In a nutshell: You will have to rough it on foot - or maybe rent a bike - on your next tour of The City of Light. Nearly 90 percent of votes cast in a recent referendum were in favor of banning battery-powered scooters in the French capital. It is a sizable margin but perhaps the numbers reveal that most people did not seem to care one way or the other. Of the city's 1.38 million registered voters, only about 103,000 participated in the vote.
According to the BBC, Paris was one of the first major cities to adopt e-scooter rentals but it would seem as most believe they have done more harm than good. The publication cited mounting concerns over reckless driving of scooters and the fact that many riders do not wear helmets. Others took issue with parked scooters cluttering up parks and other public spaces, and taking up spaces typically reserved for cars or motorcycles. People as young as 12 can legally rent an e-scooter in Paris, the BBC noted.
Now, Paris is the first major European city to turn against the trendy mobility aids.
Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo, who supported the ban, announced the vote back in January. "I'm committed to respecting the choice of voters, purely and simply," the mayor said, adding that scooter rentals were both expensive and the cause of lots of accidents.
Three of the city's largest scooter rental providers - Tier, Dott and Lime - leveraged their reach on social media to try and get younger voters out to the polls. They even offered free rides to voters on voting day but clearly, the marketing push did not have much of an impact on voter turnout.
It is worth mentioning that the referendum only included e-scooter rentals, and that privately owned two-wheeler scooters were not involved.
Hidalgo told The Washington Post that Paris will ban self-service scooter rentals starting September 1, which is one day after the city's current contract with operators expires.