Sofia, Bulgaria: Georgi Valentinov Georgiev, chairman of Metropolitan Municipality, informed through his social media account that new traffic and parking rules will come into effect at the beginning of August.
Electric scooters are environmentally friendly and comfortable for citizens to transport, but without clear rules, they lead to incidents and endanger pedestrian safety.Â
There are three scooter rental companies in Sofia, and they provide services through 2000 scooters; the municipality discussed the rules with them and thanked them for their understanding. They will be applied to e-scooter software with all restrictions accepted by the municipal council.
From the beginning of August, the following are the new rules set to be implemented in Sofia-Â
- Prohibition on scooters in parks, gardens, squares, sidewalks and pedestrian areas. To ensure compliance with rules, scooters will be automatically restricted by their company’s software – to travel speeds of up to 5 km/h in parks, gardens and squares. GPS location of the vehicles will be used for this purpose.
- In all other zones, the speed of electric vehicles is legally restricted to 25 km/h, and this restriction will also be applied through the software.
Parking bans in wide urban spaces like:
– parks
− gardens
– children’s and sports grounds
– green areas
– pedestrian spaces
– public transport stops
– entrances to metro stations
– entrances to buildings
– ramps for disabled people
- The Metropolitan Municipality makes exceptions within parks, gardens and pedestrian areas. These places are determined within one month of the adoption of the Order and will be indicated in the applications for rental scooters.
- Currently, the municipality has about 200 designated places for parking two-wheeled PPS within the street network.
- Obligation for operators or owners who rent scooters to indicate in mobile apps the allowed places for movement and parking, and that driving after the use of alcohol or drugs or their equivalent is prohibited.
- Obligation for operators or owners who provide rental scooters to remove improperly parked electric scooters by 4 hours on weekdays and 6 hours on weekends after the violation has been committed between 08.00 h. and 18.00 hrs.
- At the suggestion of my colleague municipal councillor Proshko Proshkov, it is provided that in the applications for the rental and use of electric scooters, there will also be the possibility of sending a signal in case of an improperly parked scooter.
The Metropolitan Municipality introduce the following fines:
- From 500 to 1,000 BGN. Property sanction for any violation for companies that do not comply with their mobile applications with the new rules
- 50 BGN for violators who ride scooters and do not comply with the new rules.