city bikes vs private bikes/scooters

[vqdriver]

can someone give a brief non-legaleze explanation why scooter and bike rentals like lime/bird/jump can legally park their vehicles on the sidewalks while city sponsored bikes are parked on the street? the latter necessitating removal of traffic lanes or parking spaces to do so. (at least here in LA)
if anything, even if cities allowed it, i would have thought the powered nature of the rentals would qualify them as motor vehicles like segways to be banished from sidewalks altogether.

[buddybikes]

Like Lyft, Uber, AirBnb - wave of future - push out until the masses accept it thus the govt has to.

[charliedid]

can someone give a brief non-legaleze explanation why scooter and bike rentals like lime/bird/jump can legally park their vehicles on the sidewalks while city sponsored bikes are parked on the street? the latter necessitating removal of traffic lanes or parking spaces to do so. (at least here in LA)
if anything, even if cities allowed it, i would have thought the powered nature of the rentals would qualify them as motor vehicles like segways to be banished from sidewalks altogether.

Chicago told them to F-off so they did.

[Mark McM]

can someone give a brief non-legaleze explanation why scooter and bike rentals like lime/bird/jump can legally park their vehicles on the sidewalks while city sponsored bikes are parked on the street? the latter necessitating removal of traffic lanes or parking spaces to do so. (at least here in LA)
if anything, even if cities allowed it, i would have thought the powered nature of the rentals would qualify them as motor vehicles like segways to be banished from sidewalks altogether.

What makes you think that dockless scooters and bikes can be parked legally on the sidewalk? For many "disruptive technology" startups, legal status has never been considered a barrier.

[benb]

They all seem to get parked/docked on the sidewalks around here.

If the private guys put a dock on the street they'd probably get in trouble a lot more since car space is sacred in the .gov's eyes while sidewalks are not.

[cderalow]

in DC the bike docks are on the sidewalk as well. I believe most of the ones i recall seeing in san francisco and chicago were sidewalk based as well.

I know i remember seeing ones in new york that were in the bike lane/or pedestrian styled plazas.

I imagine it varies by city on the docked ones and what agreement they've negotiated with the locals.

same for the dockless ones.