c/o Andrew Lu, Editor-In-Chief
Bird scooters—produced by a business that makes electrical scooters and bikes—initially appeared on school as part of a Middletown sustainability effort at the start of the Fall 2022 term. The scooters were briefly eliminated from school throughout the winter season and are scheduled to return in the spring. Though the scooters provided a brand-new, hassle-free technique of transport, some trainees have actually raised issues concerning their availability.
“Scooters have been causing some issues for students with disabilities,” Wesleyan Student Assembly (WSA) Community Committee Chair Valerie Lee ’24 said. “It’s easy to trip over Birds, people are not mindful about who they might impact with their irresponsible parking behavior.”
During the current fall term, the scooters and bikes were typically haphazardly left in the middle of pathways and throughout typical sidewalks throughout school. As an outcome, the parked scooters ended up being challenges that trainees might quickly journey over. For example, Jonghwa Kim ’25, who has a visual disability, revealed issue over the positioning of Bird scooters around school. He regularly discovers them in locations where they are not expected to be, like in pedestrian paths, in front of stairs, and in front of doors, impeding his capability to browse school.
“People with various types of mobility related disabilities…[will] trip over them and it’s kinda just a hazard,” Kim said. “This morning, I tripped over one coming out of Hewitt.”
As a preliminary action to this issue, Dean for Academic Advancement Laura Patey started eliminating Bird scooters from pathways and sidewalks around school. However, this was not a long-lasting service. Currently, the University and Middletown authorities are utilizing geofencing—a procedure that involves utilizing GPS or RFID innovation to develop virtual geographical borders—to see when Bird automobiles leave the location and to deal with keeping pedestrian routes clearer.
“[University staff] have reached out to Bird or Middletown officials about the parking issues, so I’m pretty sure they have geofenced it a little more strictly since they came to campus,” Lee said. “That is probably why you are seeing less of the Bird scooters around campus—parking has been an issue that we are trying to tackle.”
The Office of Accessibility Services verified that the elimination of the Bird automobiles was because of the winter.
“Bird scooters will be returning in the spring season,” Director of Student Academic Resources Crystal Rose Hill-Farrell composed in an email to The Argus. “Accessibility Services is aware of the accessibility challenges the Bird scooters and bikes caused on campus last semester…. [W]e are working with the WSA to get information out to campus at that time regarding the importance of maintaining clear pathways when ‘parking’ the scooters and bikes.”
For some trainees like Margery Fang ’26, who does not have simple access to a car on school, the approaching return of the Bird scooters is good news.
“[Bird scooters are] useful for me because sometimes I have errands I need to run that’s more than a ten, twenty minute walk,” Fang said. “The scooter is efficient [for that].”
Fang likewise said about how simple the online payment function is and how the choice of a month-to-month payment strategy for the scooters can show to be beneficial to those who count on the Bird scooters for daily transport.
Ultimately, with a 2nd opportunity to gain access to Bird scooters this term, trainees and professors alike hope that the University neighborhood will interact to discover a safe, sustainable method of incorporating Bird scooters back into the neighborhood.
Carolyn Neugarten can be reached at [email protected].
Judy Liu can be reached at [email protected].
