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Electric Scooters to Stay on Arlington Streets for Another Six Months

Published June 19, 2019 at 3:30PM

The Arlington County Board needs a little more time to see how it likes e-scooters and e-bikes.

At a County Board meeting yesterday (Tuesday), the Board voted to extend the e-scooter and e-bike pilot project through Dec. 31. to allow for continued public comment and additional time for analysis.

More than 300,000 trips have been taken on e-scooters and e-bikes since the pilot launched last October, according to a press release, with 21 reported injuries during scooter-related incidents. A total of 307,243 miles have been traveled through April, with the average trip length at little over 1 mile.

The extension will allow county staff to collect data for warmer months, showing year-round usage numbers.

Meanwhile, the County Board is weighing how to regulate the devices, after legislation signed by Gov. Ralph Northam in March authorized local governments to do so. The legislation also authorizes scooter use on sidewalks unless otherwise prohibited, though riding on the sidewalk is currently prohibited under the terms of Arlington’s pilot program.

“Great transportation options are an important feature of life in Arlington County,” County Board Chair Christian Dorsey said in the press release. “On a day-to-day basis, we are learning a lot about what’s working and what isn’t working with dockless scooters and bikes. Before this Board considers how to permanently regulate these devices in Arlington, we need a complete analysis from staff of information from operators, staff experience, adopted plans and policies, and feedback from our community.”

Seven companies have participated in the pilot program, each paying an $8,000 fee per mode of transit to assist with the cost of program administration. Scooters are capped at 10 miles-per-hour while e-bikes are capped at 20 miles-per-hour.

According to the press release, most trips have been in the Rosslyn-Ballston and Route 1 corridors, though some ambitious riders have taken the scooters out to Columbia Pike and other sites outside of the main transit corridors.

The county has received over 600 emails about the pilot so far, with complaints centering on use of the scooters on sidewalks, scooter parking that blocks pedestrian or vehicle traffic, erratic behavior and riders under 18-years old. Feedback can be submitted via email to [email protected] or by filling out an online form.

“Through June 30, the County is conducting a formal public feedback process for the demonstration project,” the press release notes. “Those who live, work and visit in Arlington are invited to complete the online feedback form to help the County gauge interest, issues and concerns around dockless e-bikes and e-scooters. All feedback is welcome, even if you have never used shared mobility devices in Arlington.”

In October, the analysis of the pilot and a recommendation is scheduled to be presented to the County Board. Ordinance changes are scheduled for November, with potential adoption in December.

Morning Notes

By ARLnow.com

Published May 31, 2019 at 7:35AM

Arlington Wins State Safety Award — “The Arlington County Police Department (ACPD) and Department of Environmental Services (DES) were awarded the 2019 Governor’s Transportation Safety Award in the category of Pedestrian/Bicycle Safety at the 2019 Virginia Highway Safety Summit.” [Arlington County]

Ducks Close Fairlington Pool — “Due to a family of ducks ‘living’ in pool 2 (safely re-located) earlier today, the pool will be closed until Premier Aquatics balances the chemicals to meet Arlington County Health department code.” [Twitter]

Translation Added to County Website — “The County website — arlingtonva.us — now includes a built-in language translation tool that web visitors can use to more easily translate online content into more than 100 different languages.” [Arlington County]

More Candidate Endorsements — Greater Greater Washington has endorsed Del. Alfonso Lopez and state Senate candidate Nicole Merlene. The Sun Gazette, meanwhile, has endorsed incumbent Commonwealth’s Attorney Theo Stamos. [Greater Greater Washington, Sun Gazette]

Nearby: Sugar Shack Hurt By Metro Shutdown — Metro’s “summer shutdown” is hurting the Alexandria location of Sugar Shack donuts and other small businesses in the city. [Washington Post]

Nearby: Electric Scooter Bursts into Flames — “A Skip e-scooter burst into flames near Franklin Square in downtown Washington on Thursday morning… The cause of the fire is not clear, though it appears to have started around the battery pack while the scooter was parked.” [Washington Post]

Morning Notes

By ARLnow.com

Published April 25, 2019 at 7:30AM

Amazon Signs Another Lease in Crystal City — “Amazon.com Inc. has tacked on another block of space to its planned footprint at National Landing, less than a month after executing its first set of leases and purchase agreements with JBG Smith Properties for its second headquarters.” [Washington Business Journal]

