With electric scooters possibly coming to campus, transportation to and from classes could look very different soon. Photo by Greg Clark.
The University of Rhode Island may be adding a new form of transportation on campus for students soon that could make moving from class to class more efficient and more fun.
According to Student Senate Campus Affairs Chair Michael Bentley and Student Senate President Austyn Ramsay, the senate is currently in talks with SPIN, an e-scooter company based in San Francisco, to bring a scooter hub to campus.
SPIN was founded in 2016, and according to its website, “partners with cities, campuses, community groups and businesses to provide dockless scooter-share services to get you where you need to go.” They have expanded from San Francisco to cities and colleges across the country.
Ramsay said that she believes that it would be very beneficial to have a motorized scooter hub on campus. She said that she thinks that it will be very fun for students to use them to ride around campus to classes or just to relax
She said that last year Bentley and the previous president looked into a similar idea but those plans fell through as there was not enough support for it at the time from the other members of the senate. She also said that the senate will look through its archives in order to see what students had thought the positives and negatives would be and work from there.
Bentley said that the scooters can be used for things such as going to classes from the parking lot instead of using the often crowded shuttle. He also thinks that they can be used as a way to make it to classes across campus more efficiently and can be a nice way for students to relax and have fun.
Both Ramsay and Bentley noted that nothing is set in stone yet, but that a meeting with the representatives of SPIN took place on Feb. 2 with both of them attending. The meeting gave them more information on the scooters, such as that they can be located via an app on phones.
SPIN has been very popular elsewhere and came to Providence in 2019. However, there have been some reports from universities such as Ohio State University, where 15 injuries happened between July 2018 and Sep. 2019 and Duke University where 10 people cited injuries that have happened as a result of the scooters between March and Nov. 2019, including serious injuries such as broken teeth and head injuries. This has led to more regulations at these schools focusing on the safety of students.
According to Bentley, the scooters will lock at a certain point at night with geofencing technology, in order to keep them on campus for the safety of the students
Bentley plans to conduct a survey of students to better understand if they want a scooter hub on campus. Ramsay noted that the price of the scooters will affect their decision on whether or not to get the hub.
If the data comes back positive, Bentley said it will make it more likely that the Student Senate will believe that the investment would be worth it.
“I would consider it worthwhile if the general student body supports the idea and the benefits will support the values of the University,” Bentley said.