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Pedestrians, E-Scooters Are Clashing In the Struggle For Sidewalk Space (latimes.com)
Slashdot reader mileshigh writes: Activists in California have filed a federal lawsuit alleging that parked scooters littering sidewalks interfere with sidewalk accessibility for people with multiple types of disabilities and violate the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). Many people have been wondering when this would happen since California courts are notoriously friendly to ADA complaints and lawsuits. Realistically, this type of lawsuit may well be the Achilles' heel of scooter-sharing services, especially if they're granted class-action status as this lawsuit is requesting. Will likely be the first of many. "Without full use of the sidewalk and curb ramps at street intersections, persons with mobility and/or visual impairments have significant barriers in crossing from a pedestrian walkway to a street," the suit alleges. "This is exacerbated when the sidewalk itself is full of obstructions and no longer able to be fully and freely used by people with disabilities."
The suit accuses the city of not maintaining streets and sidewalks in a way that doesn't discriminate against the disabled and allowing "dockless scooters used primarily for recreational purposes to proliferate unchecked throughout San Diego and to block safe and equal access for people with disabilities." The lawsuit also alleges the scooter companies have been allowed to "appropriate the public commons for their own profit."
The suit accuses the city of not maintaining streets and sidewalks in a way that doesn't discriminate against the disabled and allowing "dockless scooters used primarily for recreational purposes to proliferate unchecked throughout San Diego and to block safe and equal access for people with disabilities." The lawsuit also alleges the scooter companies have been allowed to "appropriate the public commons for their own profit."
Why would anyone think it was ok to ride a motorized vehicle on the sidewalk?
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
send meter maids around to collect the scooters that are illegally parked and auction them off. This is what most municipalities are doing and it pretty much would wreck their business model, which they seem to be aware of .
I don't necessarily think this is a bad idea. It could potentially make commuting by bus viable in major cities that were laid out with cars in mind and do so long before self driving cars are a thing. But more thought needs to be given to it.
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If a City wants to allow e-scooters, the e-scooter companies should pay for use of City infrastructure via a permit or licensing mechanism so that the scooters can be placed in designated areas carved out near bus stops and the like and not clutter sidewalks. Any e-scooters not licensed or permitted should be impounded.
There is literally no way to sanely combine a single passage for both pedestrians and vehicles of any form. Governments that allow the abuse of pedestrians by any vehicle do so quite purposely, do DISCOURAGE walking. It is notable that many SF short stories in the 50s and 60s explored this theme, with citizens arrested and given psych evaluations if they insisted on still walking to places outside.
In the recent past, plebs were purposely controlled by severly limiting their ability to travel any distance beyond tiny limits, and plebs tended to live and die in a very small radius. Today, the SJW movement demonises most methods of travel used by ordinary people. The Deep State intention is a future where the plebs once agian live and die in highly contained regions.
The 'electric' car and 'oil is bad' movements are a key part opf this strategy. Humans that travel are a problem to the Deep state demons in many ways- not least because they learn that their own societal rules are pretty much arbitary.
Every quality of life ordinary people enjoy is currently under concentrated attack by warmongering neoliberal outlets like slashdot. Tony Blair's orwellian planetary agenda is hurtling ahead in every major empire power, and forced on the people of the nations controlled by these empires. Those voices that oppose the demonic Blair, and the blairites that impose his will in pretty much every nation are carefully attacked.
(and yes, I'm aware Britain is one of those nations that currently limits electric vehicles on pavements, but that isn't a counter argument since the Deep State has to tailor its methods for greatest impact in any given society)
Ding ding ding - we have a winner! You dear AC have combined almost every wing nut touchstone into a nice concise package, and adequately proven that the solution to everything is getting rid of e-scooters!
Now bonus points if you can wrap the whole thing in a bow, and tell us how this promotes dogs and chinchillas living together in sin, and the damn teenagers dropping thought control pods disguised as fertilizer pellets on your lawn.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
They're all over my campus. When I encounter one either blocking a sidewalk, or anywhere near a ramp, I toss the fuckers into the bushes/landscaping. They're not mine. They're not the universities. They're not supposed to be there. If anybody else, individual or company, puts anything in the middle of the sidewalk, it's abandoned trash, and as far as I know, anybody can take it. I once saw a blind person walking on a sidewalk and running into one of those things, and I lost my mind.
See anything abandoned in a sidewalk? It's your moral obligation to get it the fuck out of there for people who can't navigate around them. I've actually gotten good at getting some distance with the fuckers with a single foot under the center of them.
I don't respond to AC's.
They exceed 10KM/hr on sidewalks, so you simply can't get the things.
Which is a bit of a shame, I'd like to try one. As annoying as they apparently are, we have a ridiculous insane population boom here (fuelled by the govt) and public transit and roads have become a nightmare (my morning commute has doubled via public transit, simply due to more stops, more starts, more traffic and more people getting on and off the cable car / tram)
I'd love to jump on a scooter and get to work that way.
a 2.5mile trip shouldn't take 45 minutes via public transit. (and yes, Americans, I know I'm the lucky one here with such a short commute)
I'm not sure banning human legs is practical; since they can make you run.
Scooters by Lime and Bird have a top speed of 15mph, well within the human running range (and not just the top athletes, those guys can hit the mid 20s). Or should running on the sidewalk be banned too? I think the issue isn't speed itself, but unsafe speed. Ticket people being unsafe on these things like we ticket unsafe driving and biking.
Yes, we are talking about the same thing, and yes it is illegal - although the police and council enforcement officers do have leeway in certain cases.
Children riding bikes on the pavement is also illegal, but cant be prosecuted under the age of 10 years.
Republicans believe laws are things enforced by an armed government. They aren't suggestions, politicians and bureacrats don't get to follow them *when they feel like it*.
lol
Republicans are the gods of selective enforcement, and general hypocrisy. Oh, we can't have a controversial president name a supreme court justice. We have to let the next guy do it. Oh wait, it's our guy, so we have to make sure he names the next justice, hell or high water. Blah blah blah bull fucking shit.
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Worked for us: https://www.abc.net.au/news/20...
And in California, riding bicycles on sidewalks is left to the cities. It's illegal in San Francisco, and many of the LA suburbs - you have to use the street. Additionally it is illegal to turn without signalling. And per the link provided above, electric scooters are bundled with motorized bicycles/mopeds - and are thus prohibited from use on the sidewalk. This isn't about utility, this is about legal operation of a vehicle. Riding an electric scooter without an M2 endorsement, without a helmet, or on a sidewalk is illegal.
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
It's all the same thing under UK law - pavements are for pedestrians, and anyone riding a bike, scooter or whatever is not a pedestrian. Allowances are made for the disabled, but even then those motorised scooters used by old people should be driven on the street and not the pavement.
Your cause is lost because your cause is based on a wrong premise - not because we have the wrong end of the stick in responding to you.