With the recent fine weather these things are everywhere around the city and not just ridden everywhere but abandoned everywhere.

They appeared first in the late Autumn but there are now three companies renting out these scooters.

Initially there was some debate about scooters being legal on the public road - they appeared in October - were banned three days later and then given permission. Then there were questions about the possible dangers of relatively fast scooters mixing with bikes on the cycle lanes and pedestrians on footpaths and, more recently, complaints about scooters blocking footpaths when they are left at the end of the hire.

Now, in one national paper, comes a more interesting controversy. The scooters are promoted as not just enabling people to get around easily and quickly and independently but that, powered by batteries, they are ecological - good for the environment - if you assume that someone abandons a car journey and goes by scooter ….… before abandoning the scooter.

The problem seems to be that the scooters, or at least the first ones, were designed for use indoors and were for personal use so presumably that means not built for continuous or frequent use and not designed for, shall we say, robust use, rented out.

The average life for one of these scooters is said to be between 60 and 90 days so, when taking into account manufacturing costs, materials and energy and so on, then that is hardly a sustainable 'wheel' print.

But, to be fair, much of the problem is with the user rather than the scooter.

Properly regulated and used sensibly these could provide one solution for getting from metro and suburban train hubs into or around the city and they do actually take up less space than a bike when parked properly. It will be interesting to see how this works out but at the moment it is looking more and more likely that the politicians will act first and bring in a ban.

earlier post nice parking

Udlejningsløbehjul? That's the Danish word for rental scooters

This Spring, in Copenhagen, the new trend for fast transport to get around the city are battery-powered scooters. A couple of companies are providing the scooters that are hired through phone apps of course.

There are two obvious problems that have to be sorted out. First, although many scooter riders stick to the bike lanes, many do not, and if the rider tries boarding tricks of popping up onto the pavement and off or weaving in and out of pedestrians then these things get up quite a speed and accidents are inevitable.

The second problem - and already the cause of heated debate in the newspapers - is that the scooters, even when neatly parked, can be left and are left anywhere so can and do block footpaths. They are also just abandoned - as I spotted here last weekend - and this was not some disgruntled pedestrian moving a scooter out of the way - but a pond well away from the footpath.

OK. Call me old and grumpy.