Downtown scooters take temporary break
Dayton’s popular electric scooters have been removed from downtown, but fans shouldn’t fret — they’ll be back soon.
Spin collected the dockless scooters Feb. 1, and the company expects to relaunch them sometime next month.
Spin e-scooters have been a hit since they first rolled into downtown less than six months ago.
Many people have come to rely on the scooters to grab a bite to go eat, travel to meetings and get to leisure destinations.
“Giving people the opportunity to explore downtown in different ways is important, and the scooters are a complement to other mobility options, such as the Link bike share program and the RTA’s free Flyer bus, that give people the choice of different ways to travel in downtown,” said Sandy Gudorf, president of the Downtown Dayton Partnership.
In late August, San Francisco-based
Spin put about 100 to 120 e-scooters in downtown Dayton.
The scooters were an instant success, and the company decided to roughly double its local fleet.
Scooters often are used to shorten trips around the center city.
Some people use scooters to get to work or return home at the end of the day.
They make it easy to visit destinations that otherwise might seem too far to travel on foot.
“In downtown, we’ve noticed that people are using the scooters as an option for a quick and easy way to get from different destinations,” Gudorf said. “They’re used by a variety of people, whether it’s someone who works downtown and rides a scooter to a quick lunch, or if it’s people who are visiting downtown for an event and hop on to try the new trend.”
Spin scooters, which can reach speeds up to 15 mph, were kept fully operational in Dayton during the winter, which isn’t common.
In many colder markets, Spin puts its scooters in hibernation until better weather arrives.
But throughout this winter, Daytonians have braved frigid, subfreezing temperatures and hopped on the scooters.
Dayton is the first market where a transit agency — the Greater Dayton RTA — runs the operations side of Spin’s business, a Spin spokesperson said.
Spin is using this break to evaluate ridership trends and its deployment strategies, the spokesperson said.
Last year, the company said 92 people in Dayton every day try out the e-scooters for the first time. The average trip was estimated at nearly two miles, with a travel time of about 9 minutes.
Users download an app on their phones to pay for and unlock the scooters.