Houston City Council passes e-scooter ban unanimously, setting a citywide curfew
HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) -- The Houston City Council decided on Wednesday to ban electric scooters at certain times of day.
This is something the council was also considering back in the summer.
It was on Wednesday's agenda again, though this time posed as a citywide ban on e-scooters from 8 p.m. to 4 a.m., which passed unanimously.
The city says data from the Houston Fire Department shows that between those hours is when nearly 80% of all incidents involving e-scooters happen downtown.
On the city council agenda, it says the city receives lots of complaints from people about the e-scooters blocking sidewalks and being hazards for people walking, especially in and around Discovery Green and downtown.
The city says that targeted enforcement over the past four years has resulted in more than 3,000 rider warnings, 13 vendor citations, and even eight arrests.
Houston Mayor John Whitmire has said one reason for the ban is that "most scooter riders disregard traffic laws, putting themselves and others at risk," and added, "I think it's one of our number one security risks in the city right now."
When the ban was considered a few months ago, ABC13 spoke with the owner of a local scooter rental company, who said that if a ban happens, it shouldn't be so broad, but rather only go after the people breaking the rules.
"I think it's really like killing the whole industry, and it's just basically causing so many people to go unemployed or bankrupt... just like when somebody rents a car, that's their responsibility to obey the traffic laws," said Adib Baghdadi, the owner of ERYD Scooter Rentals.
The ordinance states that people who own their own scooters and use them for "certain commuting purposes" would be exempt from the citywide scooter curfew.
On Wednesday, Councilmember Julian Ramirez at first asked to tag the item and vote on it later. But after a break to discuss further with other council members, he agreed to allow the vote, with the agreement that there will be a committee meeting in early December about this new ordinance where people can speak out about it.
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