Scooter hire firm Bird launches UK trial – on one east London path
The electric scooter revolution is coming to London, as the US-based startup Bird launches the UK’s first legal scooter-hire service.
The company, which has already launched in France, Israel, Belgium, Austria and the US, is starting out small, however: its scooters are only allowed to travel on one path running through the Olympic Park in east London.
This restriction is because the UK is “the most highly regulated and restrictive market for this kind of product, globally”, according to Bird’s UK head Richard Corbett. The Santa Monica startup’s battery-powered scooters, which are limited to 25km/h, cannot be used on public footpaths, because they’re powered vehicles; but neither can they be used on public roads, because they’re not able to pass a standard MOT.
As a result, Bird’s initial launch is highly limited. People can rent the scooters, for £1 plus 20p a minute, using Bird’s smartphone app, and ride them from the corner of Westfield Stratford City shopping centre to the Here East campus, home to a host of startups, including Bird’s UK office. The scooters will power down if they are removed from that path, and must also be dismounted to cross the road running through the middle of the park.
“This is the first step on the journey to change UK regulations,” says Corbett. “And this is why today is actually quite a key milestone in British transport history: this is the first time we have seen a UK e-scooter trial, and we’re really proud to be the first to do that, to help push the boundaries.
“The first step is a pilot on private land, to be compliant and within legality, but over time we would like to work with [the Department for Transport] and the regulators to work out a policy framework” that would allow escooters on UK roads.
Bird, with competitors like Lime, Skip and Spin, have seen a huge growth in interest since scooter-sharing began to take off in the US last year. The companies have attracted record investment from transportation giants and venture capital firms: Bird was valued at $1bn (£770m) in March, while Lime reached that milestone four months later.
The investments prompted an arms race between the firms, who filled city streets with scooters, eventually leading to a backlash from regulators. In San Francisco, where strict new rules limit the number of scooters, Bird and Lime were denied permits.
Bird has taken a different approach to recent launches, working with cities to open only when local government is satisfied that infrastructure can cope with the scooter influx. Corbett hopes this approach will earn favour with would-be regulators: the company is explicitly attempting to be the “nice guy” of the sector, he says, and the trial in Stratford should work to bolster that image.
Corbett says it is imperative that regulators act quickly. “London has one of the biggest transport issues in the world: [the city] unfortunately has turned into a giant car park, and if you look at the stats the average speed in central London is about 6.4mph.
“We’re slowly but surely not only polluting our lungs but also grinding to a halt as a city. And so something has to give. We have to make public transport more viable.”
Bird’s trial scooters are available in the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in east London from 7am to 9pm on Tuesday.