So many E-scooter deaths..

Parliamentary committee into transport safety have done a report on their safety and recommendations. It's up to the govt now to actually legislate or ban them entirely (my preference!)

https://www.pacts.org.uk/the-safety-of-private-e-scooters-in-the-uk-pacts-research/

They ARE for private land only
other than rental schemes in some towns they are illegal and nobody cares

personally I think they should be legalised but there should be some kind of licensing system. They have the potential to replace a lot of car journeys where I am. But as others have suggested you only see them being driven irresponsibly by young hooded men dressed in black

Well no, but in that respect it's more similar to a car than an eBike, which won't do anything unless you're peddling.

The point I was making us that they are not the same as ebikes and shouldn't be classified the same. There's a fundamental difference.

AgathaMystery

how is this any different to the carnage drivers cause on rds? People in such a state when other drivers get to them they throw up afterwards

I got overtaken in my car - a line of us we were at about 20mph going over the speedbumps past the school. No helmet, couldn't really see what was coming the other way as he was going past about 6 of us. Accident waiting to happen.

there is a piece in NYT about this (& e-bikes) at the moment.

one mother describes cradling her child’s head in ICU except there was no back of his head. Absolutely tragic.

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/29/health/ebikes-safety-teens.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare

Alexandra2001. Don’t forget to mention the 20000 life changing injuries caused by drivers each year

HaveYouHeardOfARoadAtlas
The people who are riding a proper e-bike are usually on the road, using a small motor to assist them in riding.

A motor on an e-bike switches off at 15/16mph so any speed above that has to come from the person pedalling. In many ways it's no different from a standard road bike. If someone needs motor assistance to get to 15mph they're unlikely to have the physical power to cycle much more than that speed. The people riding these are probably going to be average citizens who want a bit of mechanical assistance to keep fit and active, which is why they're not dying or being badly injured in the way that e-scooters, e-motorbikes etc are.

Nobody needs to be speeding around residential areas, footpaths, etc on e-scooters/e-motorbikes the way the chavs/neds/scrotes are. The injuries and deaths caused by these people are because the sort of person who wants to zip around on footpaths and be able to avoid the police quickly are the sort of people who will ride recklessly and don't care who they take out on the way.

so if you test all escooter riders and put all that energy into it what would be the result? One less death per year

if you concentrate on finding a way to make drivers safer, the result might be saving up to 2000 lives per year

which do you think you should tackle first or as priority to save the most lives?

3 e-scooter deaths so far this year, approx 1000 caused by vehicle drivers.

This thread is just another example of car drivers refusing to accept responsibility for their own poor driving & wanting the roads for themselves, regardless of who they kill or pollute.

A proper legal framework, restrict sales, I agree.

Though don't let us forget all the other road deaths and injuries, let's call a crash a crash not an 'accident' as many are preventable, and make anyone who wants to use an SUV take their test in one.

It’s hard to know how many e-scooters there are as they are unlicensed, but it seems there are about one million. There are 33 million cars, and that’s just cars, not lorries, buses, motorbikes etc.

An e scooter will move on its own, you just hold a button down.

and if you release the button does the scooter continue on its own?

Again, what's the ratio?

it’s surely whether a test is going to prevent deaths, presently you have less than 1 death a year by bikes, ebikes and scooters which are all untested and 2000 deaths a year by tested drivers

The difference is an eBike is not self propelled, they won't move if you don't pedal, they just assist. An e scooter will move on its own, you just hold a button down.

And the people I see on e-bikes are often older adults. My 75 year old dad has one for example.

Motorbikes are ridden by adults who have had to pass a test. E-Scoters are ridden by any passing kid. And as we all know teenagers have much less common sense and a hugely inflated sense of immortality.

Yes the actual machine involved might not be that different but the rider and road sense are very different.
I don’t see many motorbikes being ridden at speed through a pedestrianised area, along pavement, the wrong way down one way streets, with no lights on etc.

How many deaths from cars etc.... in the same period?

I think escooters should be legal if you have insurance and a licence but then you have the argument about ebikes as well. There have been deaths caused by ebikes and bicycles but no one moans about those. We need cleaner forms of transport, and escooters would be a great way for people to get around if they were licenced.

What can the police do -they are underage so get a telling off by courts.

Again, what's the ratio?

My issue where we live is the ones you rent out are outside our gate. People don’t put them back properly and there always ones laying across the pavement in random places . Making getting my DC out in her wheel chair difficult

Well there were 14 last year. How many e scooter users are there? I genuinely don’t know, but we can’t talk about deaths been statistically low if we don’t know the numbers involved. But they seem to be increasing.

Part of me thinks I couldn’t give a shit if a load of neds kill themselves so let them crack on. but if they’re riding so dangerously they endanger others. I feel sorry for the ambulance driver who killed an e scooter rider only last night, they have to live with that.

ebike riders aren’t dying in the same numbers which suggests they’re riding more safely.

so we either say we don’t care about the idiots on e scooters and let them keep dying. Or we admit for some reason there’s an anomaly about why they’re more likely to die than ebike riders and put something in place for their own benefit 🤷‍♀️. I don’t really care either way.

Privately owned escooters are illegal.

It’s these that are the issue near me. No helmets, obviously. Natural selection will pick some of them off but unfortunately drivers and police get dragged into it when there are accidents.