Movements | January 8th, 2020
Issue #78 - Brought to you by Michal Naka and Adam Feldman. Join thousands of others who receive this analysis and curation of emerging mobility news in their inbox every week — subscribe now.
Hello Movements fam, welcome to 2020! Buckle up as it’s going to be a rollercoaster of a year for mobility. Also if you are in New York City on January 16th, we are teaming up with the Micromobility crew to host a happy hour. Space is limited. Shoot us a message if you are interested in attending!
Micromobility
Bird teamed up with PowerMobility and Swiftmile to upgrade some of their nests to dedicated charging stations in Ramat Gan, Israel. | PowerMobility
Lime contract chargers (aka “Juicers”) in California are receiving termination letters. It’s yet to be seen if this is due to the company moving towards complete in house operations or because of recent state legislation around contract work. “Unclear if it's related to #AB5, but the timing sure makes it seem like it.” | Harry Campbell
Shared micromobility enforcement: Police in Beijing have arrested more than 2,600 people in relation to dockless bike theft and vandalism, according to Mobike’s blog. | BBC
Lime is removing all of its eBikes off the streets of Seattle. | Seattle Times
2020 predictions for shared electric scooters from Asher. Some highlights:
Personally owned scooter usage overtakes the shared model
Swappable batteries become much more common and perhaps even required
Operators consolidate and become more discerning about where to grow
Product Launches & Updates
SmartSwap is a new swappable battery product that allows operators to swap in freshly charged lithium ion in under 10 seconds. It looks like Circ is deploying these swappable battery vehicles in Dortmund, Germany. | Feishen Micro Mobility
Segway-Ninebot unveils the AIr T15, a 22-pound commuter electric scooter with a max speed of 12.5 mph. | The Verge
Bird continues to test new retail channels: Amazon featured Bird’s early ES1 scooters for sale during the holidays. | Amazon
Uber has a new safety feature that allows riders to complete rides in the event their card was declined. | LinkedIn
Uber rolls out transit ticketing in their app in Las Vegas. | The Verge
The new Apple Maps are now available across the US and users seem to like them. | Geo Awesomeness
Cubic is launching in-app advertising and loyalty programs. | Mobile Payments Today
Share Now, the carsharing service owned by BMW and Daimler and more commonly known as Car2Go, is leaving the US market. | The Verge
Using GTFS data to analyze bus schedule deviation and on time performance in Calgary. | Saadiq Mohiuddin
Ridehailing
Uber completes its acquisition of Middle East ridehailing startup Careem for $3.1 billion. | Uber
Travis Kalanick steps down from Uber’s board and offloads all of his remaining shares. | FT
The Information has a great piece on the latest happenings at Uber, including a number of challenges that they’re facing. Worth a read in its entirety. | The Information
Cities & Policy
An interview with Jeffrey Tumlin, the new head of the SFMTA. | Smarter Cars
An overview of cities’ experiments with on-demand shuttle services. | Wired
Following a trend in Europe, York is planning to become the UK’s first city to ban cars. | Sky
In case you haven’t heard, people are driving less and less: “Younger people are delaying getting their driver’s licenses and using them less than their predecessors. Drivers aged 16 to 19 drove 24% fewer miles in 2017 than did people of the same age in 2001, according to U.S. Transportation Department surveys. Those aged 20 to 34 drove 22% less.” | WSJ
NY’s governor has vetoed a piece of legislation that would have legalized scooters and e-bikes. Sigh. | NY Post