City of Calgary releases numbers on electric scooter pilot project

Dec 16 2019, 6:47 pm

Calgary’s fleet of e-scooters are currently in hibernation, but the wheels are still turning on the city’s pilot program.

City council has a few big decisions to make as the program enters into its second year — namely whether or not the scooters should become a permanent staple on the city’s streets and sidewalks.

The City of Calgary has released a report following up on the first half a year or so of operations, detailing statistics on how much the scooters were used over the course of July to October of this year.

According to the report, there were 750,000 recorded e-scooter trips during that time, with a survey finding that those who did use the scooters had generally used them for five to 15 trips.

A third of those trips, so roughly 250,000 scooter rides, were done to save the rider a car trip, and over half of all scooter trips terminated somewhere in Calgary’s Business Improvement Area or Business Revitalization Zone — which could mean that scooter riders were using the rides to access local businesses.

When it comes to injuries over the course of the four months, there were a total of 33 serious injuries that required an ambulance ride to an emergency room. Minor injuries were seen at a rate of one in every 1,500 rides, which equals out to about 500 small injuries across the 750,000 total rides.

The release notes that the above rate of injury is actually significantly lower when compared to bikes, according to Bird Canada, one of Calgary’s two e-scooter suppliers.

The fleet of 1,500 scooters are expected to be back on Calgary’s streets by March 2020 for the final phase of the pilot project.

Chandler WalterChandler Walter

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