which allowed eScooter vendors to obtain a permit to operate within the City of Phoenix. As part of the Pilot Program, City Council approved Ordinance G-6602, amending the Phoenix City Code to allow eScooters to operate on public streets. The Ordinance amendment also included definitions for an electric standup scooter and authorized the City of Phoenix Police Department or peace officer to issue civil traffic citations for, among other things, speed limit violations, yielding the right-of-way, parking violations, and riding on the sidewalk. Additionally, the Ordinance amendment included a one-year sunset provision, which would effectively repeal the Code changes on June 25, 2020, one year from the Ordinance effective date of June 26, 2019.
The City of Phoenix issued permits to three vendors (Bird, Lime, and Spin) to deploy eScooters as part of a six-month Downtown Shared eScooter Pilot Program. The pilot program began on Sept. 16, 2019. During the pilot, staff collected performance data, which included 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.
On Jan. 7, 2020, the Street Transportation Department (Streets) presented a three-month update on the Pilot Program to the Transportation, Infrastructure and Innovation Committee. Based on the preliminary results of the Pilot Program, on Feb. 19, 2020, City Council approved the extension of the Pilot Program for an additional six months and to re-open the permit application process to allow new vendors to apply for the Pilot Program (G-6676). City Council also amended Ordinance G-6602 to extend the sunset provision for an additional six months.
Streets is now providing an update on the Pilot Program following its first six months of operation, including fleet information, ridership, violations, program fees and revenues, public and stakeholder comments, observations and challenges, and information on the Pilot Program's six-month extension.
Fleet Information
At the launch of the Pilot Program, each vendor was authorized to deploy a maximum of 300 scooters each per day. Spin deployed 300 scooters, Lime deployed 150 scooters, and Bird deployed approximately 50 scooters. After the first week, Bird removed all its scooters and cited the lack of availability of their next-generation scooter, which was necessary to comply with the program's geo-fencing requirements. Lime temporarily removed its scooters at the end of the first week due to an issue with its mobile application but quickly resolved the issue the following week and redeployed its scooters. Because only two vendors deployed scooters for the pilot, on Nov. 25, 2019, the City approved an increase in the total number of scooters authorized per vendor to 450 scooters. In response, Spin increased its deployment to 450 scooters and Lime increased to approximately 300 scooters. Bird was inactive and cited the program's designated parking locations and nightly retrieval requirements as reasons for its decision to not redeploy scooters.
Based on company-wide deployment considerations across the country and internationally, Lime stopped operations and retrieved their scooters in January 2020. This left Spin as the only operating vendor from January to March 2020. Because of Lime's departure from the Pilot Program, the City approved Spin to increase the total number of its fleet to 900 scooters in February 2020. Spin maintained approximately 900 scooters until March 2020.
Ridership
As part of the Pilot Program, vendors were required to provide monthly data on ridership, including the number of daily trips, average ride time, distance, and number of scooters deployed. The information reflected below is ridership data for all three vendors combined over the six-month period.
- Total trips (September 2019 to March 2020): 101,476.
- Average trips per week: 3,922.
- Average trips per day: approximately 600.
- Average trips per scooter: 1.43 trips taken per deployed scooter per day.
- Average trip length (Spin data only): approximately 1.5 miles.
- Average trip duration (Spin data only): approximately 7 minutes.
- Saturdays are the most popular riding day with 20,379 total Saturday trips.
- November 2019 was the popular month with 19,794 trips.
Violations
Under the vendor permits, the City charged the vendors an $80 relocation fee for violating parking requirements. The vendors were only authorized to deploy scooters at the parking locations each day during the hours of 5:00 a.m. and midnight, and were required to pick up all scooters each night by midnight. Any scooters not picked up by midnight were temporarily impounded by the City contractor until the vendor retrieved them, and the vendors were charged an $80 fee. The City rescinded this nightly removal requirement in January 2020 and allowed the vendors to leave scooters at authorized designated parking locations overnight. However, the operational hours still applied. The vendors were also required to relocate improperly parked scooters to an authorized parking location within two hours of being notified. If the vendors did not relocate the improperly parked scooters within the two hours, the City contractor relocated them to a designated parking location, and again, the vendor was charged an $80 fee.
