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SALT LAKE CITY — Dockless electric scooters have been a controversial addition to the Salt Lake City transportation scene ever since they arrived in summer 2018.
On Tuesday, the Salt Lake City Council reviewed a draft ordinance to formally regulate the use of such e-scooters, but the ordinance as written would make few changes to the temporary operating agreement the scooter companies are using now.
Salt Lake’s transportation division director Jon Larsen was at the council meeting to talk through and field questions about the draft proposal. “There really shouldn’t be too many surprises, at this point, in this ordinance,” Larsen said by way of introduction. “It really just takes most of what’s been working in the pilot phase and just, basically, codifies it in an ordinance.”
In reviewing positive and negative community feedback about the scooters, Larsen said many residents, especially seniors, have expressed concern about sidewalk riding. “They go fast, and they’re very quiet,” he said. “I’ve had several octogenarians mention to me that if you break a hip, you’re done. So that’s a very real fear for them.”
He also mentioned concerns about parking and sustainability. “A lot of these scooters only last a month,” Larsen said. He said the ordinance “doesn’t address” most of those details but rather “provides a framework” to address them in the future.
The draft ordinance does detail where e-scooters can be parked and says they are not allowed on downtown sidewalks where bicycles are banned. Under Utah Senate Bill 139, passed in 2019, e-scooters cannot be regulated more restrictively than bicycles.
The ordinance leaves open the possibility that the city could move to a competitive contract-based system with one or more scooter companies, and gives the mayor authority to determine the number of companies and devices in the market under such a contract.
City Councilwoman and Mayor-elect Erin Mendenhall and Councilman Chris Wharton said pedestrian safety should be top of mind when considering the ordinance. “To say that some people are having a concern about the dockless scooters is very mild,” Wharton said. “People have very strong feelings about dockless scooters, at least from what I’ve been hearing, in terms of safety concerns.”
“The priority is 100%, for me, about protecting the pedestrian environment that we have spent hundreds of millions of dollars to create in Salt Lake City,” Mendenhall said. She called for a new transportation master plan that takes shared mobility devices into account, but noted that she’s unlikely to be on the council when it ultimately votes on a new ordinance.
Larsen discussed possible ways to improve enforcement of dockless scooter rules without police involvement, including placing prominent ID numbers on all devices to make them easier for anyone to report. “The city would then tag the vendor with a fine, who would then pass the fine on to their user,” he said.
Councilman Andrew Johnston, who self-identified as an e-scooter user, agreed with the focus on pedestrian safety but said that many riders choose sidewalks over crowded city streets. “It’s not about the sidewalk being desirable,” Johnston said. “The street’s not desirable.”
“We have to look at the city and heavily invest in multiple modes of transportation options on streets,” he said.
When Wharton asked how many people have been cited for sidewalk riding so far, Larsen said he is “not aware of any.”
“If there’s a culture of zero enforcement, then I think that’s a pretty obvious target to start with,” Wharton said in response.
The dockless e-scooter companies operating in Salt Lake City, which include Lime, Bird and Spin, require riders to take a picture of where they’ve parked and have participated in campaigns like “Walk Your Wheels” to encourage riders to stay off sidewalks downtown.
The city is currently soliciting feedback on the scooters and the draft ordinance via email, at dockless@slcgov.com, and online at slc.gov/transportation/sharedmobility.
