Paris Bans Rental E-Scooters After Residents Vote 89% to Remove Them
The scooters arrived in 2018 promising a micromobility revolution. By 2023, Parisians voted them out by a margin most elections only dream of.
Rental e-scooters landed in Paris in 2018 and multiplied fast, accessed by app and left wherever the ride ended.
By 2022, the city was logging 459 scooter-related accidents a year, including three deaths. Mayor Anne Hidalgo put the question to residents directly: a non-binding referendum on April 2, 2023, asking whether the scooters should stay.
Turnout was low — under 8%, with in-person, pre-registered voting only — but the result wasn't close: 89.03% of roughly 103,000 votes cast were against keeping them.
The ban on rental operators took effect September 1, 2023. Privately owned e-scooters are unaffected — this was specifically the end of the share-and-leave-anywhere rental model.
