Madrid moves to ban app-rented e-scooters over safety concerns

Madrid will ban e-scooters rented through mobile apps after the city’s three licensed operators failed to implement limits on their clients’ circulation or to control their parking, the Spanish capital’s mayor has said.

José Luis Martínez-Almeida said on Thursday the licences of Lime, Dott and Tier Mobility would be cancelled from October, adding that the city had no plans to grant new licences to any other operators.

“The market was found to be incapable of meeting the requirements set by the mayor’s office to ensure the highest level of safety for citizens,” he said in a statement.

The “scooter sharing system” has raised opposition in cities around the world due to reckless driving and haphazard parking by some users.

Paris banned e-scooter rentals last year after a public consultation.

Since May 2023, the Madrid city council had regulated the rental e-scooter market, only authorising Amsterdam-based Dott, Germany’s Tier Mobility and US-based Lime, whose scooters are available on Uber’s app.

They were authorised to rent 2,000 scooters each.

The three operators were supposed to give the mayor’s office access to their data and were ordered to implement technology that forced customers to leave the scooters in authorised areas and prevented them from hiring scooters in pedestrian-only streets or near historic parks.

The operators failed to meet these conditions, the statement said, adding that they had 20 days to appeal.

Dott, Lime and Tier did not immediately respond to requests for comment.