Regina executive committee approves shared e-scooter program

People in Regina might see rental electric scooters around the city starting this summer.

During Wednesday’s executive committee meeting, a shared electric kick scooter program was approved by a vote of 8-0.  Councillors Landon Mohl, Cheryl Stadnichuk and Dan LeBlanc were away for the vote.

Last fall, SGI gave Saskatchewan municipalities the ability to decide whether or not they wanted e-scooters.

The city will grant permits for up to two providers to fund and operate the program. The agenda for the executive committee meeting said the program would cost the city $25,000 per year, but that would be recovered from the companies that get the permits.

“Permittees will also each be required to provide the City with a $10,000 refundable security deposit, which the City will use to address any costs incurred by the City for damage to city infrastructure, remedying safety concerns, and the removal or storage of E-Scooters as needed,” the agenda said.

The program would allow a total of 500 e-scooters to be available for short-term use in the city starting as early as July. The program would last until October 2024, though the agenda stated those timelines are tentative and subject to change.

The e-scooters will be allowed to operate on bike lanes, park and multi-use pathways and roads with a speed limit of 50 kilometres per hour or less. They won’t be allowed on sidewalks unless in specific circumstances to connect to other pathways.

The program also would ban all private e-scooters from operating within city limits for its duration.

Coun. Jason Mancinelli motioned for an amendment that would remove the prohibition of private e-scooters from the program, but it was defeated 5-3.

“I think there is something fundamentally unfair about folks who have already purchased (e-scooters) who are using them (who) likely will be using them then illegally in the summer because they’ll see this bylaw and say, ‘Well, we can actually use them in the city,’ ” Coun. Andrew Stevens said during the meeting.

“And then there’ll be a backlash saying, ‘Well, now we have to go to these two monopolies and access them at their cost after we’ve purchased them.’ I think there’s greater risk with that approach.”

City manager Niki Anderson said private e-scooters might be allowed in the future after council receives feedback for the program.

“This isn’t a pilot; we’re doing it,” she said. “We will come back to you with the learnings through the shared model to also talk about integrating private (e-scooters) the next year.

“So I would say that we have presented all of the information that we have and should council decide that they want administration to move towards both public and private e-scooters in 2023, we could do that.”

EDITOR’S NOTE: This is an amended version of this story, correcting where the e-scooters would be allowed to operate.