DALLAS, Texas — Rental scooters and bikes are returning to Dallas once again -- you’ll start to see them on Wednesday during a soft launch.
More will arrive in the coming weeks. They were welcomed, loved, hated, loathed and dangerous before they were suspended in 2020.
While Dallas gets ready to ride again, those who are blind or visually impaired are preparing to be more alert than usual.
Blake Lindsay, the Outreach and Communications Director for Envision Dallas, told WFAA on Tuesday he wasn’t overly thrilled by the news.
The agency provides crucial programs, employment and services to the visually impaired within the city.
Yet, Lindsay isn't offering a war -- he's only asking riders to think of people like him.
“I heard the news this morning and thought, ‘Here we go again.’ My memory of rental scooters and bikes in Dallas is vivid,” Lindsay, who has been blind since infancy, said.
“We had to be extremely cautious with our canes then, and that’s how we will handle it now.”
If you lived in Dallas when the rental scooters and bikes arrived, it wasn’t difficult to notice the sidewalk clutter they created.
It was worse when riders wouldn’t park them correctly or if they were left knocked over and discarded.
It wasn’t long before stories of blind residents in the city tripping over or running into the rental blight reached Lindsay. He raised awareness then and is trying to do so again.
“People who are blind, like myself, love to travel. We get our cane out and do our best not to trip over obstacles,” Lindsay said. “But when people accidentally leave things in our way, sometimes it’s inevitable. Just zipping along, we’ll miss something.”
“Just make sure you pick them up; it will make a big difference in our lives.”
In 2018, Eric Burton spoke with WFAA after partially tearing his ACL after tripping over a rental bike.
Burton, who is blind, paid for a fancy pair of glasses with a camera on the side that sent a live feed to a visual interpreting service.
He would wear them anytime he walked somewhere -- the person monitoring the feed from the glasses would then give him a heads-up over the phone if he were about to run into an obstacle.
“I don’t know if you can put a price tag on freedom,” Burton said. “I’m a self-driving blind guy — and I love every minute of it.”
Lindsay warned the blind community after WFAA shared Burton's story that year.
Envision Dallas has a full-time mobility instructor who will share tips and info about navigating around rental bikes and scooters on sidewalks.
The city received thousands of complaints via 311 when the bikes and scooters arrived.
New regulations and restrictions are in place to make things less cluttered and safer. You can read them all here.
Only three vendors are being allowed to operate for now, meaning fewer will be on sidewalks than before.
Parking corrals will also be available to avoid sidewalk clutter.
Riders can be fined $20 if bikes or scooters are improperly parked.
All these new firewalls will be tested heavily very soon.