[ggm]

I (also?) think these disruptive transport plays are a bit grubby, and probably predating public transport shared costs and the commons. Here in brisbane, they basically became scofflaw over "riding without helmet" and "riding on pavement" to force the issue. Why the state authorities caved instead of taking them to the cleaners is beyond me.

We've already started to have drunks on scooters, elderly people feeling exposed to random vehicle hits, no-helmet fine issues, public nuisance, juicers hiding scooters to game the demand pricing/charging..

What we needed was integrated public transport on a non-profit basis. Lower cost fares, better integration. We got half of it. A really good high circumference e-ticket integrated fare scheme, but not cheap and with some serious computer-systems weaknesses. The transport planners are obsessed with reducing public cost, not with increasing public utility.

[8ytecoder]

I see these scooters as somewhat good for the society if it'd be accompanied by enforcement- proper docks or allotted areas and no riding on the sidewalk and following the rules of traffic flow.

As it is right now it's a mobility issue for the disabled. I come from a country with no sidewalks with the disabled forever left to the mercy of their caretakers. I was simply amazed by the level of planning to accommodate them in the US. But now these scooters are blocking the sidewalks everywhere. What are the disabled going to do? Get up and move the scooter?

[hawaiianbrah]

I hear that complaint and I think it was certainly more true when first launched, at least in Seattle and DC. Nowadays it seems like people are parking them better on average

[8ytecoder]

At least not in my metro. It's still haphazardly scattered everywhere. The thing is it need not be the riders themselves who do this. Unlike a docked bike that can't be moved the scooters can be lifted by anyone. Vandals definitely move it, throw it in water bodies, cut the wire and sometimes just knock it over.

[eeeeeeeeeeeee]

I’m in Denver. I’ve seen no change. Plus we have numerous different companies operating now. I regularly see them blocking the sidewalk entirely or all of them have been toppled over.

[finnh]

Does Seattle have Bird scooters? I haven't seen any scooters here, just bikes.

[hawaiianbrah]

No, no scooters. I was thinking of the bikes when including Seattle there.

[MauranKilom]

It might just be me, but I'm having a hard time following your post due to these terms:

> scofflaw

> taking to the cleaners

> juicers

I normally would just go look it up, but this is a high density of jargon/colloquialisms. Or maybe it's not and I just never heard them, but I'm just offering my data point here.

[laurieg]

I think you were just a little unlucky and hit a post with a few words and phrases you don't know.

Scofflaw is a pretty old word, and being a combination of scoff and law many people could work out its meaning.

Take someone to the cleaners is a fairly common idiom.

Juicers seems to be slang related to the people who charge up the scooters, but again, juice + er is a pattern many people can pick up on.

[ardy42]

> Juicers seems to be slang related to the people who charge up the scooters, but again, juice + er is a pattern many people can pick up on.

It probably is. Saying something is "out of juice" to mean "out of power" has a fairly long history. It's a pretty straightforward to extend that slang to someone who restores power to things by recharging them.

[reaperducer]

One of the things I enjoy most about HN is learning the idiomatic language of other cultures, even if I have to look a word up.

I don’t think that asking people to use bland, lowest common denominator language is an incentive for smart people to participate. This isn’t the Simplified English version of Wikipedia.

[ggm]

> scofflaw https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scofflaw > taking to the cleaners https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/take_to_the_cleaners > juicers https://www.reddit.com/r/LimeBike/comments/89tpqy/is_anyone_...

Apologies.

[robkop]

Juicers is a lime only term afaik (it referd to someone who charges lime scooters) and the rest are reasonably common Australian expressions (maybe scofflaw is a little less common).

[masonic]

In U.S. vernacular, "juicer" generally connotes someone using performance enhancing drugs.

[walshemj]

Juicers I would read as drug addicts given its an Australian

[el_dev_hell]

Straya at its finest

[walshemj]

And which other thing will you de prioritise or will you increase taxes

[ggm]

I would definitely increase taxes. I'm not small government minded, and I am not anti tax. AFAIK its by far the best way to get public utility functions done. The exceptions are out there: Japan Rail is a good example of an efficient non-public utility running, with no subsidy. So I don't claim its the only model, but its the one I like best. Most of the "but its my money" arguments come from people with disposable income, or who are in denial about how much the depend on centrally managed spend (again, IMNSHO)

In my own economy, attempts to avoid public support for transport have marginalized investment, and meant service is very expensive, and not well suited to local communities. A number of things like Uber have wrecked the taxi industry, and Lime appears to be squeezing a rental-bike model funded out of Bus Shelter advertizing. This doesn't make me happy.