Philip O'Connor

speaker

100 appearances 1 recordings 1 series first heard Jul 2026 last heard 18 Jul

Philip O'Connor’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.

Trend

recordings per month · last 12 months

Recordings per month over the last 12 months — 1 in all, peaking in Jul 2026 with 1.

Appearances

newest first · ▶ plays the moment

The Pat Kenny Show · E-Scooters: What have other European countries done about them? · 18 Jul 2026 podcast

Oh, I would have to say I'd be an e-scooter user myself.

I may be using one when I go into the record store later today.

They appeared here probably about 10 years ago on the streets of Stockholm, where I live, and they quickly spread to other parts of the Nordic region, to Copenhagen, to Oslo in Norway.

And like many other cities, they sort of appeared out of nowhere and flourished, and all the problems that came with it immediately became apparent.

We had problems with accidents, we had problems with parking, with e-scooters dumped by people being outside apartment doors.

They've been out for a few drinks the night before and just left there.

So over the years, they've come up with different kinds of legislation.

The most recent law that was passed here in Stockholm, it reduced the number of operators.

So the private hire operators from three to two, because basically they want to deal with less people when it comes to private hire.

So pretty much across the board in Scandinavia, Pat, the speed limit is 20 kilometres an hour.

There are various limitations when it comes to helmets.

Helmets are mandatory for kids under 15 in Sweden and Norway, but they're mandatory for all users in Denmark, which is interesting because Denmark being the most southern of the Scandinavian countries, it's very much a bicycle dependent, particularly in Copenhagen, where I know you've been.

It's very much a bicycle dependent city and people are ready for those kinds of things.

So, and again, I suppose the last thing is the difference between the public and the private hire.

The e-scooters that I use are the ones that you scan with your phone, you jump up, you take your 10 or 12 minute ride.

to the next place you're going.

But there are also people who use them every day to get to and from work and to and from college and that kind of thing.

But they are also banned now, going back a couple of years, on public transport.

The reason given for that is, of course, the possibility that the lithium batteries might go on fire.

I don't think I've ever heard of a case of that happening.

Showing 1–20 of 100 · page 1 of 5