Banning escooters on trains

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news...:~:text=A 14-year-old boy,on 2 June last year.

The number of people killed in e-scooter crashes has tripled in the last year, new figures have revealed.

Data from the Department for Transport (DfT) shows 12 people died in incidents involving e-scooters in the year ending June 2022.


The figure is three times higher than for the same period in 2021, when four people died.

Meanwhile, the number of people seriously injured by or when using e-scooters has almost doubled over the last year, up from 228 in 2021's figures to 429 in 2022.

https://news.sky.com/story/e-scoote...-call-for-government-to-pause-trials-12754673


The family of a 12-year-old boy who died in an e-scooter crash on his way to school have called for e-scooter trial schemes to be banned until major safety changes are made.

Mustafa Nadeem is believed to have been riding an e-scooter when he collided with a bus in Bordesley Green earlier this month (6 December).

He was confirmed dead at the scene.

His father, Nadeem Khan, said: “We want to stop these scooters because I lost my son. I don’t want anybody else to lose their son or daughter.

"So that’s why we want to stop these scooters because they don’t have safety."

Just days after his father buried him, he’s still haunted by the day he found out he’d lost his son.

https://www.itv.com/news/central/20...e-scooter-crash-call-for-ban-on-trial-schemes

 

First they came for your eescooters next they will be after your horses. Wind powered fox hunters watch your backs!! Bring back penny farthings and 4 year old chimney sweeps.

 

How did a 12yr old get to be on one of these things?

Regards

Richard

 

Unfortunately, for my sins, I have to go to Slough fairly often. In that hell hole, it's normal for private e-scooters to be double manned.
They come out of nowhere, straight across the road and at speed.Traffic lights? Waste of time.
No helmets of course, or lights at night and the riders invariably have hoods up.

 

I have seen one or two , they look very dangerous as all they are is the wheel

 

hmm blaming some one else for his failure to prevent his son riding one.

 

There's plenty in the media that the police have said that they weren't pursuing the boys on the scooter when "this video clearly shows a police can following close behind" with the implication that the police were somehow possibly partly instrumental in the crash.
What the video shows is not an e bike (15mph limit) but an electric motorcycle being ridden illegally (2 up, no helmets, probably no licence, insurance, registration etc) and the police weren't pursuing it (no blue lights) but they were apparenty following someone who appears to be breaking the law. There's nothing in the media reporting that electric motorcycle s are illegal on the road unless they are insured, registered, etc like any motorbike and the video shows an electric motorcycle.

 

It happens every time there's a tragedy like this. The last one was a dead boy's mother saying "they should put in a helmet law for these e scooters" . Er, how does that work? They're illegal on the road, so your son was breaking the law anyway. He chose not to wear a helmet, if there had been a helmet law he'd simply have broken 2 laws instead of just one.

 

These e-shiters are like clucking cockroaches.

They are everywhere and dangerous.

Before I fell ill, one rider cut across at a set of traffic lights. The lights were green for me.

A near miss but almost certain fatality was avoided as my car operated it's emergency brake system (VW Arteon) and avoided him.

This was at 6am, and dark in February.

All I got was verbal abuse from him.

I wished I'd deselected this car feature. He'd have been toast.

He had no lights, no helmet, no common sense and no respect.

 

Scooters in the trial scheme in Slough come with a helmet. I saw somebody wearing one, once.

 

That makes sense. I think scooters are less likely to result in a head injury than a fall from a bicycle. In neither case do I think that compulsion would be desirable, as it would reduce usage. At least in the case of a bicycle there's an argument that the benefit from the exercise outweighs the risk of injury resulting from not wearing a helmet.

 

I’ve mixed views about them. When they first appeared, an overweight early 20s guy almost hit me on the pavement with one doing about 20mph, then trying to cross a busy road, I stepped in front of one going even faster. The problem was that he was very close into the kerb and I was scanning the road for traffic coming in both directions. I would probably have spotted a bike but not that profile. I can see that they get people around faster than cars etc and if they reduce private car use and congestion, that’s a good thing but not on the pavement.
From being anti to now moderately pro.

 

the guy that nearly did me a serious injury going downhill was under 12 !! schoolboy on way to school

 

this is the problem Anil, our dear west midlands mayor is dead keen on them . feel free to comment on his FB page about it !!

 

I thought there was a clear distinction between powered and non-powered vehicles. An electric motor is a motor, be it on a scooter or a bicycle or on those things that look like a lawn mower. A friend of my wife ended up in hospital because in the dark she tripped over a thing lying on the pavement. Apparently nobody has any responsibility. (At least not in Italy).

 

There is, in the UK at least. An e-bike in the UK is defined as something that has electrical assistance while you are pedalling, a power limit (I think) and no assistance beyong 15mph/25 kph. It can go faster of course but you are on your own. It only has 1 seat. If you stop pedalling, the thing stops assisting and you will eventually stop. An e-bike is legally a bicycle. You don't need a licence,insurance, etc.
Most of the problems we are seeing are illegal electric motorcycles, they go faster than 15 mph, they don't need to be pedalled(don't have pedals generally), they will take 2 people, etc. These are legally not e-bikes, they are motorcycles, albeit they have no petrol engine but they have a motor. They *should* therefore have registration, insurance, driving licence, etc but of course they don't.

 

Sounds like Italy!
But on the basis of what you say, they should be seized by the police and the operators prosecuted for illegal everything. Why are they not? (An odd question, coming from Italy, but for some reason one expects a more rigorous application of the law in the UK).

 

Many E-bikes are easily fettled into electric motor cycles.
I have a dumb nut round here who has one that he brags can do 45 mph.

 

Plod is too busy assaulting protestors and covering each others arses to get involved with such trivia.

 

extremely common sight here

e cycle by , on Flickr