On a recent weekday morning, 36 shared electric scooters were available at the tiny Polish Triangle park on the city’s Near Northwest Side. They outnumbered the pigeons.
West Town resident Vince Eckles, 50, used a smartphone app to rent a red Jump scooter for his 1-mile trip to work.
“I’d rather take these than the bus — less crowds, less hassle,” said Eckles, adding that he has used the scooters for his commute since the city’s pilot program began June 15.
Eckles is part of a trend. A new study from DePaul University’s Chaddick Institute for Metropolitan Development looking at one July day found that most rentals in Chicago’s scooter pilot program take place during the morning or evening rush hour.
Here are four findings from the study, which comes out this week:
Mornings are busy
“A Day in the Life of Chicago’s E-Scooter Pilot Program” by Chaddick Director Joseph Schwieterman and Assistant Director C. Scott Smith, looked at scooter use between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m. on Wednesday, July 24. The study found that use was highest during the morning rush hour, with 37% of all trips occurring between 7 and 9 a.m. The next highest use period was between 5 and 7 p.m., which accounted for 23% of all trips.
The four hours that make up the rush periods accounted for 70% of all e-scooter miles traveled, the study found. The higher level of users in the morning likely reflects the heightened sense of urgency that users feel going to work, compared with returning home, the study said.
Candice Xie, CEO of scooter operator VeoRide, said that allowing more scooters would ensure better availability and predictability for daily commuters. Currently, the scooter program is limited to 10 companies with 250 scooters each.
Where they’re hot
The boundaries for the four-month pilot program are Halsted Street on the east, the north branch of the Chicago River and Irving Park Road on the north, the city limits on the west and the South Branch of the Chicago River on the south.
The city requires that companies place 25% of their scooters each morning into each of two priority areas — one north of Chicago Avenue and west of Pulaski Road, and one south of Chicago Avenue and west of Kedzie Avenue. Those areas were chosen because they are not as well served by the Divvy bike program.
The most popular spots for scooter use tended to be in the eastern part of the pilot area, according to the study. The Near West Side saw 622 scooter departures and 465 scooter destinations, followed by 408 scooter departures and 454 destinations in the West Town neighborhood, and then Logan Square with 118 trip starts and 133 destinations. Riders sometimes start in one part of the pilot area and end in another one.
Less trendy neighborhoods ranked lower. Portage Park, for example, saw just 29 trip starts and 25 destinations. Only 23 trips started in the West Side neighborhood of West Garfield Park.
The heavy use at the far eastern end of the pilot zone suggests that the Halsted boundary is “a real constraint on riders,” Schwieterman said.
“If they could go to Union Station or Ogilvie Station, you could probably get more trips,” Schwieterman said.
Matthew Lehner, a spokesman for Lime scooters, said the company supports the idea of a long-term scooter program with more scooters that serve the entire city. “We’re likely missing out on many rides because you can’t go east of Halsted, or south of the river,” said Lehner.
Where they’re distributed
Though a few scooter companies have been cited by the city for not properly distributing the devices, the study found that on average, almost 49% of e-scooters were located within the two priority areas.
The study also found that more than 20% of e-scooters were in areas of very high economic hardship during most of the day, compared with less than 8% of Divvy bike stations in a 2017 DePaul study. Hardship was measured by 2017 U.S. Census American Community Survey five-year estimates, which look at factors like unemployment, lack of health insurance, and percentage of residents without a high school diploma. The DePaul scooter study noted that a planned Divvy expansion, which will bring bikes to all 50 wards, will improve access to shared bikes.
They’re not fully deployed
The DePaul study found that most companies had not deployed their full number of scooters during the day studied. For example, only about 165 of Uber’s Jump scooters were deployed on July 24.
Josh Gold, senior manager of public affairs at Uber, said that while it started most July mornings with 235 to 250 scooters on the road, those numbers can fluctuate based on various factors, such as the weather and software updates.
High numbers for Wheels (283 for July 24) and low numbers for Gruv (2) can be blamed on problems with the companies’ data feeds, said Isaac Reichman, spokesman for the city’s Department of Business Affairs and Consumer Protection.
The DePaul study counted a total of 2,620 trips over a 12-hour period, with an average distance of 2 miles, for an average of 1,486 deployed scooters, which works out to less than two trips per scooter.
The Chicago Department of Transportation declined comment on the DePaul study.
