Busy Philipps Helps Woman After Scooter Crash: 'It Only Furthers My Belief These Are Not Safe' https://t.co/KSqYwq1KqS
— People (@people) January 29, 2019
Is every city being infiltrated by those for-hire scooters? I live in LA and they are ubiquitous here. I assume most major metropolitan centers share the same affliction. While I haven’t had a problem with them, I know a lot of people who have. Scooters litter the sidewalks and take up space needed by disabled people. Over the weekend, Busy Philipps and her husband, Marc Silverstein, came to the rescue of a scooter victim. Busy told the story on her show. The scooter story starts at the 2:30 mark:
Here’s what happened. The paparazzi follow us around. Usually we aren’t doing anything, but yesterday something ‘V’ dramatic happened. We saw a woman who fell off a scooter, she’d gotten into a scooter accident and so we raced over to see if we could help her and the guy she was with. Anyway, the paparazzi caught us. Here’s the Daily Mail headline: ;Busy Philipps dons overalls on a walk with her husband, Marc Silverstein, before playing good Samaritan and helping an injured scooter rider.’ Thank God, I am getting some attention for something that’s actually important – wearing overalls. Anyway, we saw the woman fall and we just, like, ran into the street to see if we could be of assistance and get her out of the street. And I hope that she’s okay today. Those scooters are so dangerous but most importantly, I hate them.
I’ll admit, I have wondered what kind of insurance these companies have that allows them to lease scooters without helmets. This is the first I am hearing of Busy’s scooter hate but I guess she’s been ranting about it for a while. She complains about them on her show and social media:
I can't stand these scooters everywhere and I also think they're a safety hazard. Also. I just think they're dumb. https://t.co/Y9AYj9saYt
— Busy Philipps (@BusyPhilipps) August 1, 2018
Busy has always contended that weird stuff happens to her, this instance included. She thinks it’s karma that she tweets hate about scooters and then has scooter drama. It is comically coincidental. Were it me, I would go all Don Quixote on scooters, seeing this as confirmation that I should lead a scooter crusade. Busy, on the other hand, thinks bigger. She wondered during the scooter segment that if she tweeted that she hated Oprah’s Harvest Day, the universe might score her an invite. See, this is why Busy has her own talk show and I just write about Busy. Gotta think in Hollywood to make things happen here.
I will forever love this pantsuit
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I to hate those electric scooters. Not just for the sidewalk litter-but also by nearly being hit by random tourists as I’m either walking or driving to work. On the sidewalk, in the road-they stink.
South Park had a great episode about scooters taking over the world and how awful they are.
Someone in my city got hit by a car while on one of those scooters. Apparently they felt like they could just ignore lights and cross the street whenever they felt like it. Lucky for the driver of the car there was a camera at the intersection. Those scooters are a menace.
Yeah, they are bad news. They showed up on my son’s college campus this year. Bird just dumped them without asking permission from the city or university. There’s no ordinance on how to deal with them so it’s a mess on several levels. People are supposedly not allowed to ride them on the sidewalk, but they do. They’re not supposed to ride them in the bike lane, but they do. That leaves the street for them which doesn’t seem safe either.
The campus police has tried to impound them but as soon as they grab a bunch, Bird just drops a whole new batch. One night we visited and took my son to dinner. Kids were doubled up on them everywhere, zipping to the bars. Accidents just waiting to happen, day and night.
My city banned them. It was controversial, and apparently some people miss them. I think the ban is great.
I’m not gonna blame the tech for humans being assholes and having poor infrastructure. Bikes get the same crap in Seattle, and what is the solution? Cram bike lanes into already crowded roads. We need separate bike, walking, and driving paths.
+1
No one talks about how dangerous cars are, but yeah, scooters are the problem. If we had actual safe street infrastructure that served everyone and not just cars, then this wouldn’t be a problem. Pedestrians, cyclists and yeah, motorized scooters would have the space to operate safely. Scooters can actually be a great option for people with mobility issues and help get people out of cars.