Beyer Endorses Buttigieg — “Democratic presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg picked up his first endorsement from a member of Congress on Wednesday when Rep. Don Beyer from Virginia announced his support for the South Bend, Indiana, mayor.” [CNN]

County Scooter Pilot May Be Extended — “Though scheduled to come to an end in June, Arlington officials could extend through the summer months a pilot program allowing motorized scooters across the county – while potentially imposing additional regulations in the interim.” [InsideNova]

Soros Funding Stamos Challenger — “A political action committee funded by Democratic megadonor and billionaire George Soros has made large contributions to two upstart progressive candidates attempting to unseat Democratic prosecutors in Northern Virginia primary races.” [Washington Post]

Airports Authority Mulling New HQ — “The Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority is considering moving its headquarters to a potential development on the Reagan National Airport footprint as part of a larger plan to accommodate Amazon.com Inc.’s second headquarters in Arlington County.” [Washington Business Journal]

New CMO, CFO for Arlington Startup — “Snag today announced key appointments to the senior executive team as the company continues to expand its online marketplace for hourly workers and employers.” [PR Newswire]

Flickr pool photo by GM and MB

Morning Notes

By ARLnow.com

Published March 19, 2019 at 7:30AM | Updated March 19, 2019 at 8:57AM

Woman Injured When Scooter’s Brakes Fail — “An Arlington, Virginia, woman says she had to jump off of an electric scooter moving 15 mph to avoid oncoming traffic because the rented scooter’s brakes weren’t working.” [NBC 4]

Could Goody’s Challenge Sign Rules? — Goody’s restaurant in Clarendon painted over its outdoor mural after running afoul of Arlington’s sign ordinance, but one attorney says a 2015 Supreme Court ruling may point to an avenue to challenge the county’s regulations. [Reason]

Refugees Get Car from Arlington Diocese — “A Catholic family fleeing religious persecution in their native Pakistan [received] a car Monday in Arlington.” [WUSA 9]

Tornado Drill Today in Va. — Updated at 8:55 a.m. — Virginia is conducting its annual statewide tornado drill today at 9:45 a.m. [Virginia DEM, Twitter]

Flickr pool photo by Kevin Wolf

Bolt Brings Its Dockless Scooters to Arlington, Becoming Seventh Company in the County

By Alex Koma

Published March 4, 2019 at 3:30PM

Bolt scooters in Ballston (Image courtesy of Joel K.)

Bolt scooters in Ballston (courtesy of Joel K.)

Yet another company is now offering dockless electric scooters around Arlington, as Bolt has now becomes the seventh firm operating in the county.

Bolt first began renting out its scooters in Arlington last Wednesday (Feb. 27), county transportation spokesman Eric Balliet told ARLnow. Like its six other competitors, the company is participating in the county’s pilot program for dockless vehicle providers, which is set to run through the summer and help Arlington officials determine the best way to regulate the technology.

February was a busy month for scooter companies in Arlington, with three winning the county’s approval for participating in the program in the last few weeks alone: Skip, Spin and Jump.

Bird kicked off the flood of scooters onto county streets this past summer, when it dropped hundreds of devices around the county. That prompted the County Board to sketch out a more formal pilot program to guide the process, clearing the way for Lime, Lyft and the others to follow suit.

Under the terms of the pilot, the companies are restricted to operating 350 vehicles for their first month in the county, and can then apply for gradual increases each month (so long as they can meet certain ridership targets).

Thus far, county officials haven’t recorded many problems with the scooters, though they remain a bit vexed in how to dissuade younger riders from using them or how to enforce the county’s ban on the scooters on local trails and sidewalks.

The pilot program is set to wrap up in July, when the Board will subsequently consider passing a formal ordinance governing the devices.

Skip Becomes Sixth Company Offering Dockless Electric Scooters in Arlington

By Alex Koma

Published February 13, 2019 at 5:30PM

Arlington now has its sixth dockless electric scooter company: Skip.

The San Francisco-based firm was just approved to start operating its vehicles in the county under Arlington’s pilot program this week, county transportation spokesman Eric Balliet told ARLnow.

