E-Scooters will soon be legal in the Queen City.

City Council approved a traffic bylaw amendment that will allow for a shared e-scooter program beginning this summer and personally owned e-scooters to be legal starting later this year.

Ward 9 Coun. Jason Macininelli brought forward a change to the original amendment that allowed for personal e-scooters to be legal.

“In terms of sustainability and environment, this is a great option to take some vehicles off the road and put a smile on some people’s faces during the summer months when commuting back and forth to work or for any unnecessary transportation they might encounter.”

“Sometimes we have to embrace new things in our community and look forward to the changes it might bring and react accordingly as we find those changes,” he continued. “This is exciting; this is enjoyable; this is something to be embraced.”

The proposed traffic bylaw amendments to allow for the use of personal e-scooters will be considered at the April 26 City Council meeting.

Using personal e-scooters is not legal in the City of Regina until the bylaw amendments are approved.

The City is also posting a Request for Application (RFA) next week for interested shared e-scooter vendors that will be open for three weeks. Once the public procurement process has been completed, the City will work with up to two approved vendors to launch their e-scooter operations this summer. When launched, shared e-scooter services will be available for rental through the vendor’s app.

E-scooters will be allowed on bike lanes, park pathways, multi-use pathways and roads with a speed limit of 50 km/hour or less.

The City said that it would evaluate the program after the first season based on resident and user feedback and through data collected from the vendor, Saskatchewan Health Authority and SGI to help inform the program’s safety and make any necessary changes to the framework.

A public survey will also be available after the first season to gather feedback on e-scooters.