It’s finish. In a week, it will no longer be possible to swallow the bitumen of the Parisian boulevards perched on its green and white electric scooter rented for 23 euro cents per minute. The machines of the three operators, Dott, Lime and Tier, will have disappeared from the roads by the end of August, in accordance with the result of the “citizen vote” organized by the City of Paris on April 2. In total, 89% of voters, representing only 7% of registered voters due to high abstention, then chose the ballot against self-service scooters. In fact, the Parisian municipality had openly encouraged voters to get rid of the service, estimating that accidents had increased by 189% since 2019, and that the scooter generated an anxiety-provoking climate.
The three companies have taken steps to phase out the 15,000 “loc trots”, as users called them, before the deadline, set for August 31. Dott was the quickest, collecting 3,000 of his 5,000 devices by July. Lime announced on Tuesday 1er August, the withdrawal of its fleet during the month and Tier began the operation on Monday 14. “We know how to deploy and withdraw a fleet in a few days”, comments Erwann Le Page, the company’s public affairs director for Western Europe. And too bad if summer is usually profitable, thanks to the long days, the rather mild weather and the many tourists.
But, on the side of the operators, the pill is still visibly struggling to pass. Paris “is an exception on European territory”, underlines Lime in a press release. The Californian company announces that its machines will be reassigned to Lille, Copenhagen or London, “leading cosmopolitan and international cities”.
The German company Tier sends its scooters “in Germany, especially in Berlin, and in Poland, especially in Warsaw”but also in Ile-de-France, in the intermunicipalities of Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines, Grand Paris Seine et Oise (Yvelines) or Val d’Europe (Seine-et-Marne), communities where the service East “very well kept”, insists Erwann Le Page. The greater Ile-de-France crown thus appears to be an El Dorado for rental scooters, at the very moment when Paris is parting with it.
Transfer to the bike
Dott’s machines will take the paths that lead to Rome, Bordeaux, Belgian cities or Tel Aviv, where the company founded in the Netherlands is established. In the meantime, the operators’ machines will have been overhauled and parts may have been changed. A process that takes a few weeks at most.
You have 58.23% of this article left to read. The following is for subscribers only.