It’s probably fair to say that not many over-50s ride e-scooters. If they did, they’d probably show more consideration for others by not misusing them, and not dumping them wherever and whenever they step away from them.
Authorities are grappling with what they euphemistically call “compliance issues”. What that actually means is people riding e-scooters while disregarding the rules, riding them without helmets, riding them at illegal speeds and in places they are not allowed.
Also of concern is identifying e-scooter riders who break the rules.
Injuries to people riding electric scooters in Victoria increased by 234 per cent in the past 12 months, leading to at least 427 hospital admissions, mainly due to broken bones, The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald report.
It details data from Monash University’s Victorian Injury Surveillance Unit that shows a steep rise in hospitalisations due to injuries among e-scooter riders, jumping from 28 in 2019–20 to 128 in 2020–21, and 427 in the past year.
The data was collected from Victorian public hospitals with 24-hour emergency departments.
Broken bones were the most common injury, with 148 fractures recorded, followed by dislocations, sprains and strains.
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Ben Rossiter, executive officer of advocacy group Victoria Walks, told The Age that “technically”, e-scooters should be on the roadways, not the footpath, but there is a lot of non-compliance, which is a concern.
“Particularly for older walkers, people with disabilities, families with kids, when e-scooters are breaking the law [by riding on footpaths] it makes it harder for them to move about. It is not just crashes, it is fear of the risk of injury,” he said.
The problem is not confined to Australia.
The UK’s largest independent road safety charity, IAM RoadSmart, is urging the government to do much more to drive down the number of death and injuries on Britain’s roads.
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This comes in the wake of the Department for Transport’s findings that in 2021 there were 1434 casualties involving e-scooters, resulting in 10 people being killed, 421 seriously injured and 1003 slightly injured.
This is in stark contrast to the department’s 2020 statistics, which recorded 484 casualties involving e-scooters, including one death, 128 serious injuries and 355 slight injuries. Shockingly, this means there has been a 900 per cent increase in deaths in the UK in just 12 months.
Neil Greig, director of policy and research at IAM RoadSmart, said: “The e-scooter carnage must stop. A tenfold increase in deaths related to e-scooters in just one year is utterly unacceptable and the continued delay in regulating these machines is costing lives and causing misery on our city roads every day.”
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In Australia, electric scooters are banned from roads in NSW, Victoria, South Australia, Western Australia and the Northern Territory, reports mondaq.com.
It says that in NSW, electric scooters are classified as motorised vehicles under 240(2)(c) of the NSW Road Rules 2014. This means they are banned from the road “at any time while any person travelling in or on the device is wholly or partly assisted in propelling the device by means other than human power”. A penalty of up to $2200 applies.
Along with other concerned parties, seniordriveraus is lobbying local authorities to do something about regulating e-scooters and e-scooter riders.
Paul Murrell is a motoring writer and creator of seniordriveraus.com, which specialises in “car advice for people whose age and IQ are both over 50”. This article originally appeared here and has been updated and republished with permission.
Have you been involved in an e-scooter incident? Were you injured or was your property damaged? Why not share your experience in the comments section below?
I’m a senior, yes believe it or not, and I recently obtained an e-scooter and love it. I don’t go stupid on it or break any laws that I’m aware of. I find it a way of getting out of the house and go places without using the high cost of petrol. I am a Traffic Warden at a School Crossing and I do come across quite a few young riders speeding and riding recklessly with pedestrians in the area causing havoc.
Education is required not banning them for the sake of a few. I get really annoyed when people hop on their high horse condemning or asking to penalise those that do the right thing.