As E-Scooters Roll Into American Cities, So Do Safety Concerns
The above is an article from last October connected to a newer article below this post..
I start with this one because it describes the basic problem: Electric scooters in cities.
After reading several related articles all pretty much focused on recurring themes of injuries, I found myself coming to a fundamental cause of the problem, regardless of its being mentioned in the articles. Government paralysis.
Taken further, it’s about the failure of certain blocs of people to agree on a set of actions to address and correct a serious problem.
We can read articles like this and many others over and over blaming this person or that peeson because we think they’re on the wrong side, but some problems or challenges are just too complicated to reveal an obvious answer. This case about electric scooters in cities (overwhelming?) is one of those problems.
I may personally disagree with the complexity of tackling this situation, but I see obvious issues that should’ve been anticipated the moment one single electric scooter was permitted in one city. Let alone, several now, and growing.
- We can not have motorized anything on sidewalks where pedestrians walk. Period. End of story.
- Laws have to be in place, and enforced to ticket offenders who break these laws. Period. End of story.
- Companies who rent these things should not allow renters to just drop them all over the place with no centralized hub network picking up after them.
- Cities should limit the number of scooters it allows on its streets. There’s no limit now. That’s insane.
- Special lIcenses should be required to operate these things, and operate the companies. They are not toys. They are not bikes. They are a motorized forms of transportation equipment capable of causing significant injury to its riders, pedestrians, and other vehicle operators.
This and all the other “complicated” problems around us in life need a compromised approach among interests or opinions. But what we need more than any of these things first is swift action and forward movement. That doesn’t happen in cities in this country. That has to change.
Related recent article:
As Electric Scooters Proliferate, So Do Minor Injuries And Blocked Sidewalks