Parisians have overwhelmingly voted to banish the French capital’s ubiquitous rental electric scooters from their streets.
The 15,000 opinion-dividing mini-machines are expected to vanish from central Paris at the end of August when the city’s contracts with the three operators expire.
The question Hotel de Ville asked voters in a citywide mini-referendum on Sunday was: “For or against self-service scooters in Paris?”
Photo: AFP
The result was not close.
Just more than 103,000 people voted, with 89 percent rejecting e-scooters and 11 percent supporting them, the city government said.
Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo hailed the consultative referendum as a success and said its outcome was “very clear.”
“There will no longer be any self-service scooters in Paris from September first,” she said.
Turnout was low. The vote had been open to all of Paris’ 1.38 million registered voters.
Scattered around Paris, easy to locate and rent with a downloadable app and relatively cheap, the scooters are a hit with tourists who love their speed and the help-yourself freedom they offer.
In the five years since their introduction, following in the wake of shared cars and shared bicycles, rental scooters have also built a following among some Parisians who do not want or cannot afford their own, but like the option to escape the Metro and other public transportation.
Many Parisians complain that e-scooters are an eyesore and a traffic menace, and the micro-vehicles have been involved in hundreds of accidents, some fatal.
Hidalgo and some of her deputies campaigned to banish the “free floating” rental flotilla — so called because scooters are picked up and dropped off around town at their renters’ whim — on safety, public nuisance and environmental cost-benefit grounds before the capital hosts the Olympic Games next year.
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