Skip CEO Sanjay Dastoor did not immediately respond to a request for comment on his plans for the county, but Balliet says the company has been cleared to deploy 350 scooters around Arlington — that’s the minimum number of vehicles the county is allowing firms to operate in the area upon first joining the pilot, which the County Board crafted this fall as a way to test out the best methods for managing dockless devices.

Skip has been eyeing Arlington for an expansion dating back to this summer, when Bird became the first scooter company to drop its scooters in the county.

The company also told county officials it was planning to offer scooters in both Arlington and D.C. this fall, and it now joins Bird, Lime, Lyft, Spin and Jump in renting out dockless vehicles around the county.

Spin just started offering its scooters around Arlington, while Jump will do so sometime in the next few weeks.

The county’s pilot is set to run through this summer. Once it wraps up, officials will have to consider the best way to craft permanent regulations for the scooters, and will likely be helped along by a new state bill making its way through the General Assembly.

Video: Scooter Safety in Arlington

By ARLnow.com

Published February 13, 2019 at 9:05AM

E-scooters have been proliferating around Arlington over the past few months, but their growing ubiquity has brought with it some challenges.

A new public service announcement from Arlington County seeks to answer some key questions that can improve safety for scooter riders and those around them: Who can ride e-scooters? How can you ride safely? Where do you park after riding?

The video is above. The county has also set up its own website for dockless scooter safety and regulation information.

Two More Companies Will Soon Offer Dockless Scooters, E-Bikes in Arlington

By Alex Koma

Published February 6, 2019 at 4:30PM

Spin’s dockless scooters pictured earlier this year (Photo courtesy of Spin)

A Jump dockless e-bike (courtesy of Jump)

Two more companies are planning to bring their dockless scooters and e-bikes to Arlington in the coming days.

Spin will soon be dropping its electric scooters around the county, while Jump will offer both e-bikes and scooters in Arlington. Both companies currently operate in D.C.

Ariella Steinhorn, a Spin spokeswoman, told ARLnow that the company’s scooters will be available for Arlingtonians to rent starting Friday (Feb. 8).

Jump has told local officials that they will follow suit “within the next few weeks,” according to county transportation spokesman Eric Balliet. The company did not immediately respond to a request for comment on its plans.

The companies will become the fourth and fifth firms to offer dockless vehicles in the county when they arrive, joining Bird, Lime and Lyft. All of the companies are participating in a pilot program set up by the County Board last fall, allowing firms to deploy hundreds of the devices around Arlington through the end of the tentative test period this summer.

The county generally hasn’t recorded too many problems with the suddenly ubiquitous scooters thus far, outside of some scattered accidents and concerns about younger riders using the devices when they shouldn’t be.

State lawmakers are also currently hard at work crafting legislation to allow localities to set additional regulations for the vehicles once similar pilot programs end.

Both of the new firms are owned by much larger companies — the ridesharing service Uber owns Jump, while Ford recently acquired Spin.

Legislation Allowing for New Regulation of Dockless Scooters, E-Bikes Gains Steam

By Alex Koma

Published February 6, 2019 at 9:00AM

New legislation working its way through the General Assembly could set new state standards around dockless scooters and e-bikes, giving localities like Arlington full authority to ban the vehicles on sidewalks and regulate where they’re parked.

A bill from Del. Todd Pillion (R-4th District) unanimously cleared the House of Delegates Monday (Feb. 4), setting the stage for state lawmakers to pass their first regulations governing the devices since they began popping up in Arlington and other urban communities around the state last summer.

The legislation shouldn’t change much about the county’s current dockless vehicle pilot program, which the County Board created last fall to set new standards guiding the use of the suddenly ubiquitous scooters. But the bill would codify into state law many of the regulations the county has already created as part of the program.

Perhaps most notably, the legislation would allow people to ride scooters and e-bikes on sidewalks, unless a local ordinance specifically bans the practice. The county has barred scooters from both sidewalks and trails as part of the pilot, and this bill would allow Arlington to take the next step and pass its own law doing so once the program wraps up.

“Under this, we can have the ability to adopt an ordinance that takes care of all of our specific issues,” said Pat Carroll, the county’s main lobbyist in Richmond, during a Jan. 29 House committee hearing on the bill.

