Begun in 2019, Scoots of Hazard is an ongoing street photography project of keeled over electric scooters on the streets of Los Angeles. More info below.
For-profit, drop-anywhere electric scooter rental touches on so many of this city’s current issues: Privatization of public space, gentrification, tourism, public transportation, as well as broader issues of technological accessibility and ableism. The scooters raise the essential question, "Who are the streets for?" Never is this question more pointed than when a scooter has collapsed across the sidewalk. Who's benefiting from this? Who's losing out? Riders often describe electric scooters as a great convenience and a green alternative to cars, but these arguments make a neoliberal leap over the interconnected issues that really determine "greenness" and the convenience of life in Los Angeles (ie. livability). There's a tell-tale absurdity to scooters tossed aside on a street corner like new toys come Christmas afternoon, or fallen down like drunks in an alley. By documenting this hyper-specific phenomenon, I aim to reawaken a now scooter-blind public to the gizmos’ comically unregulated ubiquity.