The only reason we're here arguing about this is companies like Bird chose to ask for forgiveness rather than permission in the past.
What they say "wtf, no?" to is companies treating public good and spaces like sidewalks as something they can just offload all of their costs onto, without ever asking permission.
Look at the Boston area with Bird right now. Bird just started dumping their scooters on sidewalks, got asked to stop by the towns, got told to stop by the towns, and then finally stopped only because the towns were confiscating all of the litter Bird left around and the number of locals who started destroying the scooters because they were abandoned property and none of them took lightly to companies dumping their shit on public grounds.
There is an argument to be made about how their is corruption in governments and they will push back on startups even though they are better for society, or how regulations strangle change and smaller firms. That argument doesn't apply to companies worth billions like Uber or Bird. They are just trying to break the law and offload costs to society, and then trying to claim it's disruption so they can tap into that feeling of doing good and changing the world that SV used to have 15 years ago
The absolute best outcome for Bird would have been the city saying "you can put them in designated scooter areas, and they have to be docked in designated scooter areas". And that would have turned them into just another e-bike: utterly useless and used by no-one.
Now, there's absolutely a reasonable conversation to be had about corporate over-reach, responsibility, and externalities here. However, let's not pretend that this could realistically have been accomplished any other way.
That would have gotten a no, but ”we would like to do an experiment decreasing road congestion” could have gotten them a yes _and_ a subsidy for running the experiment.
And yes, that “yes” would have had strings attached, even if it weren’t subsidized, but that’s normal for anthingmyhea affects shared space. If a company goes to the city and says “we would like to park our cars on the street instead of on our expensive parking lot” or “we would like to semi-permanently occupy the space in front of or shops”, would you expect the city to say “yes”, too?
Fat VC dollars come when they think you’ll dominate the world of scooters and put them everywhere. If you spend some of those millions fighting city governments so be it. Bribe them, make them fail elections, find loopholes, extend court trials forever. This companies have almost an unlimited supply of money.
Yes? I'd assume it would take finding someone friendly who works for the city, getting them interested in the concept, and getting their help and support in navigating the process, but yes, I'd absolutely expect the city to say "sure", maybe "sure, with caveats". Hell, maybe the city folks could find a way to finance half your deployment with taxpayer money. It's not like city administration exists only to sit on their collective butt and default-deny every request.
Were I only following the local media and other people's opinion on our city, I'd still be believing it's all bunch of busybodies led serving a no-good city president. But, as a part of leading a local Hackerspace, I ended up involved in city-NGO cooperation space. I've interacted with both city officials and private organizations trying to run publicly beneficial projects in the city, and it turns out my city is really willing to help, to partner, to support.
Of course, the local and national politics sometimes leak through and create issues, so it's not all roses. But I left the space with the impression that one only has to try to start a friendly conversation, and there's plenty of city officials, with budgets behind them, willing to cooperate with your new endeavour.
EDIT: Oh, and yes, there are procedures. Things move much slower than you expect, and if you're trying to get some of the city money for the project, you end up organizing public consultations and preparing recommendation reports to the city, and doing other busywork that may seem, or even be, pointless in the case of your project. It can be frustrating.
If it's risky proposition, then yes, it's better to refuse.
If he accepts it and things go wrong, it'll be blamed on him, and he might get kicked out.
If he refuses, the worst that could happen is it could succeed somewhere else. In which case, he could then reconsider.
The only time where it makes sense to accept is when he's desperate and needs to shake things up, or there are enough kickbacks to make it worthwhile.
Yes. The politicians already do this all the time, every time a development company wants to turn a vacant lot or McDonald's into an apartment building even though that building meets all the codes and standards.
It turns out that politics is often times negative sum, and whatever good thing you are doing will stopped, merely because you havent given them their cut.
When you meet an asshole you've met an asshole. When you meet assholes all day, you're probably the asshole. These dockless companies are complaining about everyone's reaction to them, which is making me think they might just be assholes
Before the scooters littered the city, the companies talked to SFMTA, and SFMTA said they were drafting up regulations to govern the scooters prior to giving permission.
The companies went ahead and littered the city with them anyway, without permission.
Claiming that breaking the rules is what led to the SFMTA coming up with regulations to allow scooters is just plain wrong. They were working on them already. The companies just got greedy and figured it was a first-mover market and that they'd be able to pull an Uber and continue operating despite breaking the rules.
If they'd asked for permission before anyone had heard of the idea of a scooter company, SFMTA would have ignored the request.
Do you genuinely think it's good for society when businesses do this?
In then end I guess I don't care because I truly believe the rules are backwards and protecting cars above any useful alternatives that may represent a useful future for green sustainable urban transportation.
I should also say, look below[0]. Bird's application was terrible . Scoot on the other hand set an example for a great application to a government body for a resource of some kind, I can compare it to my experience for writing grants.
I can imagine some class on professional writing contrasting these very two applications as examples of what not to do and what to do when applying for something from a government. After scanning both, I'm pretty much convinced the city chose the applications based on the quality and substance behind each application, not based on anything else.
The free market has worked out much better. Uber/Lyft have to provide competitive service at a low price. If they stop doing this, they too will be replaced.
It's like everyone who preaches this line knows so little history or wants people to forget[0].
In most situations, a process that allows for more freedom is the solution. I do not count corporations as people and as far as I'm concerned, they should be required to be far more open about operations than they are currently. I'm also not a fan of IP laws generally speaking and think they should all be scaled back.
I don't mind ubers quickly stopping to drop someone off on a non-separated bike lane as long as they don't cut people off and signal and merge safely. I'm happy to wait behind them or merge around just like a car would had they stopped in the main traffic lane. We can share the infrastructure, just don't leave your car in the bike lane!
Why's that ok? You are a private individual. You are using public space for private benefit, instead of , I don't know, letting the needy homeless use it.
So-called "black" cars where passengers arranged transportation in advance were governed differently, and required no licensing or a different and more permissive kind of licensing. Black car services were already widely available in many cities from lots of different companies, often independent owner/operators - it's just that no one had provided a service that worked across many different cities and was available conveniently as an app.
I won't claim that Uber and Lyft broke no laws, because there are a lot of jurisdictions in the world, and I don't know the laws of all of them, but many cities regular taxies and black cars very differently.
Edit: Why the downvotes? Am I wrong? Evidence would be appreciated.
Lots of just causes broke unjust laws.
This sort of retaliatory "shit list", constructed without due process, from which a company might only be able to extricate themselves by "kissing the ring" of local politicos/bureaucrats, is a recipe for inefficiency and corruption.
I also don't think the "litter" charge against the initial scooter deployments is correct, anyway, for reasons I outlined in a prior thread:
There is very little traffic on sidewalks and using it for pedestrians and scooters and bicycles is much better. Especially considering that cyclists can pause or go around pedestrians when necessary.
Having an absolute law rather than an adaptive is not useful to the community.
But I don’t think scooters parked in the sidewalk apply to me very much. If we’re moving, they or I move around each other.
lol. i guess the plebs who can't afford uber don't count as people. SF sidewalks have seem pretty packed to me whenever I am there.
In contrast to Bird, Scoot hasn't attracted that much criticism in SF despite being a pretty similar service.
You tell me if you see a scooter on the sidewalk if that strikes you as the same as people disposing of trash on the sidewalk: loose papers, cigarette butts, plastic bags, etc.
I get what you're saying for the sake of argument, but littering is a disgusting act that makes most people feel like their city is unclean.
Business should be able to operate freely, but they should not be able to break the law until someone catches them.