Third company joins Bird, Lime on city streets
San Francisco-based company the third such venture to hit Edmonton streets
Edmontonians have another way to get around the city with San Francisco-based Spin launching a fleet of roughly 450 e-scooters onto Edmonton's streets.
The rollout last week marks the company's debut appearance in Canada.
This is the third e-scooter company to offer alternative transportation for Edmontonians following the launches of Bird and Lime in 2019.
Spin e-scooters cost a dollar to unlock and charge 35 cents per minute to ride. In comparison, both Lime and Bird charge $1.15 to start and 35 cents a minute to ride.
Spin scooters are available in the city's downtown core, Old Strathcona, the University of Alberta and Oliver.
Senior launch manager Carolyn Liou said the company wanted to place their e-scooters in areas with good existing biking infrastructure.
She said Edmonton stood out from other Canadian cities because it already had an existing e-scooter program in place.
“The city allowed us to come in rather quickly because of everything that's already in place,” Liou said. “I feel Canadian markets are great markets for us because a lot of people are very outdoorsy (and) also love biking. It is a little harder (to move into a market) when a competitor already has a presence (but) ... our scooters are brand new ... the wheels are bigger (and) it's a lot more stable.”
Spin, like all e-scooter companies, has to follow the rules set out by the city. This means they will have to provide health and safety information, pick up scooters that are damaged, outside of their operational zone, improperly parked or if they need to recharge. E-scooters are permitted in bike lanes, shared pathways, and streets and roads with a posted speed limit of 50 kilometres per hour or less.
They cannot be on sidewalks, park trails not maintained by the city or vehicle lanes designated for patio use on Jasper Avenue, Old Strathcona or 124 Street.
Sara Dodrill, Spin's communications manager, said the company has a warehouse where it stores and cleans the scooters daily. She said the company has hired seven people so far.
“A lot of scooter companies do their employee structure differently, some people use outside contractors,” Dodrill said. “Our employees are actually employees of Spin. We have control over the benefits that they get, we make sure they're treated fairly and have access to different parts of the company that maybe they wouldn't if they were working for a competitor.”