E-Scooters: Are They Really Helping the Planet or Just in the Way?

Have you seen them? The lime-colored e-scooters casually thrown across footpaths, parklands, and even into streams. They were introduced with a promise — to reduce carbon emissions and make transport cleaner and more efficient. But walk around Brisbane and you might ask the same question I do: are these things actually helping, or are they just in the way?

It is hard to ignore the irony. These scooters were never essential to begin with. Someone, somewhere, thought they would be a great way to help the environment. But think about what goes into producing them — the plastic, the batteries, the manufacturing, the shipping, the constant maintenance. Is the carbon footprint really smaller? Or are we just swapping one type of pollution for another?

And then, there is the safety issue. The other day, I saw a man in a wheelchair struggling to get past one lying right in the middle of the footpath. Another time, a mother trying to push a pram had to take a detour. I have even seen some dumped into the water. This is not rare — it is happening everywhere.

The companies say they are about convenience and sustainability. But at what cost? These things are often left anywhere, with no sense of responsibility. And the councils seem powerless, or unwilling, to address it. At the very least, there should be designated parking areas. More importantly, the users should be held accountable for how and where they leave them.

E-scooters may have started with good intentions, but as it stands now, they are becoming more of a public nuisance than a public good.