essay
by kirin kumar
streetalk
by Patrick Hyun Wilson
Asked At the sAcrAmento wAterfront:
Who shouldn’t be famous? menle y bAber crew member
Don’t vilify scooters If regulated, they can be good for Sacramento Kirin Kumar is executive director of WALKSacramento, For many, just the thought of motorized which advocates for active transportation to make the scooters from companies such as Lime, Bird region healthier, safer and more sustainable. and Jump can induce a panic. And in many cases, rightfully so. In cities across California—including Santa when wearing dresses. And while there have Monica, San Jose and San Diego—scooters certainly been cases where people have been have cluttered walking and bike paths, sped injured riding scooters, we must also consider rapidly down sidewalks and blocked access for the health benefits of traveling by an active the disabled. mode of transportation. A recent lawsuit filed on behalf of disability Given the benefits of these kinds of travel rights groups in San Diego accuses the city of options, many of us in the active transportaallowing scooter providers to operate with a tion advocacy world are still quick to vilify disregard for those protected by the Americans scooters and their riders. Often the arguments with Disability Act. These are major issues, center around user behavior and uncooperative that if go unresolved, will not only continue to providers. impact pedestrians, but can lead to providers Instead, I think we should consider the being banned and riders moving back into their scooter craze as a boon to our work, enabling cars. thousands of new users to experience Scooters have already landed in our streets—and the need for Sacramento, with more on their improvement—first hand. City way. The City Council is schedstreets that allocate a miniuled to vote March 26 on an Whether you mal amount of space to amendment to the ordinance like them or not, it’s healthy, alternative forms regulating “shared rideables” of travel while prioritizdifficult to argue that including bicycles and ing motor vehicles are scooters. These amendments getting more people out of going to continue to seek to proactively address their cars and on to shared leave pedestrians, bicymany of the concerns other clists, scooter riders and bikes and scooters isn’t cities have faced by requireveryone else fighting for ing companies to help pay a good thing for the limited space. for parking, by fining those planet. We must use this who leave electric bikes and opportunity to collectively scooters blocking the sidewalk and push our cities to rethink how we imposing permit fees that ensure the allocate space on our streets. Wider city has adequate resources to manage the sidewalks, more protected bicycle lanes, more shared rideables. While we fully support these pedestrian crossings and narrower travel lanes amendments, it’s important to also consider not only make things safer for all roadway the underlying reason we continue to have this users, but encourage more people to walk, bike fight: car-oriented design of cities. or scooter. Whether you like them or not, it’s difficult At the end of the day, common-sense reguto argue that getting more people out of their lations are a must. But to truly be proactive, cars and on to shared bikes and scooters isn’t California cities must dramatically rethink how a good thing for the planet. Uber has shown our streets work for people of all ages, abilities that there have been more rides in downtown and modes. Ω Sacramento on Jump bikes than in Uber vehi-
cles. We also hear from women in Sacramento that scooters are much easier to use than bikes 6 | sN&r | 03.21.19
The Dr. Phil girl—“Cash me outside” girl—definitely shouldn’t be famous. She acted like a brat and got famous for being a brat.
sAmAnthA l Awless residential counselor
Donald Trump, because he’s racist, he sucks, I hate him … He’s famous because of his money and that’s really all that gets him anywhere.
Joe y freitAs college student
Miley Cyrus … She could have moved forward as far as being a role model.
helenA beckert college student in Germany
All the Kardashians. I hate them all. [In Germany] we have all these YouTubers—they are all as stupid as the Kardashians. They stand for nothing.
mAlik Pinckne y barista
I disagree with “celebrity-ism” as a whole thing. Why are we following other people? Why can’t we just live our own lives and be progressive about that?
kevon robinson-hArris sales associate
Mumble rap is not really music, it’s just people making noises to a beat and they’re getting a lot of money for it. Young Thug irritates me.