Originally Posted by
Happy Feet
a tinfoil hat conspiracy theory that people vandalize scooters because they see the potential for lost automotive business in them? Really?
I don't think you look at 'conspiracy,' in the same way I do. All culture boils down to subconscious conspiracy. Take something simple like gender-segregated changing areas. Those are completely normal in some places but in others men and women change in the same area for, say, swimming. Then there is the idea of gender-segregated swimming, which would seem abnormal and excessive in places where public pools are 'co-ed' but normal in places where they are traditional and expected. It is a conspiracy to suspect and persecute men who walk into women's changing rooms in places where that's abnormal, then? Not a conscious one, but from the perspective of someone who views co-ed changing areas as normal, yes it would be a conspiracy.
Share/bike scooter vandalism is due to these things being new. Who knows what is going through the mind of each vandal as they trash a share scooter or bike. There are probably plenty of people angry about their economic situation, who see the scooters/bikes as representing a new economic paradigm where money doesn't flow as easily as it did when everyone was driving cars everywhere. So they see the scooters/bikes as a scapegoat. It's not a conscious conspiracy but it amounts to the same at a cultural level.
Rather than a grand conspiracy by the auto pact I think people vandalize things because people vandalize things. Leave scooters lying around unattended and that's just what happens. Leave your bike out unlocked on a street corner for a couple of days as an experiment.
Then why aren't cars and trucks being vandalized just as much?
Huh? what does that have to do with leaving them unattended?
It's just the reason they make sense as a vehicle option. It's like if a computer company made and sold computers as powerful as a large desktop that fit in the size of a smartwatch and they had trouble getting people to use them because of cultural norms, etc. This actually happens with laundry detergent, soda, etc.. You can get concentrated detergent or soda and mix it with water at home, but pre-mixed stuff sells better because people think they are getting more when there is more volume in the package when they buy it.
You are mixing two issues: 1. Viable means of transportation 2. Administering said means. I won't argue that public use scooters may have a role somewhere, somehow but will argue that if administered wrong they will probably fail. Try to keep the two concepts separate. Otherwise, you wind up arguing that they ought to work just because they are a good idea. It's also a good idea to love one another but that doesn't always work out so well either.
I'm just not willing to accept that it's natural that every challenge to ubiquitous car ownership and driving fail. I think it's because there are business/economic motives to keep as many people as possible buying and paying all these automotive expenses. It's ridiculous otherwise that rationality doesn't prevail in achieving progress beyond the inefficiencies of vehicle size and infrastructure that are currently causing environmental/economic/social problems to stagnate.
To review. For LCF using e scooters you need: density, good mass transport infrastructure (unless you plan to drive to the scooters), bicycle scooter friendly corridors/roads, security and a decent bike scooter.
Why are you now putting 'scooter' with 'bicycle' crossed-out next to it? Are you implying that there's not enough room on the roads for bikes and scooters both? If so, why not? It is the cars and trucks that are the road/space hogs. Bikes and scooters are relatively small in comparison.
I don't mind engaging in a conversation but you really seem to have a hard time doing that without slipping into evil world order rhetorical baffegab. To me that's boring. The problem with dockless scooters is not the vehicle itself but that no one is taking responsibility for them. You seem to think it is the anticipated end user and/or casual bystander who should be doing that. I disagree. I believe it is the company who wants to implement them that needs to provide intelligent foresight to set the program up and administer it in such a way that it doesn't fail due to easily anticipated and predictable behaviors such as vandalism.
The bottom line is that progress beyond ubiquitous driving must be possible. All the failure and blaming is just for the sake of buying time for the economic investment/financial complex sustained by the driving paradigm. Achieving progress is better than stagnating for morale, and morale is eroding under all the environmental/climate awareness. Traditionally the solution has been to pull the wool over our eyes and go on as if the problems weren't worsening, but that only drags out the misery and makes things worse in the long run. It is better to be working toward sustainability than dragging feet and denying there's a need for reform.
Functional share bikes/scooters would be a good option to establish everywhere, so people should stop vandalizing, mismanaging, or otherwise thwarting progress in achieving the affordable dockless car-free vehicle option.