The Ministry of Transport will oblige regions to design infrastructure for personal mobility devices

The Ministry of Transport will oblige the authorities of the constituent entities to design paths and parking lots for electric scooters and other personal mobility devices (IM), as well as create generally “favorable conditions” for their movement. In particular, new markings may appear on city streets that prescribe certain ways to park mobile devices – parallel, perpendicular or at an angle to the roadway. Such requirements are contained in the draft departmental order, which describes the procedure for installing road signs, traffic lights, markings, and arranging parking for vehicles. Now it is proposed to include SIM within the scope of general road regulations.

The Ministry of Transport has posted on regulation.gov.ru a draft of new rules for the preparation of projects and comprehensive schemes for organizing road traffic (amendments are being made to departmental order No. 274). These rules regulate the installation locations of road signs, traffic lights, markings, parking, one-way and reverse traffic, etc., taking into account the flow of cars, pedestrians and bicycles. The Ministry of Transport proposes to add personal mobility equipment there. The development of such documentation is mandatory for regions.

Subjects of the federation will be obliged to “justify decisions” on the development of infrastructure for SIM, as well as create generally “favorable conditions” for their movement. According to the new requirements, traffic management projects (TRAP) will have to include proposals for the organization of bicycle paths and SIM parking areas. The road traffic regulations used during repair work or during road construction must necessarily include measures for the movement of cyclists and SIM in the area adjacent to the places of restrictions. The Ministry of Transport also proposes to create targeted lists of parking lots for electric scooters, rental stations, indicating the size of the site, the number of parking spaces for bicycles and SIM cards, and the parking method (parallel, perpendicular or at an angle to the roadway).

The draft order is provided for by the roadmap for regulatory regulation of SIM, which the Russian government approved in 2023. Among other things, it contains amendments to the Traffic Rules and the Administrative Code. These documents are also being developed, the exact degree of readiness is still unknown.

In the explanatory note to the draft order, the Ministry of Transport refers to statistics from the beginning of 2023, according to which almost 192 thousand SIM cards were in circulation, and 540 thousand mobile devices were sold at retail in 2020–2022. The Ministry of Transport estimated the total fleet of SIMs in operation in the country at the beginning of last year at 750 thousand units, but now there are obviously more of them. Thus, the Association of Micromobility Operators estimated the kick-sharing fleet at the end of 2023 at 300 thousand units. Accidents with electric scooters are growing: over the nine months of 2023, the increase in road accidents exceeded 215% compared to the same period last year, and fatalities – plus 63%. Most accidents were recorded in Moscow, Tyumen region, and St. Petersburg. New requirements for documentation will ensure the development of infrastructure, improve the quality of conditions for SIM traffic and increase road safety, the Ministry of Transport is confident.

Experts interviewed by Kommersant supported the document. “In order for infrastructure to appear, we need accurate calculations of the number of SIM users and correctly drawn up project documentation,” says Evgeniy Litvin, co-chairman of the “Road Safety” working group within the framework of the “regulatory guillotine.” “Now transport planning is happening as if there are no electric scooters exists”. Sergei Karlov, head of government relations at Whoosh, calls the draft order “the next step to create conditions for the integration of SIM into city transport systems.”

The total length of bicycle paths that SIMs can use is about 5 thousand km, of which about 500 km are in Moscow and 150 km in St. Petersburg, says Ksenia Erdman, director of the Association of Micromobility Operators. “This is very little, and it’s great that the Ministry of Transport is entrusting cities with the responsibility to create new infrastructure,” she says. “The question is who will finance it. Every time I meet with representatives of city and municipal administrations, they say that there is no money for this. In many regions, the situation with roads and sidewalks is deplorable; they will build cycling infrastructure on a residual basis.”

However, there are also alternative financing options, notes Ms. Erdman, citing the example of Almetyevsk (Tatarstan), where an investor built a network of bicycle paths at his own expense. Significant investments are not required, says Evgeniy Litvin: marking a bicycle lane can be done as part of the annual marking update; installing additional signs and parking for SIM is also not very expensive. If we combine this activity with work on improvement and reconstruction of streets, for example, within the framework of the national project “Safe and Quality Roads” (this is already being done in Pskov, Ivanovo, Ufa, Penza, Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk), then the costs will be minimal, Mr. Litvin believes. The explanatory note to the order states that its implementation will not require the allocation of funds from the budget.

The capital’s data center recalled that for several years they have been organizing a network of bicycle paths throughout the city, and are also working on a project for the “Green Ring” cycle route, which will connect green areas, the metro, the MCD and the MCC. Total expenses for cycling infrastructure in 2024–2026, provided for by the city budget, will amount to 1.3 billion rubles. The data center told Kommersant that they consider the proposals of the Ministry of Transport to adjust the rules “correct and positive.”

Ivan Buranov