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"Unsustainable conditions"
: As it is here in Berlin, it sometimes also looks like in Düsseldorf, Cologne, Hamburg or Munich.
Photo: Jochen Eckel / imago images
The many electric scooters in his city annoy Düsseldorf's Lord Mayor
Stephan Keller
(51; CDU) - really. "I'm really very annoyed that this problem has been stuck to us," he recently complained. "These scooters have no use in terms of transport policy, are questionable from an environmental point of view and a problem in public spaces."
Now the city is taking rigorous action against the five providers who, according to the latest data, offer a total of 12,700 electric scooters in the city. The Office for Traffic Management has formulated a new "scooter strategy", according to which the number is to be halved to a total of 6500 from next year. In the city center, only 1,800 scooters are allowed to be used - and they can only be parked in specially marked areas. The responsible transport committees in the state capital of North Rhine-Westphalia had already adopted a majority of the rules at the end of October. This Thursday the Council should also give its approval.
In reality, the new sharing offer has brought "considerable problems" with it, explains the city of its initiative.
"The e-scooters are often driven improperly and parked illegally. This has a particularly negative impact on inner-city pedestrian traffic."
In future, the vehicles may only be parked outside the city center.
The providers - currently the five European market leaders Tier, Voi, Lime, Bird and Bolt - will in future have to identify the city center in their apps as a no-parking zone.
And it will also be more expensive for them: The required special usage fee per year and scooter is to increase from 20 to 50 euros - an increase of 150 percent.
This means that Düsseldorf joins the list of cities and municipalities across Europe that have recently cracked down on the providers and their 360,000 scooters across Europe. Just last week, Sweden's capital Stockholm also decided to almost halve the number of scooters in the city from 23,000 to 12,000. In the future, only three providers will receive licenses there from the beginning of January and - similar to Düsseldorf - commit to parking and driving restrictions. Around 140 euros per year are due for each scooter. "We have cleaned up the e-scooter jungle," said Vice-Mayor
Daniel Helldén
(56) after the decision.
In the Norwegian capital Oslo, a night driving ban has been in effect since July. In the Finnish capital Helsinki, the electric scooters may only be used to a limited extent on weekend nights; speed limits also apply. Just like in the future in Italy. Since the beginning of November a new road traffic regulation has been in effect there, which reduces the maximum speed nationwide from 25 to 20 kilometers per hour.
In Germany, regulation is a matter for the municipalities.
In Cologne, for example, the city and the operator got involved in a dispute over the recovery of scooters from the Rhine for months.
Christian Joisten
(49), head of the SPD parliamentary group, spoke in SPIEGEL of "intolerable conditions".
Last week, the city council then commissioned the administration by a large majority to set stricter rules in order to put a stop to the wild west hustle and bustle with the 14,000 scooters in the city.
The possible means here too: limitation of the fleet, parking bans, higher fees and an obligation to meet quality criteria.
lhy
