
Boosted Boards founders launch heavy-duty scooter renter Skip - waqasaday
https://techcrunch.com/2018/05/17/skip-scooters/
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jpao79
Instead of the 'park it anywhere and inconvenience everyone else model' of
deployment, the dockless scooter companies should advocate for dockless
scooter dedicated parking spots/landing zones around the city.

The dockless scooter companies should negotiate (and pay a daily fee to) the
cities to convert say every 100th car parking spot into a dedicated spot to
park your scooter/bike.

I think this would be fair as one existing car parking spot could serve 10-20
dockeless scooters/bikes [1]. And it would require no effort other than
repainting the parking spots and the city revenue (i.e $20 per day per spot)
would be about the same if not slightly more.

[1] [https://www.citylab.com/transportation/2017/06/bike-share-
do...](https://www.citylab.com/transportation/2017/06/bike-share-dock-parking-
space-citi-bike-new-york/531936/)

[additional edit] Or alternatively, the city could just mark/paint out
dedicated spots on the existing sidewalk that are currently underutilized
(i.e. out of the way of existing pedestrian traffic) and that ends up leading
to more city revenue in addition to car parking.

~~~
tlrobinson
Are these things really much of an inconvenience to you? The vast majority of
the ones I've seen are parked in reasonable locations.

This could be further improved by better education of users, requiring the
user take a photo of their parking job, easily allowing other people to submit
complaints, and warning then banning repeat offenders.

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rectang
It irritates people to have brightly colored bike-shaped ads strewn about
residential, non-commercial neighborhoods.

~~~
ryanwaggoner
And this is different from brightly colored car-shaped ads how?

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rectang
They're novel. They are in unexpected places such as sidewalks, rather thank
locked up like basically any privately owned bicycle. Depending on the
neighborhood, there may be no car-shaped ads at all.

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tlrobinson
As a long time Boosted Board fan, and someone who's underwhelmed by the
current crop of rental scooters, I'm interested to try this.

I'm also somewhat surprised Boosted Boards themselves haven't released other
light electric vehicles like scooters and bicycles. I'd guess the market for
non-skateboard electric vehicles is much larger, and a lot of the expertise
they have should transfer.

I think a lightweight (~15 lbs) commuter scooter with ~5 mile range, ~16 MPH
top speed, maybe an integrated charger and shoulder sling, and Boosted Board's
design and quality would kill it.

~~~
CyrusL
I remember Boosted's mission from the beginning being something like
"improving last-mile personal transportation." My hunch is that the electric
skateboard market is bigger than they expected so the company just keeps
growing with one product category.

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habosa
All the ethics and controversy of ScooterGate aside, this is a good move for
those who like these scooters.

I've ridden them in SF a few times and they are extremely underpowered. When
you hit the slightest incline they go <10mph. I have consistently wondered why
they can't be as fast as Boosted Boards, which seem to fly up any hill in San
Francisco. So ... case closed I guess.

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foolfoolz
we have not reached peak scooter yet. and that’s a good thing. i say bring
them all on, they have really solved a good balance of personal but light
transportation

~~~
on_and_off
I have moved from Paris to San Francisco relatively recently.

The transportation system is pretty poor here compared to Paris.

I don't want to own a car. Driving has always been a chore to me and inferior
to all the other modes of transportation where I don't have to focus on the
road.

I am lucky enough to live 20 minutes by foot from my workplace.

I bought a boosted board, it is great when I want to commute a little bit
quicker or need to go to the other side of the city.

pros : way faster than walking, can be hooked on my bag. cons : not very
stable, you have to share the road with cars on many streets.

A scooter sounds interesting. With bigger wheels, it should be more stable,
and it should still be possible to carry it.

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infecto
Is there really that much money to be made from rent-able scooters? I imagine
a business can be made out of it but this level of competition seems amazing
to me. There is no differentiation from the products.

~~~
colbyaley
This post on Bird's unit economics is pretty good.
[https://techcrunch.com/2018/04/10/how-to-understand-the-
fina...](https://techcrunch.com/2018/04/10/how-to-understand-the-financial-
levers-in-your-business/)

~~~
jpao79
Interestingly since charging the electric scooter is such an additional
complication w.r.t. unit economics, it'd be great to see them just make them
kick scooters (i.e. foot powered with no motor like the OG Razor scooter) with
the only electronics being the GPS/cellphone locator unit?

You then mitigate the speed/helmet concerns somewhat as well.

~~~
clairity
companies like [http://immotor.com/](http://immotor.com/) are trying to solve
that with swappable batteries that the user owns rather than the rental
service.

interesting idea, but i haven't really thought through it to figure out if it
makes more sense or not.

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drakonka
I would love to actually just buy one of the scooters; I'm looking at getting
something robust that can handle gravel, water, dirt, etc in questionable
Stockholm weather.

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Dwolb
Awesome. I love they designed the scooter to facilitate a service model right
from the get-go.

Personally, I'm bearish on the light electric vehicle sharing model due to
skepticism on the unit economics.

Skip will also be a great piece of evidence for large automakers thinking of
running their own ride-sharing services on their own automobiles.

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CyberDildonics
Electric scooters are interesting but this is a straight up advertisement.

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pg_bot
Looking forward to Casey Neistat's upcoming review of this.

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gist
All it takes is one accident or false move and you will have years of pain
(and potentially medical procedures and/or drugs) if not death.

