It’s the era of scooter commuters.
You may have seen people in business suits zipping along the sidewalk or heading into the office, wheeling their stand-up electric scooters with them. Electric scooters are quickly becoming a new tool for South Florida commuters who ditch their cars because of gas prices or simple convenience.
Many South Florida commuters are using electric scooters to solve the “first and last mile challenge” — the distance between a public transit stop and someone’s final destination.
“Scooters and bikes fill that gap,” said Steven Abrams, the executive director of Tri-Rail. “It is popular because people can access between cities and then be able to get to their ultimate destination using their bike or scooter.”
At Tri-Rail and Brightline stations, commuters get creative, sometimes bringing electric scooters, bicycles, roller blades and even electric skateboards. Scooters offer the advantage of fast travel without the exertion that bikes or skates involve.
“For commuting like how I’m doing it, I love it. It’s great. It’s so much better than the drive,” Mark Koenig said.
Koenig lives in Fort Lauderdale and takes the Brightline to Miami for work. Although Koenig received his scooter as a gift before the price of gas went up, he said he would probably want to get one now anyway.
“If I wasn’t doing it already, I would be deeply considering it,” Koenig said.
Colton Ralston, the owner of Boca Scooters, said recent higher gas prices are driving more people to electric scooters.
“Anytime gas surges, we see a spike in the sale of scooters,” Ralston said.
He said buyers at his shop are split into those who are purchasing electric scooters for recreation and those purchasing it with an everyday commute in mind.
“I would say about half of my buyers live a mile or two or three from work or school and want to get there and are willing to ride the scooter down the sidewalk and ride to where they need to go,” Ralston said. “And then the other half is more like, they live in big gated communities and they want to ride around and their neighbors have golf carts, that kind of thing.”
Those shorter distances between bus or train stops and home or work are good for scooters, Ralston said. The cost of parking, gas or ride-shares gets expensive quickly. Parking at Tri-Rail stations is free, but parking at Brightline costs $5 if you add it to your ticket or $15 for the whole day in the garage.
“I would imagine after a few weeks of doing that, you’d probably be more than halfway to just buying a scooter,” Ralston said.
Daniel Paiva initially bought his scooter for leisure but now uses it to connect the half-mile on each end from his home in Miami and work in Fort Lauderdale. He said it was a worthwhile investment.
“You don’t pay parking; you don’t pay gas. You can take it up in a building or something like that,” he said. “So it’s pretty convenient.”
One drawback that Paiva mentioned is safety. “It depends where you are. If you’re in a high traffic area, it can be very dangerous because you know, drivers are crazy. Most people don’t wear helmets …” he said.
Scooters have faced regulation hurdles in cities like Fort Lauderdale, which was one of the first in Florida to adopt dockless e-scooters, allowing riders to rent them using an app and leave them on the sidewalk when they’re done. But due to COVID and a number of accidents and complaints of pedestrians and scooter riders clashing on sidewalks, Fort Lauderdale banned electric scooters in 2019 for nearly two years.
That same year, the state legislature voted to treat scooters as bikes, allowing riders to use streets and bike lanes as opposed to sidewalks only. The bill still leaves other scooter regulations up to municipalities.
Many scooter commuters can go up to only about 20 miles an hour on their scooters, but some devices can go much faster. Paiva says he’s seen some people on the train with the kind of scooter that can reach 40 miles an hour.
Brightline rider Seth Goldberg has two higher-end scooters that he alternates between when going to work. He lives in West Palm Beach and works in Fort Lauderdale, and he cited ease of travel as a main draw of electric scooters.
“It’s 100% worth it for the convenience,” he said. “There’s no wait for a ride share or Uber. Brightline accepts it. It has an area where we can put our scooters.”
Brightline offers a shared ride service that will take users up to 5 miles from the train station for $5 or less. Even with this service, Goldberg says his scooters help him save time. If it rains, he can use the Brightline shared ride or take an Uber.
Regular Tri-Rail rider Grace Marcel relies on her electric scooter to connect between the train and buses.
“It’s easier with a scooter, and I save time,” she said in Spanish. “It’s easy to take with me on the bus or the train.”
Marcel doesn’t have a driver’s license and uses her scooter to travel short distances. Even when she takes the bus or the train, her scooter is still helpful to connect between shorter distances. She said she’s noticed other people doing the same when she takes Tri-Rail.
“I see a few people with scooters,” she said. “More with bikes, but one or two people with scooters every time I take the train.”
Marcel bought her e-scooter on sale for $300, which is on the lower side for scooters. Slower scooters with smaller batteries are hundreds of dollars, but fast scooters that can go longer between charges can run upwards of $1,000.
Although electric scooters are more common in big cities like New York and San Francisco, Ralston added Florida is an ideal place for electric scooters.
“Florida is gonna be one of the best places in the country for it because it’s flat. You don’t have hills. You’re not contending with snow and sleet and ice, and you get 12 months a year,” Ralston said. “It’s not seasonal.”
It’s not just commuters who buy scooters. Ralston said that Florida Atlantic University students love scooters “because there’s such a parking issue.” He’ll also see parents come in the store who will buy scooters for themselves and their kids so they can cruise around the community.
“You save yourself time, you save yourself headaches, you save yourself money, whichever combo of those three,” Ralston said. “That’s where they really get used.”
