Thailand
Indonesia: Transportation Ministry urges local e-scooter regulation as popularity grows
The Transportation Ministry has urged city and provincial administrations to regulate the use of electric scooters (e-scooters) and similar vehicles as their popularity grows.
The local regulations should include sanctions for violations of e-scooter policies, said Budi Setiyadi, the ministry’s land transportation director general, on Monday.
The ministry issued Transportation Ministerial Regulation No. 45/2020 on electric vehicles in June to regulate the specifications and usage of e-scooters.
Under the regulation, drivers of personal electric vehicles must be at least 12 years of age, and an adult must accompany drivers between 12 and 15 years old. The regulation also limits e-scooters’ speed to 6 kilometers per hour (km/h).
“While we have issued a ministerial regulation on e-scooters, it only works as a guideline and provides basic requirements. Therefore, we need regulations on the local level that include sanction clauses enforceable by the Public Order Agency [Satpol PP],” Budi said during an online press conference.
The regulation states that e-scooters should be used in bicycle lanes, in designated road lanes or on the sidewalk if such lanes are not unavailable.
Budi said he hoped the regulation would protect users of e-scooters and support e-scooter rental services, which have seen significant growth over the past years.
“Hopefully, the regulation will transform personal mobility devices into first and last-mile feeders for other public transportation systems,” he said.
While e-scooters have grown in popularity – partially as a result of an e-scooter rental application by ride-hailing firm Grab Indonesia called GrabWheels – safety regulations remain an issue. In late 2019, the Jakarta administration banned the use of GrabWheels electric scooters on the street following the deaths of two users in a traffic accident.
The use of the e-scooter service was restricted to specific areas, such as the Gelora Bung Karno (GBK) sports complex.
Grab Indonesia president director Ridzki Kramadibrata told The Jakarta Post on Wednesday that GrabWheels had deployed 10,000 e-scooters in Jakarta and had recorded more than 1 million users.
“The response of users to the GrabWheels service has been very encouraging. We have served more than 1 million users, reduced carbon emissions by 200,000 tons and own the largest EV [electric vehicle] fleet in Indonesia,” Ridzki said in a written statement.
A recent survey conducted by the Bandung Institute of Technology’s (ITB) School of Business Management shows the growing popularity of e-scooters.
The survey, which was released on July 29, found that while only 8 percent of respondents had used e-scooter rental services, 35 percent of respondents said they would be willing to ride e-scooters in the future.
Ridzki said GrabWheels was expanding its service in Greater Jakarta; Bandung, West Java; and Surabaya, East Java, among other cities.
Regarding the Transportation Ministry regulation, he said the company had updated its safety features to comply with the regulation, including by installing transmitters in scooters to prevent users from riding them into restricted areas.
“To align with the Transportation Ministry’s regulation, we have updated our safety features for our users,” he said in the statement.
Source: https://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2020/09/03/transportation-ministry-urges-local-e-scooter-regulation-as-popularity-grows.html