E-scooters in Łódź: Bolt and Lime, Poland’s rules, Piotrkowska Street, parking and towing

Which e-scooter apps work in Łódź?

Two companies’ scooters are on the ScootRadar map of Łódź:

• Bolt, in the same app as its taxis, as the city explained when Bolt’s scooters came to Łódź in February 2021.
• Lime, in its own app.

At 02:47 Warsaw time on Monday 2 November 2026 the Łódź map showed about 1,480 Bolt scooters free to rent at that moment and about 1,010 Lime scooters as last counted.

Polish law lets you ride from 13; check the app’s own minimum age before you rent.

New to shared scooters? See how to rent an e-scooter. Poland’s other big cities have guides of their own: Warsaw, Kraków, Wrocław, Poznań and Gdańsk, Gdynia and Sopot.

How much does an e-scooter cost in Łódź?

Bolt and Lime show their current prices in the app before you unlock a scooter.

When Bolt arrived in February 2021, the city gave its price then as a free unlock and PLN 0.50 a minute; check the app for today’s.

Where can you ride? Poland’s e-scooter rules

Poland’s Road Traffic Act (Prawo o ruchu drogowym) sets the riding rules in Łódź. Since 20 May 2021 an electric scooter has counted as a vehicle in Polish law, and from that day the municipal police (Straż Miejska) could check riders too, the city said on 14 May 2021. You may go no faster than 20 km/h.

• Cycle path or cycle lane first, where there is one for your direction.
• Otherwise the road, but only where its speed limit is 30 km/h or less.
• The pavement only as an exception: beside a road with a limit above 30 km/h and no cycle path or lane, at walking pace, giving way to pedestrians.

All are national rules, the same in every Polish city. The tickets come from the government’s fines tariff in force since 1 January 2022, and the helmet fine from the Code of Petty Offences.

The police went over the same rules for Łódź’s riders in March 2026, ahead of the helmet rule for under-16s: 13 and over with a bicycle card or licence (adults need neither), the cycle path first, then a road limited to 30 km/h, the pavement only as a last resort at a pedestrian’s pace, and no riding after drinking (lodz.pl, 28 March 2026).

Riding on Piotrkowska Street

Piotrkowska is the city’s main street (lodz.pl, 3 April 2025). In 2021 its street manager called it an important route, mainly for scooters, rollerblades and bikes. Because it works as a promenade (deptak), where people on foot walk freely, he welcomed the speed limits the new law brought in (14 May 2021).

• Slower scooters. At the suggestion of ZDiT, the city’s roads and transport authority (Zarząd Dróg i Transportu), the rental companies were already limiting their scooters’ speed around Piotrkowska for the safety of everyone on its promenade section, the city wrote on 4 July 2023. Your scooter may slow down there.
• Pedestrians first. Where you ride on a pavement or footway, the law asks for walking pace and gives pedestrians the right of way.
• No return places on Piotrkowska itself under the city’s 2025 plan: they are on the cross streets (see below).

None of the city’s notices of 2021, 2023, 2025 and 2026 bans e-scooters from Piotrkowska.

Where to park in Łódź

Łódź has been tackling scooters left across its pavements since 2022.

• 2022: three pilot parking places. After talks with ZDiT the companies promised to group their scooters, and in September 2022 three pilot scooter parking places were set up, by Piotrkowska Centrum, EC1 Łódź and Manufaktura (4 July 2023).
• 2023: talks with the police. On 21 June 2023 ZDiT met the police, the municipal police and the ombudsman for people with disabilities to draw up good practice and rules for using scooters.
• 2025: 313 return places in Śródmieście. The city announced 313 return places (miejsca zwrotu) for the city centre, marked with a white dashed line and a painted scooter, on practically every cross street, so that the walk to the nearest is never more than about 150 metres. They were to be finished in May 2025, with the aim that from that summer scooters be left only there, under an agreement to be signed with the operators, who would have to move scooters left elsewhere (lodz.pl, 3 April 2025).

That notice spoke of the agreement as still to be signed, and the city’s scooter notice of March 2026 doesn’t mention it. In the centre, look for the marked places and follow what the app says before you end your ride. Elsewhere the national rule applies: a marked place, or the pavement’s outer edge, parallel to it, never blocking the way.

ZDiT tows a vehicle only on the orders of the municipal police, the police or others entitled to it. In 2026, removing an e-scooter costs PLN 179, plus PLN 35 for each day in the guarded pound at ul. Pilska 2-4, open around the clock (city council resolution of 22 October 2025). The bill goes to the scooter’s owner, which for a rental is the company.

Poznań went further: in its central paid parking zones a ride may end only at a Hop & Go point (see the Poznań guide).

Trams, buses and ŁKA trains

MPK Łódź trams and buses. They run under the city council’s rules of 2 December 2020 (przepisy porządkowe), which the city and MPK still list on 2 November 2026. They let a passenger bring hand luggage, animals, a pram or a bike if it can be placed so as not to block the aisle, endanger traffic or other passengers, or hide the driver’s view; things may not go on seats, and bikes may travel only in vehicles marked with a bike pictogram. Nothing in them names e-scooters, your own or rented: if you bring your own, fold it and keep it out of the aisle, off the seats and clear of the driver’s view. In Warsaw the city’s rules let you carry an e-scooter as luggage, while Poznań’s rules ban e-scooters outright.

ŁKA regional trains. Łódzka Kolej Aglomeracyjna’s passenger rules in force from 2 November 2026 let a traveller carry a folded scooter (złożona hulajnoga) free as hand luggage; the only vehicles they exclude are those with a combustion engine. Hand luggage goes on the racks, under the seats or in spaces marked with a pictogram, never on a seat, and must not get in other travellers’ way. ŁKA’s luggage page allows three pieces of hand luggage free and charges PLN 4.50 for each further one.

ŁKA’s rules also list, among the national rules of order for its passengers, a ban on leaving “bicycles, scooters and other vehicles, including electric ones” unattended outside the places set aside for them. At a station, leave a rental scooter only where there is such a place.

Did you know?

• Łódź’s rental e-scooters started local. Minute-by-minute e-scooters, which the city greeted as a new means of transport, arrived on Thursday 25 April 2019 from a Łódź startup, Volt Scooters (24 April 2019).
• Łódź was Bolt’s 13th Polish city for scooters when it arrived in February 2021, and its scooters could then reach 25 km/h, faster than the 20 km/h limit the law set three months later.
• The 150-metre rule comes from the city bikes. Spacing the 2025 return places so that one is never more than about 150 metres away copies the rule that made Łódzki Rower Publiczny, the city bike-share, a success, the city said.
• Piotrkowska worried about its shop windows. In 2021 its street manager feared the new law, which parks scooters on the pavement as far from the road as possible, would line them up under shop windows, hiding the displays, and that a strong gust could blow them into the glass.