This is now a very common scene in many side walks or cycling lanes in Helsinki and already way worse than last year because now there are 10 times more of them covering the space.

The way they are being used make the city ugly, impossible or dangerous to use the infrastructure made by tax money for people with disabilities or parents who have they child in strollers, cyclists and other road users.

I wonder if they were covering car lanes or side street parking spots they would be still without laws or enforced laws.

Is there any work done at any level or could I get some help on how I could get my voice heard by authorities?

40 comments

  2. I don’t forsee any change for the better without a full ban. as long as dockless rental is an option people will just leave then where ever without care.

  3. I am not aware of any ongoing work, but I wholeheartedly agree that something should be done about this, you can’t just leave car parked wherever without getting a fine – and this is arguably blocking of more space than a car would.

  6. I surely hope that these scooter companies will get more tightly regulated. They have basically just taken over public space with very little consequences when their users leave the scooters lying around wherever they wish.

    And not only that, an alarmingly large portion of the scooter users are underage kids and/or drunks who drive very recklessly on pedestrian roads. “This is why we can’t have nice things”.

    **For everyone who is living in Helsinki, I strongly recommend signing this petition for tighter control (or a ban, if needed) for the scooter companies.**

    https://www.kuntalaisaloite.fi/fi/aloite/27640

    Bear in mind that the petition is meant to raise conversation about the issue in the city council and they can always come up with different solutions. So don’t get too caught up in the exact wording of the petition.

    It has been a few days since I mentioned this petition on Reddit and there have been almost hundred more signatures!

  7. I work for Tier in the city collecting scooters and swapping batteries in Helsinki and the situation is awful (I often clean up that part of Pasila and it is always trashed). For what it’s worth, I do know that the city is slowly getting rid of companies and the amount of scooters each company can have will be reduced for next year. But unfortunately, unless they introduce dedicated parking areas that you must leave scooters (which kinda defeats the purpose of them), it will never get better. I personally think they should be outright banned, it’s not worth the trouble they cause. Me and my colleagues get a lot of abuse too. It’s really a lose lose situation.

  8. I think the companies need to be given parking tickets or something or similar, per scooter. Or needs to be impounded if parked “inappropriately”. e.g. park inside alloted zoned, make the companies buy 2-3 car parking spots to stash their scooters in different places.

    When the fines start racking up, the companies will figure out how to make the customer take care of parking, as I’m pretty sure they have very good data collected to know who was the asshat who did that parking job for each of their “parking tickets”.

    Capitalistic problem requires a capitalistic solution.

  9. 1. I would reduce their maximum speed by law to make bikes an easier choice. Like the sugar tax to help people choose healthier food. And the tax is on the companies not the users.

    2. Making bad parking locations punishable with fines, could be done by the same people that give fines to cars. Each scooter has a serial number. A picture with a time-stamp should be enough for the companies to know which user was the last one and send them the fine

  11. Inebriated idjits standing on these, or marginally sober two even three morons on these scooters should face a hefty hospital bill if they end up hurting themselves. Resources are already stretched thin, and then these idiots are nothing more than insult to ~~injury~~ bleeding pus

  12. One could dream, right?

    I work at an emergency department in Helsinki, and the amount if injuries these produce is insane. Its good to remember that all taxpayers pay for the treatment, and im fairly certain they are not even a net economic positive for the city.

  14. I have not used one of these ever, but they require mobile identification to be driven, no? Couldn’t they just implement a system where if the gps sees that a user left a scooter on a road lane etc, they would get a fine on their profile? Of course this wouldn’t solve the problem of them being on sidewalks blocking pedestrians, but at least it would be a beginning to get them off the road lanes.

  16. This is basically the Uber way, promise disruption and jobs by playing the time game against the law, while targeting a far future where the human element will be removed (no more driver in the case of Uber no more battery swapper here, and automatic parking and on demand arrival when tech is mature ) in the mean time they are collecting data to build the future mostly at the cost and annoyance of the tax payer.
    I think they can be useful, and I am sure there is a way to make the situation better, but somebody (else than the tax payer) would have to pay which is always the point: enforce strong identification, include a mandatory insurance in the rental, and/or get user to be rated anonymously and indirectly: give people ride time for reporting bad parking and deduce points to the driver responsible and ban then after a couple of offenses. (Operators if you read this, I call prior art 😉

  20. It’s sad, and have tried using the city bikes with a seasonal pass but half the time they don’t work, or are in disrepair. The scooter companies seem better and maybe they should enforce stricter rules, but there’s an obvious problem. More people would use the bikes and stands… if they worked.

  21. To be honest I think we’re reaching a point where civil disobedience is the correct solution; get out there and set the damn things on fire.

    (OK not really, cos the batteries would probably explode, but I’d strongly support people getting fines for covering them with paint, or otherwise ruining them.)

  23. No, because they are on the walking and bicycle roads. But if we left them on car roads, the authorities would find solution in one week.

  26. Oh and the local kids are using these to play around all day under my window… I couldn’t care less but if you are using them without paying they make a super annoying sound periodically

  27. Yeah and what’s even worse is you’ll see people leave broken scooters and scooter parts everywhere, trashing the streets. I’ve seen in Kallio and Ruoholahti

  29. Simple solution is to adapt a bonus to the persons to leave them at for example a bus stop, and limit the amount that can use those spots to for example 5 scooter – a reward to the person who consistently leaves them in a responsible place such as a bus stop gains more rewards, and the rewards stack to eventually getting some rides for 100% free – and issue fines to the companies that fail to maintain their scooters and remove and redistribute them evenly throughout the city and suburbs.

    In short fine the companies + reward the customers = change

  30. I have seen scooters in the middle of bike paths tripped over one many times blocking entire sidewalk it’s ridiculous

  33. Or just make renting them economically unviable. I bought my own and you better be damn sure I lock it nicely right where it’s supposed to be placed.

  35. They aren’t as big of a problem in a lot of smaller cities. In Vasa for example they’re neatly parked most of the time and a great improvement on commuting options.

  37. I remember when the Voi brand was the only one(It was the first) for awhile before all the others jumped on the scooter ship.

  40. There are rules for electric scooters, the same rules that are for bicycles, but people just don’t care because they don’t own those vehicles.

    “Not my scooter, not my problem.”

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