E-scooters charge ahead in regional Victoria

In July, the state government announced permanent e-scooters would be made legal. However, in August the City of Melbourne banned rental e-scooters, citing bad behaviours including dinking passengers and riding on footpaths.

In September 2021, the City of Ballarat was chosen as a trial location for shared e-scooters. Helmets are compulsory and travel speeds are limited to 20km/h on local roads that have speed limits up to 60km/h.

There are 250 e-scooters in the Ballarat fleet, which is operated by Neuron Mobility. They can be used in a 25-square-kilometre area.

Ballarat Mayor Des Hudson said the trial had been mostly positive with more than 300,000 trips taken, covering more than 700,000 kilometres. He said 63 per cent of e-scooter trips replaced what otherwise would have been taken by a car.

“I’m certainly not opposed to the fleet expanding,” he said.

Hudson said that when the trial began, there were more instances of poor behaviour on the e-scooters, including risk riding and not using helmets.

“But I think now, over time, there has been a greater level of responsible use of the scooters,” he said.

Hudson said the main complaints related to where they were parked and users wanting to see faster response times from Neuron to return scooters to main parking areas.

A Neuron spokesman said geofencing technology controlled where the devices could be ridden and parked. He said the company was also investing in other technologies to improve parking, including designated parking stations in high-demand areas.

Last month, the City of Greater Bendigo voted in favour of expanding the operating area of an e-scooter trial in time for summer.

“It is now more than two months since the trial commenced and Beam’s purple e-scooters have been widely used by residents and tourists,” a council meeting agenda said.

In the first eight weeks of the trial in Bendigo, there were more than 13,000 trips covering almost 23,000 kilometres. By August 13, the council had received 27 complaints and nine reports of incorrect parking.

The council, which declined to comment, reported operator Beam had issued 51 warnings to riders for bad behaviour.

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Brisbane City Council cancelled its contract with Beam this month after the company was accused of under-reporting its fleet size. Beam confirmed it had appointed a legal team to investigate the allegations.

A Beam spokeswoman said the company was working with Bendigo’s council to expand the e-scooter operating area. She said Beam received 69 requests from community members to relocate badly parked e-scooters.

“We’re pleased to see that the vast majority of riders are riding and parking responsibly, however Beam’s enforcement program is always in place to ensure those misbehaving are removed from the platform,” she said.

Electric bike and scooter rental company Lime said it wanted to be part of a potential procurement process if Geelong sought to open a scheme.

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However, the company was part of an unsuccessful trial of e-bikes that resulted in frequent complaints in Geelong.

City of Greater Geelong chief executive Ali Wastie said her council had concerns about the management of e-scooters and e-bikes due to the need to keep footpaths and roads clear and safe for all users.

“We understand there have been mixed experiences from other local governments who have trialled e-scooter and e-bike ride programs,” Wastie said. “We’re very interested to learn from Ballarat’s experience as part of the state government trial.”