Sprouting Wings As Wheels In San Francisco With Zipcar For Scooters — Scoot

San Francisco has a multiplicity in choices for mobility using clean vehicles — streetcars, bikes, feet (given the walkable environment), buses, and electric car rental. But there’s another relatively new option that many of you might find even better.

One way to find wings and wheels in the bay area is through moped sharing. Scoot is the Zipcar for electric scooters that makes traveling San Francisco about as light and as easy as you can imagine, definitely a way to lower one’s footprint.

Scoot launched in 2005 with 50 scooters. “Things are going swimmingly,” Fast Company points out, “members have saved 62,000 pounds of CO2 and scooted more than 50,000 miles.”

As Chris Gayomali continues:

After undergoing a basic training session (they don’t go over 30 mph, so you don’t need an M1 license, apparently), Scoot members use a smartphone app to track down a dock to rent from. Taking a scooter out for a spin will now run you $3 with a basic membership (before it was $5), with an additional $1.50 fee for each half hour after that during the day. (There is also a premium membership tier and a pay-per-rental basis, too, depending on your usage.) You can park it at another Scoot dock and be done with it, or park it on the street if you’re running errands.

Complementing, not competing with, established transit system makes these like little paths of water that flow into all those areas that big streams don’t reach. CEO Michael Keating told Fast Company:

Our ideal customer is anyone who lives or works in San Francisco and is looking for a fast way to get around town that only costs a dollar more than the bus…. Scooting is faster than riding the bus, it’s cheaper than taking a cab, and it’s a ton more fun than sitting in traffic in your car.

Scoot sublimely weaves more waves of renewable options. San Francisco is the progressive beginning of this complementary transit option — Scoot hopes to expand to other cities in 2014.

If you are wondering about the logistics of Scoot and want to take one out for a spin, it’s simple. You can travel up and down those stunning San Francisco hills without pulling out a wad of money to buy a vehicle. Pick up a scooter with you smartphone, use it to your heart’s content, then find your destination and dock the scooter there. Grist has more on the affordable, easy system:

Scoot members use a smartphone app to track down a dock to rent from. Taking a scooter out for a spin will now run you $3 with a basic membership (before it was $5), with an additional $1.50 fee for each half hour after that during the day. (There is also a premium membership tier and a pay-per-rental basis, too, depending on your usage.) You can park it at another Scoot dock and be done with it, or park it on the street if you’re running errands.

Read more about mopeds, scooters, and innovative electric motorcycles such as the Lit motors C-1:

1. Scoot Networks Is the Zipcar of Electric Scooters
2. This Vespa Stand-up Scooter Is Everything The Next Segway Should Be
3. Scooter That Can Haul Some Serious Cargo, From Lit Motors
4. Scooter That Can Turn A Smartphone Into A Dashboard
5. 91 Year Old With His Harley Davidson–styled Electric Mobility Scooter Is Cooler Than You
6. New Bio-composite Van Eko Scooter – Video
7. Foldable Electric Scooter — Awesome! (Crowdfund It)
8. It’s Gonna Happen: Ducati is Building a Scooter in 2014
9. Genuine Scooters’ 2014 Hooligan 170 Leaked on Facebook
10. Good Clean Fun — Electric Scooters from Vectrix Japan2

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