Roads needs to be made safer for bikes yes, because bikes are supposed to share the road with cars. So yes cars need to share road and look out for bikers. But no to scooters mostly because they don’t follow any road rules. They’re not supposed to be on sidewalk, but they do. They don’t stop for stop signs. They just act as if they have the right of way like a pedestrian, but they’re going much faster than a pedestrian so they just dart out in front of cars forcing cars to slam the breaks to avoid hitting them.
For most part, bikers obey traffic road rules. Some will cut corners but most riders follow the rules and make sure they are visible. Scooter riders are no where close to this standard. I myself almost hit one that just appeared out of nowhere off the sidewalk.
Safety shouldn’t be dependent upon users following the rules. Good street design would ensure that all users were safe and scooters could and should be included in that. The problem is that our streets are designed for cars and everyone else is an afterthought. We should change that asap, for the good of everyone.
@Olivers
What planet are you on?
“Safety shouldn’t be dependent upon users following the rules.”
You can’t be serious. Driving is only made safe because people stay on their side of the center line and go the correct directly.
I do think improving infrastructure is a very important need, but it has to work with existing infrastructure. We can’t start from scratch, it’s impossible.
My city impounded them and charged $175 a pop to release them! Thank goodness. They were a menace.
Austinite here and I’m of two minds about the scooters. (They are *everywhere* here, from I think 5 different companies.)
On the one hand, they’re dangerous and people are zooming around on crowded sidewalks, streets and bike lanes with no helmets. And drunk a$$holes dump them in the river/lake which is a disaster for the already fragile environment.
On the other hand, Austin transit infrastructure is a joke, and there’s no way to keep pace with everyone moving here, and I’ve noticed a difference in some of the more congested downtown areas, because so many people are using scooters instead of driving everywhere.
I don’t know what the answer is. I think intense regulation + enforced and painful fines for the scooter companies when they aren’t being good citizens.
I’m also in Austin and I agree with you 100%. Traffic is already abysmal yet I have also noticed something of a respite now that Bird, Lime, et al. are here. I don’t know what to think!
All of you people complaining about the scooters are probably driving around in nice reliable cars enjoying your privileged lives. As a poor person living in the city, these scooters have been critical in providing transportation for people who can’t afford a vehicle. Sometimes buses don’t go where you need or they aren’t running at that time. Way better that walking 2-3 hours everyday plus carrying groceries the whole time.
You make an excellent point and I totally think there’s a ton of opportunity to make life easier for those without reliable transportation.
One other thought as someone with a moderate to severe genetic hearing impairment, I have some increased anxiety walking around downtown now after having been run into twice by a scooter rider.
One of them yelled at me because I didn’t get out of his way on the sidewalk, and sneered at me, “Didn’t you hear me coming?”
Umm. No. I didn’t. Walking downtown even with my hearing aids is already a challenge bc of the noises in every direction. Adding scooters to the mix isn’t the worst thing in the world but it does make things harder for me.
And it’s harder for those in wheelchairs and with visual impairments to navigate around the parked scooters as well.
I think they have so much potential to ease traffic and provide options for those who need to get places without a car. I just think we all need to think more about how to regulate them so we’re being good citizens with each other.
A lot of poor people are getting around fine on buses and metro and walking. I’m all for updating and boosting public transportation and making roads biker friendly. But let’s be honest. Only a small portion of car-less commuters will use scooters. Mostly young people and maybe thirty something men. Many people are not physically apt to utilize scooters either because of age or because of physical fitness. Women wearing heels or dresses probably won’t use scooter either. Bike riders can and do commute longer distances and can carry more baggage which make them more practical than scooters.
If scooter riders can’t be made to use them safely and follow traffic rules then they are just a menace that really don’t serve enough of the commuter population to be worth all the problems.
The company’s business model seems to be:
“Hey, sorry we spilled into your city, but now that we’re here, let’s make a deal!
My city said no. Ha!
Scooters solve the ‘last mile’ problem and are really useful when it’s 105 in July and you need to walk from Metro to Office.
In DC the city limits how many there can be in a fleet (i.e. 750 total so ~175 for each of the 4 scooter companies). We already have ~7500 bikes so the city got on it fast with the scooters – although there are obviously speed issues and general a**holery.