At the end of the six-month Pilot Program, there have been a total of 308 violations among the three vendors as shown below. The City contracted with a scooter retrieval company, SWEEP, to monitor, report, and correct any vendor violations and is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. SWEEP has stated that the level of violations for the Phoenix program is well below those of other municipalities they serve and provided the following violation data to the City:
Total Scooters Relocated: 308
- Bird Scooters: 2 scooters
- Lime Scooters: 244 scooters
- Spin Scooters: 62 scooters
Program Fees and Revenue
The established fees are intended to recover the costs associated with administering the program and were evaluated during the six-month pilot. Each vendor was required to pay a $500 application fee and a $5,000 permit fee to participate in the Pilot Program. In total, the City collected $16,500 in application and permit fees prior to the launch of the program. Vendors are invoiced monthly for a $0.10 surcharge fee per trip. To date, the City has invoiced a total of $10,148 in surcharge fees from all three vendors. Vendors are also invoiced monthly for violation fees at the rate of $80 per scooter. At the end of the six months, the 308 violations resulted in $24,640 in total fees. The City invoiced the vendors a total of $51,288 for all associated fees.
During the initial three months, staffing to administer the program required two staff: one person working approximately 15 hours per week and one person working approximately 8 hours per week. However, the final three months only required one staff member at approximately eight hours per week, for an estimated cost of $38,000 for the first six months. The contract with SWEEP has cost $44,881 for six months. Therefore, the administration costs for the program are higher than the funding recovered from the fees. Additionally, as part of the permit requirements, the vendors are required to reimburse the City the cost to install the designated parking infrastructure. The total cost to install the designated scooter parking infrastructure was $61,076; therefore, each vendor received an invoice for $20,359.
Public Information and Community Outreach
To collect comments and address concerns regarding the program, staff created a dedicated email account, phone number, and webpage. Staff received and responded to approximately 30 emails and phone calls regarding the program. Eighteen were received in the first month, eight in the second month, and four in the third month. The highest frequency of comments were related to improper scooter parking, abandoned scooters, and sidewalk riding. Vendors have also provided feedback, including some users reporting difficulties ending rides in designated parking locations, and users reporting lack of availability of scooters in specific areas or after 10:00 p.m.
Staff corresponded frequently with internal and downtown stakeholders to provide updates and to address any concerns. Several adjustments were made to the program based on this collaboration, including the relocation of several designated parking areas, working with vendors to strategically stage scooters during special events, working with vendors to make modifications within each vendor mobile application based on complaints, and increasing the maximum number of scooters allowed.
Observations and Challenges
The Pilot Program had an unexpected pause within the first six months. Bird stopped operations and retrieved their scooters within the first week of the start of the program. Lime stopped their operations in January 2020. Spin retrieved its scooters in March before the Pilot Program ended due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
There are challenges associated with the accuracy of the Global Positioning System (GPS) to identify and regulate parking locations, No Ride Zones, and program boundaries. This can be challenging for the riders by impacting their trip and vendors trying to comply with the regulations. However, riders adapted quickly to starting and ending their rides at the designated parking locations.
Staff received five reports of scooter-related incidents that involved the rider being injured. However, no collisions with motor vehicles have been reported. Staff has been able to effectively administer the Pilot Program, and overall feedback from both the public and downtown stakeholders has been favorable.
Pilot Program Updates
Before the end of the first term, City Council approved the extension of the Pilot Program for another six months in February 2020. Staff contacted potential eScooter companies to apply for the extended program. Spin and Razor expressed interest and submitted permit applications for the second term. The City intended to seamless begin the six-month extension at the end of the first six-month pilot on March 16, 2020. However, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the eScooter companies were reluctant to deploy scooters at the time. Staff decided to delay the start of the Pilot Program extension in order to resume operations when feasible.
Staff and vendor representatives corresponded throughout the COVID-19 pandemic to prepare for the necessary six-month permits. Spin and Razor completed their permit applications and provided the required fees to the City. The City finalized and issued a six-month permit to Razor on Sept. 29, 2020, which officially restarted the Pilot Program on Oct. 1, 2020. Razor is deploying approximately 100 scooters and intends to increase its scooter fleet up to a maximum of 300 scooters. Spin is obtaining its program permit and anticipates deploying approximately 300 scooters and will also increase its fleet size based on ridership demand. The Pilot Program will end on March 31, 2021.
Location
The main boundary of the Pilot Program is from 7th Avenue to 7th Street and from Buckeye Road to McDowell Road. The Pilot Program boundary includes an extension of the area bounded by Roosevelt Street and Grand Avenue, and a reduction of the northern boundary to Portland Street between 7th and Central Avenues.
Council Districts: 4, 7 and 8
Department
Responsible Department
This item is submitted by Deputy City Manager Mario Paniagua and the Street Transportation Department.