More Scooters Coming To Nashville As Council Mulls Revised Rules

Nashville will soon have 1,000 additional electric scooters on its streets as a two more companies — Spin and ridesharing giant Uber — join the trend. In all, the city could have 3,500 of the shared, dockless devices in use.

At the same time, concerns about injuries and blocking of sidewalks has the Metro Council considering some updated rules, including capping the number of companies.

Since a permitting process was created in August, the city says there have been roughly a half-million rides — so the scooters are getting use. But their presence is “challenging” for the Transportation Licensing Commission, says Director Billy Fields.

“We’re going to keep doing the best we can in fielding the complaints,” he said.

The friction has Councilman Jeremy Elrod, who wrote the original ordinance, pursuing changes.

“It’s something that we’re continuously evaluating,” he said. “We can have check-ins with it and make tweaks with it as we go along.”

Namely, Elrod wants to empower the police to issue citations to underage riders — “adding teeth” to the guidance already provided within scooter apps, which don’t allow riders under 18.

Elrod also wants to clarify an anti-clustering provision, which forces companies to spread the scooters across the county.

But the thorniest change could be Elrod’s attempt to limit the city to the four scooter companies that exist now, only taking newcomers through a special process.

Yet his proposal quickly raised legal questions, with the council’s own attorney saying the idea likely violates monopoly laws. An analysis pointed to the state constitution and an opinion by the Tennessee Attorney General — and notes that two other operators, Spin and Gotcha, are in permit talks with Metro.

In response, Elrod said he will continue to revise his bill, aiming for a “soft cap” that doesn’t run afoul of the law.

“We’re trying to be a city that wants to show that we’re open to new ideas, to innovative solutions to try to deal with our traffic,” Elrod said. “I’m trying to thread that needle.”

Electric Scooters And Bikes

The newest player in Nashville is Uber-owned JUMP, which has been approved for 500 scooters and 500 electric bikes. The company touts itself as having launched the first dockless electric bikeshare in the country in 2017.

Uber bought JUMP in May, adding the two-wheel alternatives to its app in several cities.

“Riders have told us they like having multiple transportation options available within a single app to fit their various needs, and soon Nashville residents and visitors will have even more transportation options,” Uber said in a statement.

Late on Wednesday, Fields said that the San Francisco-based Spin was also approved for 500 scooters, and that Gotcha, a Charleston, S.C. company, had applied.