Scoot On Out of My Way

Lime. Spin. Bird. Jump.

Raise your hand if you’ve ever almost run over someone on one of these:

Yeah, me too.

Kid was on the far side of a Suburban (gigantic SUV) and essentially invisible to me. Nearly ran him down.

This “micro-mobility” trend (yup, you heard that right), according to the National Association of City Transportation Officials, accounted for “84 million trips taken on shared bikes and scooters across the U.S. in 2018” – 38.5 million of which were scooters specifically.

Soooooo…these Razor-style scooters have clearly gained a ton of popularity and can certainly be a great alternative to a) walking and b) driving your big ole-honking-carbon-emitting-SUV.

Unfortunately, the people behind the handle bars of these things are often as bad as the people behind the wheels of their cars.

What, you ask, are the rules of the road for scooters?

It would appear that the laws in the U.S. vary by state and are not yet consistent. In some cases, you must follow the same rules of the road as any other vehicle. In others, there are specific rules related just to scooters. Some cities are banning them altogether.

Generally, E-scooter users are supposed to:

Be at least 18 years old
Have a driver’s license
Ride alone
Wear a helmet

I’m not sure I have ever seen anyone wearing a helmet. Just sayin’.

Here’s what I’d also like to see:

Get off the sidewalks, especially if you’re traveling over 15 mph.
Don’t go through red lights.
Don’t make turns without signaling.
You’re a vehicle, just like a bike, just like a motorcycle. Same road. Same rules.
You are a whole lot smaller than a lot of SUVs on the road and, thus, are difficult to see in many cases so watch out.

I could go on.

Consumer Reports did a study that shows that at least eight people died while using a rented e-scooter since the fall of 2017, while another 1,500 were injured, including some who were paralyzed.

Bird told Consumer Reports that, “what has immediately become clear is that 75 percent of the known fatalities with shared e-scooters were due to collisions with cars.”

They went on to say, “we are proud supporters of the Vision Zero movement, calling upon cities everywhere to modernize road infrastructure to protect those who choose a more sustainable form of transportation from the dangers caused by cars.”

My sense is, these scooters aren’t going away anytime soon. And, with roads ill-equipped and ill-designed to accommodate them, cars have no choice but to dodge said scooters.

You can certainly argue that we should all share the roads. We should. But who’s going to win in a fight?

Final note, kinda funny: