Speaker 1: Another inner city, Perth Council is looking to remove highest
Speaker 1: scooters from their streets. Joining me now is Allison Zamon,
Speaker 1: the mayor of the City of Vincent. Could they Allison?
Speaker 2: Good to talk to you, hy Simon good to talk
Speaker 2: to you too.
Speaker 1: Well, when did you make the decision on what are
Speaker 1: you going to do?
Speaker 2: Okay? So, look, the first thing I want to say,
Speaker 2: because I really do need to say this, I just
Speaker 2: want to express it like I'm sure you do and
Speaker 2: your listeners, just how sorry we are for the family
Speaker 2: who have lost their father, their husband, son, because I
Speaker 2: think that's the thing that is really weighing very heavily
Speaker 2: on everyone at the moment, I think. But also I
Speaker 2: want to acknowledge out that the family of the woman
Speaker 2: who's alleged to have run into him what they must
Speaker 2: be going through as well. So I do want to
Speaker 2: say that because I don't want to lose sight of
Speaker 2: the fact that this is happening in the face of
Speaker 2: a tragedy. So we a city of Vincent has had
Speaker 2: an a scooter trial for coming up to two years
Speaker 2: now that we're put in place just before I became
Speaker 2: mayor of the City of Vincent, and it has really
Speaker 2: been operating in conjunction with the City of Perth because
Speaker 2: we're obviously adjoining councils and people are using the Beam
Speaker 2: and the Neuron scooters to go between Vincent and the
Speaker 2: City per quite a lot. So I've been in regular
Speaker 2: conversations with the acting lagmir Bruce Reynolds around following the
Speaker 2: tragedy and we've been talking about what needs to happen.
Speaker 2: And as a result of that, the City of Vincent
Speaker 2: is now moving to also suspend the trials as well.
Speaker 2: With both companies, we're just we're hoping we'll be able
Speaker 2: to get the final decision out today. The only thing
Speaker 2: we're waiting on, which is waiting on a last last
Speaker 2: little piece of legal advice. And the reason for that
Speaker 2: is because obviously I don't want to be exposing our
Speaker 2: City of Vincent rate payers to any penalties for breach
Speaker 2: of contract or anything like that, so that's a concern.
Speaker 2: But otherwise we'll be seeking to effectively follow the lead
Speaker 2: of the City of Perth because they've had more time
Speaker 2: to be able to get the advice and everything to
Speaker 2: pull this together. So we're looking at doing the same
Speaker 2: thing all right.
Speaker 1: City Vincent famous for being a pedestrian friendly place in
Speaker 1: the entertainment commercial precincts Oxford Car, Vincent Street or William Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: and even off the side streets around around the big
Speaker 1: oval over there. So is it because you have pedestrian
Speaker 1: congestion versus higher scooters potentially.
Speaker 2: Well, I think I think it's as important that we
Speaker 2: talk about the higher scooters and the way that they
Speaker 2: get used. Look, I'm pretty very clear with everyone. I'm
Speaker 2: an EAT scooter writer. I was an earlier adoptor. I have.
Speaker 2: I played a scooter for four and a half years
Speaker 2: and I ride it around Vincent all the time and
Speaker 2: it's really good. But I suppose the thing about me
Speaker 2: as an E scooter rider is that because it's my scooter,
Speaker 2: I'm obviously taking particular care of it, because it's my asset,
Speaker 2: and I'm wearing a helmet because a quiet brown injury
Speaker 2: doesn't appeal, and also and you know, I'm obviously using
Speaker 2: it in a particular way. I think the concern that's
Speaker 2: emerging is really how higher scooters are potentially used differently
Speaker 2: as opposed to people that I'm in their own scooters
Speaker 2: and ride them, ride them potentially in a different way,
Speaker 2: and will be more experienced as well in terms of
Speaker 2: riding around. So well, I really really want to make
Speaker 2: that distinction because what I am very concerned about is
Speaker 2: making sure that we don't have a knee jerk reaction
Speaker 2: which just banns an entire mode of transport because a
Speaker 2: particular availability of this mode of transport is potentially able
Speaker 2: to be misused in a way that people who own
Speaker 2: their own scooters aren't necessarily going to do. But we need,
Speaker 2: we need to make sure that lads are enforced, we
Speaker 2: need to make sure that people respect it. And I
Speaker 2: also put that out to the drivers as well, because
Speaker 2: I've never had a tumble, I've never been in an accident,
Speaker 2: but I can tell you there's been two times I've
Speaker 2: almost been cleaned up by inattentive car drivers and when
Speaker 2: I had the right of way and when I was driving,
Speaker 2: when I was riding responsibly. So in the same way
Speaker 2: that people need to look out for bikes, they also
Speaker 2: do need to look out for e scooters and conversely,
Speaker 2: people who were using that mode of transport have a
Speaker 2: responsibility to use it appropriately.
Speaker 1: So yeah, so if you get the final legal tick off,
Speaker 1: Allison Neuron and being could be getting out of the
Speaker 1: trucks today.
Speaker 2: Yes, well, so the way it works is that people
Speaker 2: would be aware, I've seen it already in the city
Speaker 2: of Perth. What they made the decision they're able to
Speaker 2: be turned off remotely, and then well, look, it's actually
Speaker 2: in Beams and Neuron's interest to gather up their assets
Speaker 2: as soon as possible. They don't want to leave them
Speaker 2: lying around on the streets. And you see that people
Speaker 2: are already starting to pick them up, so we would
Speaker 2: expect that they'd all be gone within a forty eight
Speaker 2: hour period. What we're going to do is we are
Speaker 2: then commissioning We're going to commission investigations into the safety
Speaker 2: to sort of look at are there ways to make
Speaker 2: it safer? Are there restrictions that we need to look
Speaker 2: at imposing additionally, so for example, it can only be
Speaker 2: used in daylight hours, or it could only be used
Speaker 2: around the river or something like that. I don't know.
Speaker 2: I don't want to pre emp that, but or maybe
Speaker 2: the decision will be made that it's really just the
Speaker 2: future of Higher East scooters is really doesn't have a place.
Speaker 2: That might be what we do, but I don't want
Speaker 2: to preempt that. But what I do know is that
Speaker 2: right now we are working with the City of Perth
Speaker 2: following the lead, and we're working towards doing the same
Speaker 2: thing perfectively. And the Council will talk about this more
Speaker 2: fulsomely at our public Ordinary Council meeting in a couple
Speaker 2: of weeks.
Speaker 1: All right, Alison, thank you very much for talking to
Speaker 1: our listeners. Appreciate it.
Speaker 2: Thank you, no worries, thank you