The ‘app’ Voom, the first authorized skateboard operator in Bogotá - Voom app first Bogota authorized skateboard operator! The District gave him the endorsement for 12 months to operate in the towns of Chapinero and Usaquén.

The District gave the Voom application the authorization to provide skateboard rental service in the public space throughout 2020. The announcement was made days after the company Lime informed that it was leaving the country.

Last October, the District revealed what the requirements would be for six operators that had already been selected to rent skateboards.

This Tuesday it was known that the first to fulfill all the points was the Voom brand, of the company Movo Mobilitas Colombia S.A. S., which provides its services in five other countries.

Voom app first Bogota authorized skateboard operator

The authorization given by the Ministry of Mobility is for 12 months, which began counting from last December 31.

During this period, Voom will be able to operate a maximum of 712 skateboards in the towns of Chapinero and Usaquén, which, according to the Mobility Secretariat, already have signposted spaces.

The requirements that Voom had to comply with were established in resolution 336 of 2019. The rule stipulates that operators would pay more than 1 billion pesos to the District, establish a strategic road safety plan, would have to purchase insurance policies that cover property damages and extra-economic, and should have a regulation of use of public space.

The Mobility Secretariat informed that "the other companies have already fulfilled most of the permit requirements", but that the issues of information exchange are still pending, an issue that Voom already has ready.

"We want to contribute to improving the mobility system in Bogotá," said Mauricio Rodríguez, country manager of Voom in Colombia.

The announcement came after Lime, another of the operators authorized to offer the service in the city, announced that it would no longer provide skateboard rental service in Colombia. "Unfortunately, we have reduced our presence in the market and made the difficult decision to close operations in the city," said the company, which also stopped operating in other countries of the continent.

Although company sources say that they reduced their presence in different parts of the world due to financial issues, in the particular case of Colombia the decision also responded to other factors.

On November 29 of last year, Lime gave the Mobility Secretariat a right of petition expressing concern that “some of the companies that were granted the permit, under the same conditions as Lime, They are not complying with the rules. ”

In addition to that document, the company attached a 24-page report in which it showed evidence of the non-compliance of the other companies that provide the skateboard rental service.

"One of the reasons why the market is not profitable is that companies are not complying with the standards, and there are also no people who enforce them," said Gonzalo Araújo, a consultant at Lime in Colombia.

According to Araújo, competing companies had up to six times more vehicles than were initially authorized by the Mobility Secretariat. “The design of the standard was very well armed. The District did a great job, and that is a good public policy. But they should not have designed it without a follow-up of the Ministry of Mobility and local mayors, ”Araújo explained.

Is illegality rewarded?

For Edder Velandia, mobility expert and professor at the University of La Salle, we must carefully observe how viable it is economically to use the legal framework.

"Somehow, illegality exists because there is high profitability," he said. “It is clear that when someone does not comply with the rules, they will finally have the possibility of evading taxes, insurance and payments to the Government; It will have more positive results. ”

Also, the expert points out that the problem of implementing this type of innovative projects is that the regulatory framework does not adapt with the necessary agility to the changes. “Here we must call attention not only to the District, but to the National Government and the Ministry of Transportation. It is important that they have an aerial that is responsible for looking carefully at how we are facing the world in terms of mobility standards, ”Velandia suggested.