Micromobility Roundup January 8
Welcome to our Micromobility Roundup where we curate the latest news and developments in micromobility!
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MICROMOBILITY HEADLINES
Leaps and bounds: In just a few short years, bold bike infrastructure construction has catapulted Paris to 8th place on Wired’s list of most bike-friendly cities, and drove a 54% jump in bike ridership in just one year.
Bike and Rider: Even Car and Driver cannot ignore the coming groundswell of micromobility, highlighting Deloitte’s estimate of a 50% surge of ebike sales and a global fleet of 300 million total units over the next 3 years.
Unagi saves Christmas: Reversing a previous announcement, failed scooter startup Unicorn will offer 350 early customers an Unagi scooter, or a full refund.
San Francisco shake-up: San Francisco Spin employees began a vote to unionize, a first for a scooter provider. Across town, Lyft finally brought back its electric bikes after months off the roads due to battery fires.
Bike bonanza: Slowly expanding docked bike sharing quietly becoming a sizable mobility force in the US, as ebike sales expected to “enter warp speed” with 130 million units projected worldwide sales in the next three years. “Best selling EVs on the planet” indeed!
And the winner is, the bicycle! Over the last decade the bicycle has “revolutionized” mobility in cities, with the number of shared bikes increasing by a whopping 20x, projected global ebike sales exploding in the next 3 years to over 100 million, and large bike infrastructure projects showing significant gains.
Rechargeable rickshaws: As electric rickshaws prove an easy, cost effective transport vehicles, E-Chargeup Solutions aims to boost operator revenue, cut battery weight, and increase uptime for 1.7 million vehicles, with a new battery swapping system and a unique franchise model.
Safety in electrons: Not only do they allow for longer, more frequent, more comfortable, and diverse types of trips than their non-powered cousins, ebikes make cycling in cities safer especially for women and those less physically able.
Tone deaf: Even despite widespread ebike usage among delivery workers and ever-worsening automobile gridlock, NY’s Governor Cuomo vetoed a bill that would have legalized electric bikes and scooters, alarming supporters of the proposed legislation.
Charge ignites: Charge announces a major expansion of its network of service, storage, and charging facilities securing over 6,000 new locations throughout Europe and the US helping bring much needed order and servicing to the ever-expanding number of vehicles. Now we’re getting somewhere!
Micro rides, macro adoption: Uber/JUMP announces intentions of “doubling down” on micromobility with a focus on Europe which saw half a million users accumulate 5 million rides in just 8 short months.
Charge ignites: Charge announces a major expansion of its network of service, storage, and charging facilities securing over 6,000 new locations throughout Europe and the US helping bring much needed order and servicing to the ever-expanding number of vehicles. Now we’re getting somewhere!
Click here to subscribe: Lime ready to launch a subscription service after months of limited pilot testing and Latin American Grin launches its own subscription offering in Brazil as well as expanding Mexican operations.
Juiced up: The electric moped and large scooter form factors start catching on as Super 73 teases “something big” and Italian Nito brings two variations of the beautiful NES to the States.
Scooter snub: San Francisco’s surprising exclusion of scooter “nice guy” Skip leads to layoffs. It also begs the question, why are cities picking winners and losers instead of simply creating and enforcing rules as is the case with any other sector?
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Have A Go is the micromobility editor for CoMotion, a weekly roundup of all things mobility.
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