Miami has put the brakes on motorized scooters, ordering operators to deactivate and pick up their machines immediately.
Commissioners voted Thursday to end a multi-year pilot program that allowed several companies to place dockless electric scooters in the city’s urban core. Since 2018, riders have been able to use mobile phone apps to rent the scooters. Vendors were told they have until midnight Thursday to deactivate their scooters and until 5 p.m. Friday to pick them up or the city could impound them.
“We’re shutting it down,” said Commissioner Alex Díaz de la Portilla “That’s it.”
The scooters have sparked a consistent debate among politicians and residents. Transit advocates have touted the scooters as an effective micromobility solution for people to travel the last mile between transit stops and their destinations. Critics consider the scooters a dangerous nuisance that litters sidewalks and creates too many opportunities for accidents with vehicles and pedestrians.
Díaz de la Portilla had previously voted to extend the program, and he noted that he’s been a swing vote on the matter. He explained that hearing from scooter opponents has convinced him the program should stop immediately. Commissioners Manolo Reyes and Joe Carollo have opposed motorized scooters anywhere in the city. Newly elected Commissioner Christine King voted to end the program.
“On Biscayne Boulevard, at whatever hour of the day, you see kids on these scooters,” said Díaz de la Portilla, who led the effort to kill the program.“This is an accident waiting to happen.”
Commissioner Ken Russell, whose District 2 was the host of the pilot program, voted against ending the program. He was the lone no vote. He had advocated for the scooters as a transit solution and moneymaker — the city has received about $2.4 million under the pilot program, which has funded new bike lanes.
“But it has not been without political risk,”Russell said before the vote. “I completely understand your concerns.”
City staffers are preparing the rules under which scooter vendors would bid for a contract to operate in the city under a permanent scooter program, but it’s unclear if there’s enough support on the commission to authorize such a program. The commission would need to vote on a separate ordinance to create permanent rules for motorized scooters in Miami before the machines could go back on the street. Administrators said the bidding process will be proceeding in January.
Hours before the vote to take scooters off Miami’s streets, Mayor Francis Suarez appeared at a conference in Los Angeles where he touted micromobility. Advocates shared his commentary on social media.
An executive from Lyft, a ridesharing company that also operates electric scooters, contrasted the mayor’s enthusiasm with the commission’s disapproval of electric scooters.
“We’re extremely disappointed in the Commission’s hasty and short sighted action to end the scooter program, taking away a safe and popular transportation option used by thousands of Miami residents daily and putting dozens of workers out of a job the week before Thanksgiving,” said Caroline Samponaro, VP of Transit, Bike and Scooter Policy at Lyft “We were comforted to hear remarks from Mayor Suarez earlier today in which he referred to scooters as a valuable asset to cities. We are hopeful he will stand up to the Commission on behalf of Miami residents and visitors to stop this action.”
