Overview

There are a number of safety issues with the use of e-scooters that the UK government must address before May 2024 – the official date when the e-scooter trials come to an end.

The UK government has imposed strict safety measures for the use of e-scooters in the UK:  aspects such as geofencing, the requirement to hold a UK driving license for riders, compulsory training, and a ban of the use of private e-scooters: it is only legal to ride a rental e-scooter.

However, due to aspects such as road condition (the risk of hitting defects such as potholes), narrow paths, and discontinuous cycle lanes can force users to ride e-scooters on pavements. This means that both riders and pedestrians - and people with disabilities - are put at risk (as stated in the Department for Transport 2021 report.)

In her presentation, Anastasia covered many urgent issues around e-scooters and trials in the UK, including:

Lack of data on how many e-scooter riders are actually injured as often there are single vehicle collisions, and they are not reported to the police. Some information on reported collisions can be found in the recent National statistics of 2023.

Long-term burden for NHS due to face and brain injuries that e-scooter riders are prone to have in case of an accident. The urgent need to design new helmets as those for cyclists are not solving the problem (i.e., not protecting in case of face injuries), as stated in the research by Imperial College London.

E-scooters being driven on footways (and other shared spaces) and causing problems for pedestrians and other road users, especially those with disabilities, shows the need for stricter monitoring of offences and audible sound to help alert other road users.

Main takeaways from the presentation

• It is crucial to share knowledge and learn from lessons of other countries on e-scooter legislation and good practices.
• Regarding road safety, it is important to have robust legislation for e-scooters, including standards for designing private e-scooters (wheels, headlights, stability) and their batteries.
• Improve data sets with the police record, hospital admissions and operators’ data, with details of which collisions involve private/ shared e-scooters, to have a better understanding of what needs to be done at the regulatory level.
• Develop the level of acceptable road defects and improve infrastructure maintenance for e-scooters to feel safe on the road.
• E-scooters have a vast untapped opportunity to improve users’ mental health, complement public transport for first/last-mile trips, serve as fast and convenient night-time transport and help people commute on strike days.

'Obeying traffic rules, adapting speed to the situation, not being intoxicated and being considerate of others are the cornerstones of safe electric scooter driving', says Jaakko Klang, traffic safety engineer and chairman of the national working group who invited Anastasia to speak about e-scooters at the Nordic Road Association meeting.

Some of our previous work on e-scooters can be found here:

• Webinar 2021 ‘E-scooters: the Big questions’
• CIHT statement 2020: Call for private e-scooters to be made road legal (ciht.org.uk)

If you have any questions or want to discuss issues around safety and legislation of e-scooters, please contact technical@ciht.org.uk