City wants feedback on future of e-scooters in Calgary as 2-year pilot project concludes

In about six weeks, Calgary's two-year pilot project allowing e-scooters on city pathways will conclude and the city is now seeking feedback to help determine what happens next.

The city has launched an online surveythat seeks to gather the opinions of Calgarians. The survey includes questions focusing onwheree-scooters should be allowed in the cityand how users should behave while riding, among others.

Andrew Sedor, a planning and transportation strategist with the city, said the survey was an opportunity to weigh in on the issue.

"We're leaving everything open right now everything is on the table," Sedor said.

"That's why it's important that we hear Calgarians' opinions on this one, because it will play a really important role in determining the future of e-scooters in Calgary."

The city's e-scooter and e-bike pilot project launched in October 2018. Calgarians have travelled more than 2.2 million kilometres on the transportation devices since then, according to the city.

Dom Aschauermoved back to Calgary in the spring and said that since then he has been using the e-scooters quite regularly.

"I'm doing a little bit of street photography today, so it's sweet to be able to go from neighbourhood to neighbourhood in like 10 to 15 minutes,"Aschauer said.

Some of the questions in the survey also revolve around the three operators of rental e-scooters in the city, Lime, Bird and Roll.

Sedor said Calgarians have logged around 780,000 e-scooter trips this year.

"It's about 1.7 million over two years, but that includes e-bikes and e-scooters," Sedor said. "About 90 per cent of those trips have been e-scooters."

The online survey will run until Oct. 7, while the e-scooters will remain on Calgary streets until Oct. 31unless the snow falls first.