Williamsburg discusses use of scooters

WILLIAMSBURG — Seeing children use electric bikes and scooters while ignoring traffic laws has Williamsburg city officials concerned about their safety.

The city council asked City Attorney Eric Tindal to look into ordinances to regulate the use of the popular vehicles in an attempt to prevent accidents that could cause injuries or death.

“It’s been dangerous up here on the square,” said City Manager Aaron Sandersfeld. Children use the electric vehicles on sidewalks — which is illegal on the Williamsburg square — and some of the scooters hit 25 miles per hour, he said.

People don’t want to walk out of businesses and get run over by scooters, Sandersfeld said.

Williamsburg Police Chief Jason Mochal said that children younger than 16 can’t legally drive motorized vehicles that will go that fast. They’re supposed to be limited to 20 miles per hour, he said.

“We’ve had a couple of complaints on this,” said Mochal. Police have received complaints about children driving fast and not obeying stop signs. Police have no way to track down violators, he said. They have to catch violators in the act.

“There’s more and more and more of them all the time,” Mochal said.

The scooters go faster than bicycles, said City Councilman Jake Tornholm. And they are silent, so people can’t hear them coming.

Mochal said police have posted notices on the department’s Facebook page to let parents know what rules their children should be following on their scooters.

“We have been receiving a number of complaints involving E-Bikes,” said one Facebook post. “Some of those complaints are, consuming all lanes of the roadway, not stopping at stop signs, and riding on the sidewalk in the business district. We have attached links to the Williamsburg City Code, and the Iowa Bicycle Coalition, which explains in detail, the Iowa Bicycle Laws. Also attached is the Iowa Low-speed Electric Bicycles Code.”

Children are not required to receive any certification to ride scooters as they are with mopeds, said Mochal.

The city council suggested planning classes with the schools to teach students rules of the road. The council is also looking into creating an ordinance to govern the electric vehicles.

“I would prefer they stay off the sidewalks completely,” said Mochal, but riding on the road can be dangerous too, because the scooters are hard to see and those driving them often don’t follow traffic rules.

Parents need to make sure their children know traffic laws before letting them ride the vehicles, Mochal said.

This is a case of technology getting ahead of rules, said Councilman Tyler Marshall. The city has rules for mopeds, golf carts and ATVs, but electric scooters are “kind of in a regulatory gray zone,” he said.

Scooters are a good way to get from point A to point B, and they are inexpensive, said Marshall, but they go much faster than a 10-speed bike.

“The school might be the best starting point,” said Councilman Jeff Steinkamp.

Tornholm said he doesn’t want to wait until someone gets hurt. The city should be proactive in keeping residents safe.

While he doesn’t like to add a lot of ordinances, Marshall thinks the city needs one in this case. “This is a risk,” he said. Someone is going to wind up with a head injury.

“It’s going to happen,” said Sandersfeld. Scooter riders are already running stop signs.

Councilman Dale Walter said he saw a scooter driver taking a selfie with a cellphone while the scooter was moving.

“I haven’t looked at this and analyzed it much,” said Tindal, but it makes sense to bring city ordinances up to date to include scooters, he said.