Florine tested the Bird self-service scooters, which arrived on September 23, 2021 in Montluçon. Never again. “It healed me,” comments the twenty-seven-year-old Montluçonnaise. It is shame, car I think it’s a good idea. When you have difficulty getting around, you live a bit far away, you don’t have a car… ”
“The scooter has stopped”
What happened to him: “I live in the Saint-Jean district and I work on avenue Jules-Ferry. At first everything was fine. And rue Bretonnie, the scooter stopped. I searched, I did not understand. So I thought I was going push it to the station parking point. Except that it weighs a ton! I hurt my ankle. “
On the way back, from the old Plus store, boulevard de Courtais, rebelote. “I saw a teenager using one, who explained to me that you had to push hard for it to start. Corn I gave up and walked home. »
Florine left a comment on the app. “I have no feedback, I am disappointed. But it just takes a phone number somewhere, if there’s a problem. “
“Who to call in case of shock or breakdown?” “
This is a criticism of the system: “Who to call in case of shock or breakdown?” », Asks Monica, on our Facebook page La Montagne Montluçon. “The only time I wanted to test, the two available had no more battery »Angela laments. “After the excitement of the first few days, I see much less circulating. There are some in front of my work, they are often already very damaged… Difficulty handling them or unscrupulous users? Mystery ”, asks Cécile.
“In some areas, the scooter stops, without being in the red areas defined on the application where it is forbidden to drive. You have to restart it and it’s good ”, notes Guillaume, twenty-nine years old, qui rode a Bird several times, day and night :
This is a service that I will use again without any problem. But during the day, when there is traffic, it is difficult. There are not many cycle paths. And the state of the roads in some places is catastrophic.
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It is not Bird’s purview.
Improved signage?
But society gives itself time for experimentation before considering any development. “We will then have discussions with the town hall, to consider markings on the ground, signage”, indicates Antoine Picron, Expansion manager at Bird France.
Because no, the scooters are not parked “anywhere”, but on sixty-five geolocated points, which may change, such as the volume of the fleet.
Today, approximately seventy scooters are made available to the public. And testimonials describe users who ride without a helmet (it is recommended) and / or on sidewalks. It’s forbidden. “We still need some teaching time to remember parking rules and policy », Recognizes Antoine Picron.Bird gives himself the time to experiment to consider signage, to be discussed with the town hall.
This reminds us that users have a mail address ([email protected]) and messaging via theapp in case of problems : “The average response time is less than two minutes. “
As for unloaded vehicles, “we are victims of our success,” he said. “By the time we intervene to look for them”, it is already too late. In Montluçon, La Boutique de Sylvie is responsible for the maintenance of the equipment.
1,000 trips per week: “a good start”
It is “a good start, in the average” expected for a city of the size of Montluçon, according to Antoine Picron. Since the deployment, the company has recorded “a thousand trips per week, and a thousand users in a month. For the moment, they are rather satisfied, with an nExperience rating of 4.2 out of 5 ».
We must now see how the Montluçonnais will behave this winter. “If there is a strong demand and the weather is nice at Christmas, we will adapt the fleet. The objective is to gradually arrive at one hundred and fifty scooters by spring 2022.
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All about self-service scooters in Montluçon (Allier) (September 2021)
Seher Turkmen
[email protected]
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