Cities urged to tighten rules for e-scooters

Swiss cities should set clearer rules for e-scooters as their numbers and accident rates rise, SRF reported. Zurich tightened its regulations last week, reducing the number of rental e-scooters by about one third and requiring them to be parked only in designated zones.

The measures are intended in part to better protect pedestrians. Marionna Schlatter, a Green member of the Swiss National Council and president of the Swiss pedestrian association Fussverkehr Schweiz, said e-scooters often block walkways.

The Swiss Confederation recorded 77 people seriously injured in e-scooter accidents during the first half of 2026, an 18 percent increase compared with the same period last year.

The Conference of Cities on Mobility recommends that cities regulate e-scooters, its president Esther Keller, a member of Basel-Stadt’s cantonal government, told SRF. Cities should decide how many vehicles and providers they want, as well as where e-scooters may be parked and ridden. Keller said they should not be allowed in pedestrian zones.

Schlatter said regulations were useful only if they were enforced. She questioned whether e-scooters provided enough benefit to justify their presence in cities, arguing that they caused many accidents, took up space and annoyed many people. She also said riding them was less beneficial for people’s health and the environment.

Carsten Hagedorn, a professor of transport planning at the Eastern Switzerland University of Applied Sciences, takes a different view. He said e-scooters could make public transport more attractive by helping people reach stops more quickly. However, he said riders needed to follow the rules.