Raspberry Pis Found in Abandoned Spin Scooters in Seattle

Raspberry Pi
(Image credit: abolish.social)

It’s not uncommon to find scooter rental services is many major cities across the world. But when things don’t work out and the businesses close shop, they usually take spare stock with them. However, when Spin backed out of Seattle, many residents discovered unused scooters scattered throughout the city. Upon closer inspection of these abandoned devices, or should we say dissection, it was uncovered that they each have a Raspberry Pi 4B inside.

This discovery was recently shared to social media where Pi enthusiasts are simultaneously befuddled and ready to book their tickets to Seattle. Legally speaking, if the scooters are abandoned then snagging one for the Pi inside is fair game but it’s currently not clear if Spin has plans to recover their remaining assets.

The Seattle government has an official blog available to the public where we were able to confirm that Spin was originally welcomed to the city back in 2021 as a fourth scooter rental option. However, the company did not renew its license for the most recent cycle as they gear up to shift focus to other markets. Because of this, you can find a few remaining Spin scooters around the city.

As of writing, it’s not clear what the Raspberry Pi 4 Bs were actually used for inside the scooter. At first glance, it seems like an overpowered option for something like an electric scooter but without exact confirmation of its purpose, we can only speculate. No doubt it requires much more power than something smaller like a Raspberry Pi Zero.

In the meantime, residents have taken to finding these scooters and exploring their insides for the hardware left behind. We can see the Pi 4 is attached to a HAT and has something resembling a NoIR connected to the camera module port. Again, the exact purpose of each component and how it was implemented is unclear.

If you want to get a closer look at the insides of one of these Spin scooters, check out some of the pictures shared to social media. We’re not suggesting anyone fly out to Seattle any time soon just to harvest Pis as they’re much more affordable now that the supply has replenished. That said, it’s still fascinating to find something like a Pi 4 out in the wild and in an abandoned state.

Ash Hill
Contributing Writer

Ash Hill is a contributing writer for Tom's Hardware with a wealth of experience in the hobby electronics, 3D printing and PCs. She manages the Pi projects of the month and much of our daily Raspberry Pi reporting while also finding the best coupons and deals on all tech.

  • Findecanor
    What an abuse of precious Pi4s to have been part of something so nefarious.
    Reply
  • scottslayer
    What do you mean "Where was this knowledge when the Pi supply was low?"
    We already knew they were offloading supply directly to companies as fast as possible and then tried to claim otherwise.
    Reply
  • Seaguy
    Those scooters had sensors that detected (or tried) when the scooter was being ridden on the sidewalk instead of a street or bike lane. I suspect that’s got something to do with the Raspberry Pi’s inclusion on the Spin scooters.
    Reply
  • Giroro
    Fun fact: pretty much every scooter in every city is legally abandoned after a couple days without use, regardless of if the company is still in business.
    That's the drawback of basing your business model around dumping your product directly into the streets of a city and leaving them there to rot.
    Reply
  • edzieba
    scottslayer said:
    We already knew they were offloading supply directly to companies as fast as possible and then tried to claim otherwise.
    The RPi foundation were very clear from the start that they were prioritising shipments to industrial customers and fulfilling large backorders over shipping individual units to consumers.
    Reply
  • deesider
    Giroro said:
    Fun fact: pretty much every scooter in every city is legally abandoned after a couple days without use, regardless of if the company is still in business.
    That's the drawback of basing your business model around dumping your product directly into the streets of a city and leaving them there to rot.
    Facts are the most fun when they're made up
    Reply
  • Junry
    As far as the speculation about the Pi being over powered for the scooter. I would not know without looking at the programming and knowing how many points of data the computer had to keep track of.

    My guess is to why they used the Pi is it was cheaper then having a custom board designed and made.
    1. Fee for design and someone would have to custom write firmware for a new board never used. Easier to just adapt to a already existing board.
    2. Price..cheaper than having one designed
    3.Processing power. The pi is a versatile little box that can deliver alot of raw computational speed in a small form factor while not drawing much power.

    The fact the pi could run off 2.7 watts idle and 5.5 ish Watts when at full capacity. That fact alone for a mobile system that is running off a battery would be a good choice
    Reply