The legislation also bars scooter and e-bike riders from parking the vehicles “in a manner that impedes the normal movement of pedestrian or other traffic or 456 where such parking is prohibited by official traffic control devices,” another key headache for county officials. Arlington staff have set up some “scooter corrals” around Metro stations to encourage the orderly parking of the devices, but otherwise don’t have the ability to enforce where the vehicles are parked beyond bringing complaints to each company individually.

The legislation also caps all scooters at a top speed of 20 miles per hour — Arlington currently mandates a speed cap of 10 miles per hour, which initially irked some owners of the vehicles who’d hoped to use a 15-miles-per-hour cap instead.

Finally, the bill gives other localities until Jan. 1, 2020 to set up their own pilot programs for the dockless devices — once that date passes, companies will be able to deploy the scooters and bikes without abiding by any sort of pilot, much as Bird did when it dropped its scooters in Arlington back in June.

In general, the scooter companies seemed broadly pleased with the legislation. Lobbyists for several dockless vehicle companies spoke in support of it at the Jan. 29 committee hearing, and the firms were certainly well represented in Richmond — state records show that Bird has hired five lobbyists on its behalf, while Lime has three, Lyft has two and Uber (which owns Jump scooters) has six.

“We know for a lot of folks it’s a complicated issue around a new and emerging technology and we look forward to continuing to work with all legislators and stakeholders,” said Ryan O’Toole, a lobbyist representing Lime.

The legislation now heads to the state Senate, where lawmakers have until the end of session on Feb. 23 to take action on the bill.

Should it clear that hurdle and head to the governor’s desk, it’s anyone’s guess who will be waiting to sign it — Gov. Ralph Northam is still facing an overwhelming chorus of voices calling on him to resign over revelations that a racist photo appeared on his medical school yearbook page, while new allegations of sexual assault against Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax complicate any designs he might have on the governorship.

County Creates New Dockless Scooter ‘Corrals’ to Encourage More Orderly Storage

By Alex Koma

Published December 21, 2018 at 9:45AM

Dockless electric scooters at a corral in Crystal City.

Dockless electric scooters at a corral in Rosslyn.

Dockless electric scooters at a corral in Courthouse (Staff photo)

Arlington has now created seven “scooter corrals” around the county, in a bid to make the storage of the pervasive dockless electric vehicles a bit more orderly.

County workers set up the new storage spaces over the course of the last week, generally using some spray paint to cordon off specific areas for the scooters.

Officials have been considering such a step dating back to this fall, when the scooters first started popping up around Arlington and concerns about where the vehicles might be scattered began cropping up. Other cities, from Austin to Santa Monica, have adopted a similar technique.

The corrals are mostly clustered around Metro stops, as that’s where many riders first pick up the scooters. Per the county website, locations include:

Ballston

N. Stuart Street & 9th Street N.

Courthouse

Clarendon Blvd & N. Uhle Street

Crystal City

18th Street S. & S. Bell Street

Pentagon City

S. Hayes Street & 12th Street S.

Rosslyn

N. Lynn Street & Fairfax Drive
N. Lynn Street & 19th Street N.

Virginia Square

N. Monroe St & 9th Street N.

George Mason University has set up a similar “corral” near its Virginia Square campus, after briefly trying to establish a “no scooter zone” in the area (drawing fierce criticism from students and staff alike).

Bird, Lime and Lyft all currently offer electric scooters in the county, with a variety of other dockless companies eyeing Arlington, given the county’s pilot program to test the devices.

JUST IN: Lime to Deploy 150 E-Bikes in Arlington County

By ARLnow.com

Published December 19, 2018 at 1:30PM | Updated December 19, 2018 at 3:55PM

Lime, which currently operates rental electric scooters in Arlington, is expanding its local service to include powered bicycles.

The company, which says it’s the “largest shared bike and scooter provider in the U.S.,” announced today that it’s bringing e-bike service to Arlington and northern Bethesda, Md.

“To make clear its commitment to each county, Lime is deploying 150 new electric bikes to Arlington County this week on top of 350 scooters that were already in operation locally,” the company said in a press release, below. “Lime is the only electric bike provider in both counties and these additions help ensure riders in both counties can ride safely and efficiently and find dependable transportation options to reach their destinations.”

Arlington County prohibits the use of e-bikes on local trails, a rule that Priceline pitchman and Star Trek star William Shatner called “barbaric” in a Twitter exchange with Arlington’s Dept. of Environmental Services.