E-scooters back in city for second year

By Delon Shurtz - Lethbridge Herald on March 28, 2023.

LETHBRIDGE HERALDdshurtz@lethbridgeherald.com

Don’t have your own car but don’t want to wait for a bus? It’s too far to walk but taxis are too expensive? Your friend has a car, but his licence is suspended? Who ya gonna call?
Ghostbusters isn’t going to help you with this one, but there is another alternative.
For the second consecutive year Neuron Mobility has returned with its e-scooters, and later this spring e-bikes to help residents get around the city, while having fun at the same.
Like last year, 500 of the distinctive orange vehicles will be on city streets, boasting ecologically friendly, safe and sustainable transportation.
“I’m looking forward to another year of added mobility and sustainable transportation options for residents here in Lethbridge,” Mayor Blaine Hyggen said recently in a news release.
“We saw some of the economic benefits to businesses with the addition of the e-scooters and e-bikes, so I hope to see that trend continue this year. I hope to see residents and visitors continue to scoot and bike safely around our beautiful city and get out and enjoy all it has to offer.”
Ankush Karwal, head of marketing for Neuron Mobility, says riders rode thousands of kilometres on the battery powered vehicles in Lethbridge last year, and provided support to local businesses.
“The program in Lethbridge has been a phenomenal success,” Karwal says. “Since launching in April 2022, riders have travelled 430,000 km on Neuron e-scooters and e-bikes in Lethbridge, injecting a significant amount of money into the local economy and avoiding 36 tonnes of CO2 emissions.”
A Neuron report, “Shared Rides, Shared Wealth,” shows that more than 60 per cent of scooter trips in Lethbridge resulted in a purchase, cumulatively enabling $3.2 million in spending at local businesses a year. Close to 20 per cent of trips wouldn’t have happened at all if the e-scooters weren’t available.
The survey also highlights that 99 per cent of riders surveyed in Lethbridge believe the vehicles have benefited the city and improved mobility, air quality and congestion. Eighty per cent of riders said they used e-scooters for leisure and recreation, while 34 per cent rode to work or school, and 27 percent ran errands, such as shopping.
Karwal notes negative incidents involving the vehicles are rare – a scooter was seen floating in a body of water last year – and safety is a key component of the company’s presence in Lethbridge.
“Across all the cities where Neuron operates, our incident rate is exceptionally low. There is a helmet attached to every Neuron e-scooter and we operate an interactive, online safety program, ScootSafe Academy, to educate riders on local rules and safe parking guidelines.”
The e-scooters and e-bikes are GPS-connected and managed by geofencing technology, which controls where they can be ridden and parked, and the speed they can travel in different areas. The e-scooters also include an app-controlled lock that secures the provided helmet to the scooter. Riders who take a selfie while wearing the helmet before a trip are awarded a 50 cent credit.
Riders who are at least 18 years old can book and use the e-scooters through Neuron’s app, which can be downloaded from the App Store or Google Play. It costs $1.15 to unlock the scooter and 39 cents per minute of riding. More frequent users can pay for a subscription service: $25 for three days, $39 for a week, and $99 for a month.
Neuron, which was founded in Singapore in 2016, arrived in Canada in 2021 and operates in the Alberta cities of Lethbridge, Calgary, Airdrie and Red Deer, and in Vernon, B.C., and Ottawa, Ont.

Follow @DShurtzHerald on Twitter

4
-3