One of Israel’s most well known publicists was killed while riding an ebike (Motti Morel) in Tel Aviv. The city puts stricter regulations on licensing, helmets, recycling and speed. But who will really enforce this? Grandmothers are walking around dazed with blood streaming down their faces. Kids afraid of walking on the sidewalk. Another joke TA?
Just today I saw a french tourist couple doubling on a Wind scooter, in shorts screaming through a busy intersection. Money flew out of her pocket and she went running into a busy street on Hayarkon, stopping traffic as she dove for her wind-strewn money. Tel Aviv and Jaffa is a living hell for pedestrians and pedal-bike riders who use bike lanes. Ask anyone here. And so many of the users are not from here, but are tourists or long-term travellers. As an effort to prevent hit and runs and death by scooter Tel Aviv becomes the first city in the world to require all shared electric scooters to be licensed and helmetted.
It looks like a dream to coast along the sea, wind in your hair. You know how many people ruin their holidays riding these things?
Doubling on scooters. More common than you’d believe.
The Tel Aviv-Yafo Municipality has issued new regulations for shared electric scooter companies in order to keep pedestrians and riders safe. The new regulations include equipping electric scooters with helmets, installing license plates, recycling used batteries, lowering the speed of the scooters in certain areas, and preventing the usage of scooters in restricted areas.
The regulations enforced by the Tel Aviv-Yafo Municipality are unprecedented and are meant to set an example for other municipalities around the world who are dealing with similar circumstances.
In August 2019, the municipality embarked on a pilot to regulate companies that were renting out electric scooters in the city. These companies had been subjected to a number of conditions and restrictions in order to obtain a permit to operate in the city, which included ensuring availability throughout the city, limiting the maximum number of scooters per company to 2,500 units, allowing parking only in designated areas which have to be marked in the companies’ apps, preventing usage by minors, implementing and activating a service call center, and banning the scooters’ alarms during the nighttime.
How green are escooters? Sifted has found some surprising results.
Looking ahead to 2020, the municipality has decided to continue with this pilot, adding additional terms and restrictions with the purpose of increasing road safety and maintaining public order in the future.
Meital Lehavi, Deputy Mayor of Tel Aviv-Yafo for Transportation: “Our main goal is to keep sidewalks as a safe space for walking, as the city’s sidewalks are designed primarily for pedestrians. Tel Aviv is a very walkable city and we encourage people to take advantage of the city’s small size, flat topography and over 300 days of sunshine a year.”
Author: Karin Kloosterman
Karin Kloosterman is an award-winning journalist and publisher that founded Green Prophet to unite a prosperous Middle East. She shows through her work that positive, inspiring dialogue creates action that impacts people, business and planet. She has published in thought-leading newspapers and magazines globally, owns an IoT tech chip patent, and is part of teams that build world-changing products to make agriculture and our planet more sustainable. Reach out directly to [email protected]
