Nash In The Know: Local bicyclist asks how micromobility impacts transportation in Nashville

The company BCycle has returned to Nashville with 175 electric bikes. Plus, multiple vendors can each have up to 500 scooters on the street.

All of this is considered micromobility.

Local cyclist Carey Rogers asked WPLN’s Nash In the Know about the future of micromobility in the city. Twenty years ago, Rogers was an inexperienced biker, but now, he’s upgraded to being on the Transportation Licensing Division, which is a city commission in charge of licensing and regulating scooters, bikes and even horse drawn carriages.

Rachel Iacovone WPLN News

A lone electric scooter from the company Bird is propped up on the sidewalk outside the Frist Art Museum. Just out of frame is where a ragtag of scooters begins downtown — at the intersection of 9th Ave S and Broadway.

A major challenge for the city will be upgrading its suburban designed streets with limited cash — and quickly getting frustrated Nashvillians out of traffic and into other ways of traveling.

“We chip away at that is by incentivizing or requiring newer developments to have fewer curb cuts, to have setbacks, that are closer to the street,” says Peter Westerholm, Greater Nashville’s regional council director of policy and government affairs.

Westerholm says we need to rethink the rules that put cars in front of stores and create barriers for other ways of traveling.

The city currently has multiple strategies in the works.

Ambriehl Crutchfield WPLN News

A sign encourages residents to weigh in on whether or not e-bikes should be allowed on the city’s greenways by participating in the survey accessible through the printed QR code.

For infrastructure, the transportation staff is updating the WalkNBike plan for sidewalks and bikeways. The city currently has 53 projects in design or under construction.

Plus the city is studying how and if e-bikes should be used on greenways. In an email shared with WPLN News, BCycle says 11 of its 23 stations are closed for the study, which has decreased their revenue by 40%.

“Having a robust micromobility infrastructure that supports all riders and all users of all abilities is something that should be portrayed as an amenity and accessibility and a statement of values,” Westerholm says to WPLN News.

For safety, Nashville officials will create a group to review contributing factors for all deadly crashes and get the fatality rate to zero. So far in 2021, there’s been 34 people killed while walking, biking or scooting.

Research shows having bike infrastructure reduces crashes and makes the streets safer for everyone.