~~~
tlrobinson
Yup, probably safest to just stay inside.

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keerthiko
Everyone I know (including myself) who has ridden a dockless rentable electric
scooter has found it the inferior personal transit option in SF. What exactly
is making these founders think this is a worthwhile option?

The bikeshares, the electric bikes, even boosted boards are all great. A
personal non-electric scooter is great. They have designated places to go, or
you bring them inside with you.

The public nuisance (lack of sensible parking), the safety concerns/lack of
rules (ride on sidewalk or street, helmet or no, etc), the 10mph cap (slower
than a manual scooter), and mediocre economics make it seem worse than
everything. What are the pros that people care about?

~~~
mattlong
Everyone I know who has ridden a dockless rentable electric scooter has
absolutely loved them. I've used them to commute to/from work (what would
normally be a 20 minute walk turns into <10 minutes if I'm in a rush), quickly
return home from ~3 miles away after running into Golden Gate Park (too sweaty
for a Lyft), and running errands to destinations a bit out of walking distance
during rush hour when public transit/Lyft would be painfully slow. The added
benefit is that the scootering was more fun and less or comparably expensive
to the alternatives.

Scooters have advantages over bikes as well for this type of usage. It is far
easier to switch to pedestrian mode (i.e. walking next to the scooter) when
you need to navigate a crowded cross walk or slow down suddenly and get up on
the sidewalk when an aggressive taxi/Lyft/bus stops short in front of you or
turns across you. Your center of gravity is lower than on a bike lessening the
impact from falls in some cases.

The parking debate seems pretty bimodal and has been debated seemingly
endlessly already...

The safety concerns complaint is interesting. Lots of bikers already ride
without helmets but no one seems to care/complain about them too much. Lots of
complaints about safety riding on the sidewalks, but I haven't seen much hard
evidence that collisions are actually happening en masse.

A 10-15 mph cap in SF seems totaly fine for what is meant to be a casual,
relatively short distance means of travel.

How are you concluding that the economics are mediocre?

~~~
keerthiko
These seem like decent points. My reaction to them is mostly from riding my
own manual scooter prior to the electric ones became prevalent in SF, and
finding the electric share experience inferior in every way, as opposed to
bikeshares being superior to owning my own bike.

Re: economics - My scooter is cheap (second hand for $10, new for $~40), and I
wouldn't mind even if I lost it -- which is unlikely given I can just bring it
into wherever I'm stopping instead of locking it outside -- so even though
$1-2 per ride is cheap for transit, merely 5-20 rides later it's past the
economics of scooter ownership, with few of the advantages of using a share
program.

\- owning a personal kick scooter and keeping it in my apartment really
doesn't take up much space (I just leave mine on top of a shoerack next to the
door once collapsed)

\- it requires 0 maintenance

\- I average over 10mph by being able to go significantly faster on even a
slight downhill on a bike lane. (I hear some scooters go up to 15, that's much
more decent)

On the other bikeshares provide me all those pros. [edit: formatting]

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sigfubar
Electric scooters/skateboards and e-bikes are a menace to society. I'm a NYC
cyclist whose travels went from terrifying to death-defying ever since e-bikes
became commonplace here. These things travel at a flat 20mph in total silence.
Such speed is beyond what most plain old cyclists can achieve by simply
pedaling. On a daily basis I'm forced to dodge when a e-bike/board/scooter
rider recklessly passes me with not an inch to spare. These people treat
common courtesy and traffic laws as loose guidelines meant for someone else.

There are good reasons why personal electric vehicles are illegal in New York:
they're unsafe for everyone involved without proper licensing of operators and
safety inspection of vehicles. Drivers of motor vehicles are obligated to
carry insurance and are held accountable for their offenses under the law, but
operators of e-bikes/boards/scooters will kill or maim another person just as
well as a car will, but will face no consequences except for maybe, possibly a
civil lawsuit... assuming they're ever caught.

Now yet another hyped up startup is making an attempt to profit at the expense
of my and my family's safety. I will not allow this, and will continue my
citizen's campaign against illegal vehicles in my city. No quarter will be
given until they're all gone. I consider e-bikes/boards/scooters a physical
assault against my personal safety, and respond just like I would respond to
any physical assault.

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zethraeus
> respond just like I would respond to any physical assault.

Do tell.

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always_good
I raise my arms in an X-formation to absorb the blow. Then I take off my
sunglasses, look them dead in the eye, and coolly give them a piece of my
mind, terminated with a small wink to let them know I'm not going to escalate
any further if they don't want to. But, heh, usually they comply like puddy in
my hands due to my tall muscular 5'10 build. Not usually a problem. ;)

