wow I'm really surprised to see San Diego on the list of "underperforming" markets that was cut. seems like a huge red flag for the industry if that's true.
no city have I been to had more scooters everywhere than San Diego. and the city has been very accommodating in the sense that they created designated scooter parking areas. it's almost the perfect city for scooters: almost always warm/sunny, very flat, not great public transportation infra.
I think that's the problem... there's a huge market for scooters, but there's so many competitors in San Diego. I love scooters, and even I'm annoyed by how hard it is to walk around SD without tripping over PILES of them.
seems like a lose lose for the industry then. there are a few cities out there that are optimized for scooters year round like San Diego, and the barrier of entry is too low, and then no one wins because there's too much competition.
It's not weather you need, it's infrastructure. Scooters clogging sidewalks is an infrastructure problem. Scooters having to deal with car traffic is an infrastructure problem.
The solution to these infrastructure problems are to get a can of paint, make a bike lane, and a scooter parking space. Let the app geofence, and voila, a functional transit network that avoids all the annoyances everyone states ad infinitum until local council bans them.
not sure what this has anything to do with my previous comment...
i observed San Diego being relatively accommodating to scooters, including created designated parking, on top of being a city is flat and usually sunny and warm - both things that are good for scooter demand, and wondered aloud why Lime still couldn't make it work.
no city have I been to had more scooters everywhere than San Diego. and the city has been very accommodating in the sense that they created designated scooter parking areas. it's almost the perfect city for scooters: almost always warm/sunny, very flat, not great public transportation infra.
left wondering what happened.