Portland Scooter Safety Concerns Spark Safety Event

PORTLAND, OR – Three companies have had electronic scooters on the streets of Portland since July 25. It's about halfway through a 120-pilot program that ends on November 20.

To mark the occasion – and to help fulfill their obligation to the city – the three companies operating the scooters are having a safety event on Thursday, Sept. 13 from 10:30 a.m. through 1 p.m..

The first 500 people who show up will receive a free helmet from one of the three companies, Bird, Lime, and Skip. Get all the latest information on what's happening in your community by signing up for Patch's newsletters and breaking news alerts.

Officials from the Portland Bureau of Transportation will also be on hand to give away safety information. The forum event will be held at the interseciton of Southwest Broadway and Oak.

From the time that the program launched in July, the program has generated some complaints but overall, the number of complaints have been small in comparison to the number of rides.

Using information from PBOT, Patch crunched the numbers:

All complaints

Breakdown of type of complaints

So, while the city has received just more than 1100 complaints, it's not a lot of percentage of total rides.

According to PBOT, there were nearly 180,000 in the first two months for a total of more than 270,000 miles. The longest trip was 22 miles and the average trip was 1.5 miles.

There's been between 38,000 and 48,000 rides each week.

Photo: PBOT.