How Micromobility is Reviving Urban Travel
In 2019 while working for the City of Coral Gables, my calendar filled up with meetings with micromobility providers. They brought their e-scooters and e-bikes over and we took them for a spin. I thought some of them looked funny, but they were convenient, light, and let people travel further than traditional bikes while expending way less effort.
Coral Gables started their e-scooter program by designating staging spots near commercial areas and tourist attractions. Ridership took off. This was the nascent stages of the micromobility revolution, before most riders owned their own devices. We noticed how many trips took place between the Douglas Metro Station and our downtown area (a lot!). Our program was feeding transit ridership and making the system more convenient for everyone.
Fast forward a few years later, and I can’t walk around a South Florida neighborhood without seeing at least a few people on a e-bike or e-scooter. The Underline is filled with them. I also see a lot of parents riding e-scooters with their kids on their way to school. And then I see people who would probably never ride a traditional bike using e-bikes to commute to work. When I commuted using Tri-Rail, the bike parking areas on each train were filled with these devices.
A lot of these scooter and bike trips replace car trips, and that’s the beauty of living in an urban area: You don’t need a car to access your daily needs. Cities across the U.S. show booming micromobility ridership, helping support transit, environmental and safety goals. Safety, you say? Yes. Increasing ridership of other modes helps reduce the denominator of roadway VMT injury and fatality rates. The best way to prevent a car crash is to give people options so they don’t have to drive.
I took a look at how other cities were doing with their micromobility programs. Here’s what I found.
New York City: Citi Bike’s Multimodal Muscle
Citi Bike is New York City’s heartbeat. Since launching in 2013, it’s exploded to 30,000 bikes across 2000 stations, powering 30 million rides in 2024 alone. Dockless e-scooters from Lime and Bird, legal since 2021, add 5 million trips yearly, zipping through Brooklyn and the Bronx. Why the boom? It’s dirt cheap, $3 per ride or $15 monthly for unlimited travel. Stations blanket subway stops, creating first and last mile access opportunities for transit riders. A 2024 NYC DOT report found Citi Bike trips replaced 50000 daily car trips, with 30 percent of users linking to MTA trains or buses for seamless commutes. It’s not just workers rushing to Wall Street, either. Families cruise to Central Park, tourists use them to get to Times Square, and locals use them around Coney Island. You often see micromobility riders in protected bike lanes, sharing the lane with traditional cyclists. NYC proves micromobility supports transit and helps improves access to the best subway system in the world.
Chicago: Divvy’s Commuter Win
Chicago’s Divvy bike share is a commuter’s dream, with 5800 bikes and 600 stations across the city. The Chicago Department of Transportation (CDOT) announced that over 11 million trips were taken on shared bikes and e-scooters in 2024, a new annual record. A 2024 report by CDOT and Replica, states that biking in Chicago grew 119% from fall 2019 to spring 2023, with neighborhood trips up 113% and crosstown trips up 180%. E-scooters, legal since 2020 via Spin and Superpedestrian (no longer operating), add 2 million rides yearly, especially in dense hubs like River North. Divvy’s e-bikes, with pedal assist up to 20 mph, make up 30 percent of rides. Stations sync with CTA trains and buses, so you can grab a bike at Union Station, roll to the Blue Line, and hit work without breaking a sweat. Spend time in the Loop and you’ll see workers scooting to meetings, students biking to UIC, and families riding through Millennium Park. Divvy’s app, tied to CTA’s Ventra, lets you pay once for bike and train access.
Austin: Scooters Steal the Show
Austin’s e-scooter scene is a revolution. Since 2018, Lime, Bird, and others dropped 7000 scooters, clocking 500,000 rides monthly in 2024. Bike share, like Austin BCycle’s, are located near MetroRail stops and Lady Bird Lake trails. In 2023, Austin recorded 2.66 million e-scooter rides, with 55% of trips connecting to transit stops or urban trails. A 2024 ITS-DOT study found e-scooter use reduced vehicle trips by 47% in high-use areas (like Downtown, UT campus). It’s sustainable, 0 emissions, and cheap: $1 to unlock, $0.15 per minute. In a city that’s not really known for alternative mobility options, micromobility helps a lot of people access parts of the city they would usually have to drive to. Not having to pay $20 for parking every time you go out is also a big win. South Congress shops love it and say anecdotally that foot traffic is up. The city added 50 miles of bike lanes since 2020, helping to support micromobility access. Even SXSW goes car free, with scooter corrals packing venues. Austin proves smaller cities can take a big lead with alternative mobility options.
The Future
Micromobility isn’t a fad. It’s transport, and it’s helping get cars off the road. It’s also a first-last mile solution that’s supporting transit networks throughout the country. And given the increase in people e-biking and scooter-ing, more protected bike lanes will be needed to provide safe routes, not just for them but for walkers, runners and traditional cyclists. Protected bike lanes and shared use paths have never been more useful or well-used than they are today. Cities will have to continue to find ways to accommodate increasing alternative mobility options, and this may mean separating wheeled mobility from walkers and runners, given the increasing number and speeds of micromobility devices. There has been some concern about the speeds of electric devices, and there are growing advocacy groups that either want to slow these devices down or separate them from pedestrian facilities. But more on that in a future article.