Electric Kick Scooters on Sidewalks in Virginia but Not in California? A Review of How States Regulate Personal Transportation Devices

In recent years, communities have observed fast growth in the number and use of “personal transportation devices” (PTDs) such as Segways, hoverboards, skateboards, kick scooters, and electric kick-scooters. PTDs provide mobility for people making short trips who want to travel faster than walking speeds. Greater use of PTDs has the potential to benefit both individual travelers and communities as a whole, providing inexpensive mobility options that can help communities reach their environmental and congestion-relief goals. Despite the long list of possible benefits, however, incorporating PTDs into communities is not without challenges, most notably thorny regulatory and facilities management questions. For this paper, the authors reviewed in detail the state vehicle codes from U.S. states and territories to identify all direct or indirect regulations on PTDs of all types. The findings show that, overall, no widely-established state regulations clearly and effectively regulate where and how PTDs should be used in order to manage the risk of collisions while still making PTDs a viable, convenient transportation option. Other key findings include: 1) states regulate devices with similar characteristics differently; 2) many states have very few PTDs regulations; and 3) states are inconsistent in terms of where PTDs should be ridden.

• Supplemental Notes:
  • This paper was sponsored by TRB committee ANF20 Standing Committee on Bicycle Transportation.
• Corporate Authors:

  Transportation Research Board

  ,    
• Authors:
  • Agrawal, Asha Weinstein
  • Fang, Kevin
  • Hooper, Ashley M
• Conference:
  • Transportation Research Board 98th Annual Meeting
  • Location: Washington DC, United States
  • Date: 2019-1-13 to 2019-1-17
• Date: 2019

Language

• English

Media Info

• Media Type: Digital/other
• Features: Figures; References; Tables;
• Pagination: 17p

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Mobility; Nonmotorized transportation; Scooters; Sidewalks; States; Traffic regulations
• Identifier Terms: Segway Human Transporter
• Uncontrolled Terms: Skateboards
• Geographic Terms: United States
• Subject Areas: Law; Pedestrians and Bicyclists; Vehicles and Equipment;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01697852
• Record Type: Publication
• Report/Paper Numbers: 19-04299
• Files: TRIS, TRB, ATRI
• Created Date: Mar 1 2019 3:51PM