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Written by Ruth Fisher

Created: 03 May 2018

• vehicle
• game
• internet
• technology
• social/government

Electric scooters (“e-scooters”) are one of the latest hot new tech toys on the scene. Several start-ups have unloaded thousands of rentable e-scooters onto the streets of major cities in the US. The scooters offer users a cheap and convenient way to travel short distances across town. These scooters are dockless: users leave them on the anywhere on the street -- no need to find a docking station at a predetermined location. Quite the convenience for users. But quite the hazard and eyesore for local residents, who are finding scooters indiscriminately strewn about the sidewalks.

I started to map out the Electric Scooter Game. That involves identifying the players who interact with e-scooter users. However, as I started identifying the players, the game quickly expanded from e-scooters on sidewalks or in bike lanes to all users of roadways.

I realized that two trends have quickly engulfed our cities. First, capitalism has provided ever more modes of transportation – types of vehicles – to move us from one place to another. And second, city and suburban roadways have become much more congested. Together, these two trends are creating a fantastic game between people using different modes of transportation to get to where they want to go, as quickly, conveniently, and cheaply as possible.

This analysis will first review the electric scooter market – who the major companies are, how electric scooter rentals work, and regulatory actions that have recently been taken by cities against scooter companies.

The analysis will then move on to examine the broader Public Roadways Game. This game examines the dynamics among all the different users of public roadways, together with other interest groups whose actions affect the use of public roadways.

Read more: Playing the Public Roadways Game