The City of Paris is wondering about the future of self-service scooters in the capital. According to her, too many negative points remain, and the operators have little time to rectify the situation.
It’s what you might call “a nice little push”. Or clever preventive communication too, we will find out in the coming weeks. A few days ago, the operators of self-service electric scooters, namely Lime, Dott and TIER, were invited by the Paris City Hall to make a crucial point in that the renewal of operating contracts is supposed to take place in five months. And clearly, the municipality is not very keen on continuing the adventure as it is.
The fate of 15,000 e-scooters pending
In recent years, electric scooters have helped change the landscape and mobility, especially in large cities. For some, they are a real revolution. For others, they have nothing to do in the middle of pedestrians, cars and bicycles, who are already having a hard time sharing the road.
In March 2023, the contract between Paris and the operators Lime, Dott and TIER will expire. The Town Hall is considering the possibility of ending it, a non-renewal which would annoy the three companies, which attract tens of thousands of Parisians, Ile-de-France residents and tourists each month thanks to their 5,000 respective machines.
The First Deputy Mayor of Paris Emmanuel Grégoire and his colleague David Belliard, in charge of the transformation of public space and mobility, received the three operators last week to take stock of the activity of the electric scooter in the capital. And for the two chosen ones, the account is not there “.
The self-service scooter suffers from many complaints
The City of Paris has several grievances against electric scooters. Many result from a certain lack of rigor on the part of the operators and a lack of discipline on the part of the users, with too many accidents, multiple violations of the Highway Code, an unflattering modal shift and vehicles parked at random. where. The environmental balance sheet is also uncertain “, with dozens of scooters abandoned at the bottom of the Seine and machines that must be regularly recharged, cleaned and then recycled.
” We ask ourselves the question “of the end of the agreement allowing the self-service circulation of electric scooters in Paris, recognizes David Belliard, who warns that” if in the end the negatives outweigh the advantages, then the decision will be simple: we will end this model “.
However, all is not lost for the operators! Last week, the Town Hall agreed to give operators a month to propose concrete measures. Like a last chance.
Source : The Parisian
22