A ban on the rental of electric scooters comes into effect in Paris on Friday. But some experts feel not enough is being done to look at ways of replacing car journeys with more sustainable modes of transport
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00:00 A ban of electric scooters comes into effect on Friday in Paris.
00:04 Following a vote back in April, locals complained that the nifty way to get around town is causing a nuisance.
00:09 Urban mobility in Europe is a dynamic and developing sector,
00:12 but finding alternatives to car travel in cities is proving divisive between the public and private sector.
00:17 That's what each city in Europe is looking for, replacing car trips by more sustainable modes.
00:26 And that kind of data exchange and that kind of understanding based on facts is currently still under development.
00:37 Paris is not the first city to introduce a ban.
00:41 Copenhagen originally banned e-scooters, but they are now allowed in the city centre under stricter conditions.
00:47 The best way to have better grip on the use of e-scooters is to introduce a kind of licensing scheme
00:59 that allows for a sustainable procurement of these services.
01:04 And there we have many examples from cities across Europe that introduced such a licensing scheme.
01:10 Data on the use of e-scooters is still uncharted,
01:13 something urban planners want to make more transparent in order to improve safety and sustainability.
01:19 The important question we need to ask is, do e-scooters create a shift from individual car use to a more sustainable mode?
01:32 Like how many car trips have e-scooters replaced?
01:36 We know that's the case for public transport, for bicycles.
01:40 They really create a shift to more active sustainable modes.
01:44 For e-scooters, that picture is not clear yet.
01:48 A broader trend is that European cities are turning their attention to pedestrians.
01:53 If you think about cyclists, car users, shared car users, public transport users,
02:00 at some point we all walk, so it's the first mode.
02:04 And that realization has finally arrived and many cities have started to invest more.
02:11 [City sounds]
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