Haligonians and tourists will soon have a new way to get around the municipality by riding an electronic scooter.
Segway Nova Scotia is introducing the area to the technology by bringing in 30 e-scooters to their Waterfront location.
“These are special e-scooters in that they connect to the cloud,” said Max Rastelli, owner of Segway Nova Scotia.
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“They are designed with SIM cards inside of them and can only be activated through an app.”
The app is being submitted to Google Play and the App store, and Rastelli says it will then take a few weeks for approval. Once that happens he says the e-scooters will be available for rent.
“What we’re trying to do this year is introduce them to the city in the form of a pilot project, in more of a controlled way.”
In other cities including Waterloo, Montreal and Calgary companies, such as Bird and Lime, have already launched pilot projects, but they work on a dockless model.
“You kind of just grab it wherever it happens to be, you ride it to wherever you’re going and you drop it on the sidewalk,” said District 9 Councillor Shawn Cleary.
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Cleary says that Lime has already approached the municipality with intentions of coming here as well which is why he put forward a motion at the transportation safety committee to have staff look into regulating the industry.
“I know in jurisdictions where they haven’t had rules in place and companies show up there’s been chaos,” he said.
Some of the concerns being raised in other municipalities is that people can leave the scooters anywhere.
Rastelli says it’s referred to as “scooter litter” and is something he is working to avoid.
“With our approach trying to do it in a controlled way with pick up and drop off locations we want to mitigate all of that,” he said.
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Currently they are only available at the Waterfront, but he says Worthington Hotel on Clyde street which is set to open later this summer has agreed to partner with the business and act as a second pick up and drop off location.
“It’s a great location up there, near Spring Garden, near the students,” he said.
Other concerns fall under provincial regulation, such as where can you ride an e-scooter. The devices can go up to 25 km/h and even Rastelli admits he doesn’t know where the best place to ride them is.
“Perhaps under certain conditions and rules they do belong on sidewalks just like segways are allowed on sidewalks under certain restrictions,” he said.
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“My gut feel is they also should be allowed on the side of the road or a bike lane.”
The current Motor Vehicle Act is unclear.
“As long as you’re wearing a helmet technically soooters are permitted on sidewalks, call it a bit of a grey area because e scooters the electric version of the kicker, the push version is simply not in there,” said Rastelli.
The province is in the process of replacing the Motor Vehicle Act with the new Traffic Safety Act but in a statement, Transportation Minister Lloyd Hines says “it is too early in the regulation development process to say if or how e-scooters will be reflected in the regulations.”
As for the municipality, Cleary says it’s likely inevitable that e-scooter ride share companies will set up in Halifax and it’s important to be prepared.
“My goal is let’s get some rules in place around how we do docked and dockless bike and scooter share, what are the issues related to what bylaws we have in place that might need to be amended.”
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