Montreal axes e-scooters, citing disorder

The Canadian city of Montreal is halting all free-floating e-scooter services within its city limits. According to a city spokesperson, only 20% of e-scooters were parked in the designated spaces, with 80% being abandoned and causing safety risks for pedestrians.

E-scooters had entered the city in the summer of 2019 and were mostly painted in Bird and Lime livery. At the same time, electric bikes were also introduced and their permit will be renewed.

A spokesperson for Lime said his company had 50,000 users who did 200,000 trips in only three months.

In November last year, Singapore also banned e-scooters from pavements. They were already banned from roads and could in theory still be used on cycle paths. In practice, the ban made them all but useless in Singapore.

Image: Lime scooter on a street in Montreal (copyright: Shutterstock)