SIOUX FALLS S.D. (KELO) — Rental e-bikes have been operating in Sioux Falls for more than a month and the future of e-bike rentals as well as what education and policies need to be in place were discussed during a city board meeting Wednesday.
During the Active Transportation Board meeting for Sioux Falls on Wednesday, co-founder of Electric Jaunt, Samantha O’Neil, said more than 600 trips have been taken using Jaunt since they started their business in September, adding that they are very careful with where they are putting their bikes.
“It’s a private business partnering with the city to provide these services and we create these parking spaces in our back-end dashboard around existing bike racks in the public spaces of the city so we haven’t just put them anywhere or leave them all on the sidewalk,” O’Neil said during the meeting. “We have created these spaces specifically around parking racks so that they would be out of the way of pedestrians and car users.”
Kallie Larsen, co-founder of Jaunt, said in an email to KELOLAND News: “We have discussed many things and something our system as well as the public is looking for is more bike racks and bike parking throughout the Greenway. While we have been in close cooperation with the city, Parks and Recreation department has only expressed that they are ‘not interested’ in our project.”
Larsen stated the bike racks they plan on adding won’t be just for Jaunt and will be for the public as well. She added they are trying to get more bike racks up around Sioux Falls.
“A lot of what we ran into was the businesses are very open to the idea, but they don’t own the property, so having to go back and contact their landlord and ask if this can be implemented,” O’Neil said. “We just needed to put a little more data to it for them so show them that we can attract hundreds of customers if we have this available for them.
O’Neil added “safety for our riders and other independent riders on the street was also a concern. Some of our riders as well as independent riders seem to be very hesitant to ride in the street which is causing hazards for pedestrians downtown(mainly Phillips Ave)on the sidewalks.”
Sioux Falls Active Transportation Board Member Chad Pickard said the city needs a plan to deal with people riding their bikes on sidewalks and riding motorized vehicles on bike trails.
“We keep talking about e-bikes on sidewalks and I would love to see a plan from the city from Downtown Sioux Falls or the Police Department because it is getting worse and worse,” Pickard said. “The risk of being hit by an e-bike or any bike is pretty great when walking downtown. I’ve seen it happen, I’ve seen people move above 15 miles an hour on a sidewalk.”
O’Neil said what Jaunt’s plans are as we move towards colder weather
“If we have bikes there at that time, we will be decreasing our fleet greatly because there won’t be as much use in the cold. That’s our plan is just to remove a lot of the bikes,” O’Neil said. “We do wanna keep some available still, but on those extremely cold winter days, on those, polar vortex days and days where it’s colder than negative 20 we will likely be removing our batteries and putting a cover over that area.”
Pickard said he is urging the city to come up with a plan and work with other departments to strengthen those rules.
“If we want people to come to our downtowns or Steel District or whatever these developments we’re putting in, if we want them to park their car or leave their car at home and, and shot these dense places,” Pickard said. “The city needs to start taking it seriously and make it safe somehow.”
