Paris: Rental e-scooters disappear from streets as ban comes into effect

Tourists pictured riding a scooter in Paris Credit: AP

Rental e-scooters have disappeared from the streets of Paris after locals voted to ban them.

In April, Parisians overwhelmingly voted to banish the 15,000 self-service machines.

The scooters vanished on the last day of August when the city's contracts with three e-scooter operators expired.

Of the 103,000 locals that voted in April, the vast majority (89%) voted to get rid of them, with just 11% supporting them. The turnout was low however, with 103,000 representing a small fraction of the capital's 1.4 million registered voters.

Rental scooters are still available in other French cities, including Marseille and Lyon.

Posting on X, formerly Twitter, Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo said the city's e-scooter referendum decided that "self-service scooters are over".

"From today, they have disappeared from the streets of Paris," she said.

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E-scooters have divided opinion - with some seeing them as an alternative to public transport, while others view them as dangerous eyesores. Credit: AP

Since rental e-scooters were introduced five years ago, many Parisians and tourists have used them as an alternative form of public transport.

But there were frequent complaints about how they were used and the visual impact of parked e-scooters. Some also considered the scooters a traffic menace, with hundreds of them being involved in accidents, some fatal.

In the UK, e-scooters can only be used on public roads if rented as part of a government-backed trial, while privately-owned vehicles can only be used on private land.

Despite this, private e-scooters have become a common sight on British roads and foothpaths.

Trials of rental e-scooters on roads in dozens of towns and cities across England have been extended until May 2024.

There have however been calls to regulate the use of e-scooters, with Conservative peer Baroness Neville-Rolfe previously remarking the scooters created a "wild west" on the nation's streets and pavements.

In July, charity Electrical Safety First (ESF) recommended that e-scooter batteries be regulated like fireworks - with mandatory third-party approval for the vehicles' batteries.

If implemented, the UK would follow New York City’s lead, after it introduced the requirement following a series of fatal fires caused by lithium-ion batteries.

The charity's call for regulation came after a flat fire caused by an e-bike that had been left charging overnight killed a mother and two young children in Cambridge.

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