The e-scooter moral panic
There are a lot of headlines about how dangerous escooters are, but is the danger being exaggerated?
Kids are getting injured, let’s ban safe vehicles
by Matt Stickland
A moral panic is spreading in this province, swerving around the blind and the elderly leaving nothing but carnage strewn all over city sidewalks in its wake.
In response to this growing threat of children having a relatively safe mode of travel that grants them independence while saving parents from being a chauffer for their pre-teens, the provincial government has decided to ban e-scooters this fall when the new Traffic Safety Act is expected to be proclaimed.
Powered scooters have been around for 111 years with the first powered scooter the “Autoped” ripping around New York with an air cooled four stroke 155cc engine in 1915.
But the e-scooters that are familiar to us today are battery powered things that first started gaining popularity with the Xiaomi M365.
First invented in 2016, the M365 scooter rose to prominence in 2018 when they were painted bright colours and rented out by companies like Lime and Bird and left all over the sidewalks of Los Angeles and Miami.
There was a relative quiet on the scooter front after the 2018 L.A. and Miami scooter conflict, but ever since 2023 this mode of travel has had a resurgence in popularity because they are small and easy to store, cheap to buy and operate, they reduce congestion, are a far more efficient and reliable mode of transportation than the automobile, and most importantly: They’re fun.
Everyone looks like a bit of a wanker riding one, but it can’t be denied that they are very fun.
