Shared Rideables Makes Appearance in Natomas

By Jack Fedor
Staff Writer | The Pacific Times

Walking down the street in Sacramento, shared rideables are seen everywhere. These seem to be there day after day and they move from one place to another. This is because of Jump by Uber and Lime, with their introduction into the city of Sacramento.

With this introduction, a lot of bikes and scooters are being placed on the city sidewalks and are used to transit from place to place without having to use an automobile.

To be able to use this form of transportation, one must be of the age of 18 for a scooter and 16 for a bike and must have an account. After that they must make a payment to Jump, as it is $1.50 for 10 minutes on a bike and $0.20 for every minute after. To be able to use one of the electric scooters one must pay $0.15 for every minute they use the scooter.

The city of Sacramento has created rules for these bikes and scooters, so that they do not hinder the public’s use of sidewalks. 

One of the first rules individuals must know is to not ride a scooter on the sidewalk. This is because they are classified as a motor vehicle and people must have their drivers licence to ride one. 

The second rule is that they must be put into a bike rack and the scooters must be placed nearby, so when they appear just on the sidewalk not attached to anything then they are in the wrong place. Jump has stated that they will at some point will charge riders some sort of money in order to make them follow the rules so the company does not get fined.

Another rule that the company requires is for people to place their used vehicles in the designated zone, which is all around the city and in parts of Davis, part of Sacramento Jump. Failing to do so will give users a $25 fine on top of their riding payment. Users can get a free ride on a scooter and some Uber Cash, if they return a low battery scooter, to a charging station which are all near the south of downtown. 

The specific rules for the shared rideables

To be able to get Jump an introduction into Sacramento, the company was asked to include over 1,000 bike racks into the city grounds for them to be able to introduce the bikes and scooters into the city. Next time one sees a red bike or scooter on the ground, in a random spot on a sidewalk or in a neighbors driveway they know that it does not belong there. 

Melissa Meng, a program manager at Jibe for the bike and bus, describes, “We have been very interested in doing a pilot with Jump bikes, to bring them out to our area. Unfortunately at this time Jump has told us they are not able/willing to expand outside their existing service area of the downtown core.”

As Jump bikes are new in Sacramento and South Natomas it is hard to say if they will last, but one thing that is for sure is that they are everywhere.