From The Verge:

There are some early signs that shared mobility could survive the crisis, even come out looking better than before; one of those “it’s always darkest before dawn” kind of things. But before that happens, the scooter industry as a whole will need to shrink, as it already was doing before COVID-19. And a lot of people will probably lose their jobs.

In what seems like a lifetime ago, I would walk past a local MARTA train station after work every day and it looked like the rapture happened without me. Scooters were flung about in every which way, and it made walking down the sidewalk a real pain. Every time I needed to use a scooter, it seemed like I never had the correct app and couldn’t find a scooter for the one that I already had credit with. First world problem to be sure, but it rarely left me feeling positively about the experience.

You never like to cheer for the downfall of any company, but I’m not all that upset to see this industry shrinking. Ideally there’s only one or two of these companies that work with local public transportation to fill the gaps in their service, rather than the streets being a wasteland littered with a dozen different scooter brands at any given time. Consolidation could be a good thing, with more predictable service and fewer apps to navigate.