E-bikes and electric-powered scooters have become ubiquitous and not just for fun. In this new normal, it will be up to drivers of cars and trucks to adjust.
Here on the East End, e-devices are an affordable way to get around in the absence of decent public transportation. Local officials are taking notice, though it may not amount to much. In East Hampton Town, a measure to ban them from sidewalks will be the subject of a hearing a week from today. If approved, the town’s new ordinance would expand a law already in place statewide that bans e-bikes and e-scooters from sidewalks, except as authorized by local law, to include juiced-up skateboards and unicycles.
While under existing New York State regulations the default is “no” on most electric-powered vehicles, police are able to issue few tickets for sidewalk violations. It is fair to assume that few riders know the law; to our knowledge, there are no signs saying so. The state caps e-bike speed at 20 miles per hour (25 m.p.h. in cities with a population of more than one million), but plenty of models are available online that can go much faster than that. Short of an outright ban, this is how it is going to be on South Fork roads.
Anecdotally, e-powered riders race along the Main Street sidewalks we can see from our office all day long on warm days. And they are everywhere along Route 27 and all over Montauk during the high season. The operators are almost never seen wearing helmets. Kids with the inherently poor judgment of their early teens use them in unsafe ways, such as going the wrong way in traffic, not wearing helmets, or with one or more passengers; surely the adults responsible for them must understand the risk but allow it anyway. Because their manufacture is largely unregulated, e-vehicle headlights, taillights, and reflectors are often wildly ineffective, or not included at all. On top of this is the inexperience of people who have rented e-bikes just for the day and new owners of the devices.
Non-standard motorized vehicles have been a big problem in resort locations for a long time. On Martha’s Vineyard, ongoing deaths of rental-moped riders have prompted a stop-and-start effort to completely prohibit them, as well as e-bikes and scooters, on the island. Nantucket has also struggled with similar regulations, though voters rejected an effort last spring to keep e-vehicles off town paths.
Though it might be possible to reduce the number of e-bikes and scooters on sidewalks, it will be up to drivers to increase their sense of awareness. Local governments must go beyond their just-say-no approach. This needs to include providing adequate road shoulders. Design considerations for new projects, such as traffic circles, have to take e-rider safety into account. There are locations, too, such as in downtown Montauk, where parking changes will have to be made to reduce the risk of drivers backing unknowingly into the paths of e-riders.
To stress our main point: Electric-powered bikes, scooters, skateboards, and who knows what else yet to come are only going to increase on the roads. Individual drivers of traditional motor vehicles will just have to get used to it and pay greater attention. Leaving it up to law enforcement — or e-riders themselves — to prevent accidents will be less than half the solution.