{"id":248293,"date":"2026-05-29T23:02:27","date_gmt":"2026-05-29T23:02:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/248293\/"},"modified":"2026-05-29T23:02:27","modified_gmt":"2026-05-29T23:02:27","slug":"mayor-mamdani-must-rein-in-illegal-e-motos-after-queensboro-bridge-tragedy-experts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/248293\/","title":{"rendered":"Mayor Mamdani Must Rein in Illegal E-Motos After Queensboro Bridge Tragedy: Experts"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mayor Mamdani must crack down on illegal stand-up electric scooters and other devices, safe streets watchdogs said on Thursday after a man riding on one of the illicit vehicles collided head-on with a cyclist on the Queensboro Bridge, killing them both<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Francis Delball, 39, was headed west up the bridge\u2019s bike path on an illegal e-scooter with a top speed of 50 miles per hour when he struck cyclist Dmytro Stechenko, 35, as he rode downhill towards Queens. Neither man survived.<\/p>\n

The horrific incident called attention to the city\u2019s failure \u2014 over multiple mayoralties \u2014 to rein in the widespread use of high-speed electric vehicles that are legal to purchase even though they are illegal to ride on city streets.<\/p>\n

But, according to experts, the city is not powerless to stop the vehicles, which many people call \u201ce-bikes\u201d even though they are very different than legal electric bicycles. For starters, the mayor can increase street-level enforcement and rider education, and take steps to ban the sale of illegal e-motos in the five boroughs.<\/p>\n

\t\t\tRecommended<\/p>\n

\t\t
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Step 1: Enforce existing law<\/p>\n

Stand-up electric scooters capable of going over 20 mph and e-bikes capable of going over 25 mph are illegal to ride on New York City streets. Neither vehicle is permitted to exceed 15 mph.<\/p>\n

The most important thing Mayor Mamdani can do today? Direct NYPD to confiscate those illegal vehicles, said Jon Orcutt, a former DOT official and longtime city cycling advocate. (Currently, the NYPD effort has focused on electric mobility devices that have been used in crimes as well as legal mopeds that owners have failed to register.)<\/p>\n

\u201cIf someone is riding an illegal vehicle in one of the city\u2019s most crowded bike paths, it\u2019s a safety issue like we\u2019ve seen today,\u201d Orcutt said. \u201cPut a stop to it.\u201d<\/p>\n

The NYPD declined to say how many illegal e-motos its officers have seized in the past year. Cops already struggle<\/a> to distinguish between e-bikes and a mopeds, let alone between illegal and legal stand-up scooters, but technology exists to help them: European cities with strict laws<\/a> around e-bikes and scooters have turned to devices called dynamometers<\/a>, or \u201cdynos,\u201d to test a vehicle\u2019s max speed.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey take the two wheeler, e-bike or scooter, they put it on the machine and they rev the throttle and the machine tells them. It\u2019s idiot proof,\u201d said Steve Vaccaro, another longtime cycling advocate and attorney based in Manhattan. \u201cInstead of relying on police to figure out what to call them, buy the machines that exist. Invest in the tech.\u201d<\/p>\n

A Reddit<\/a> post shows the technology in action:<\/p>\n

Step 2: Regulate illegal e-moto sales<\/p>\n

Vehicles like the Blade GT II scooter involved in Thursday\u2019s crash are illegal to ride, but they are not illegal to purchase or sell. Mayor Mamdani and the City Council could fix that, according to advocates.<\/p>\n

Theoretically, New Yorkers can purchase these devices for use on a closed course, but any ride over any city bridge reveals that these commuters are not limiting their use of these devices to private roads. Besides, no such closed courses exist in the city.<\/p>\n

But Mamdani can still pass point-of-sale regulations to prevent New York City residents from buying two-wheeled vehicles that don\u2019t meet certain standards. Yes, online sellers can find ways around<\/a> such regulations, but the regs allow governments to enforce against retailers rather than relying on post-facto enforcement after the vehicles are already on the streets.<\/p>\n

Amazon recently agreed to stop selling<\/a> \u201ce-bikes\u201d that exceed state speed limits in California, after the Golden State\u2019s Attorney General Rob Bonta warned companies that the sale of such vehicles violated state law.<\/p>\n

And the scooter in Thursday\u2019s crash is illegal almost everywhere, another expert pointed out.<\/p>\n

\u201cForty-two out of 50 states clearly would not allow this scooter to be operated beyond 25 mph,\u201d said Peter Beadle, another New York City-based bike attorney. \u201cThis scooter should not be able to be delivered to an address in New York City. If you\u2019re looking for something to do, stop that today.\u201d<\/p>\n

Step 3: Take on dangerous marketing<\/p>\n

Teverun, the maker of the Blade GT II, advertises<\/a> the product on its website as \u201cbuilt for sustained high-speed dominance,\u201d \u201cbuilt to match the freeway\u201d and \u201cborn from racing instinct.\u201d The website claims the Blade GT II goes from \u201czero to 53 in 3.9 seconds.\u201d<\/p>\n

Nowhere does the site point to the potential dangers of riding a scooter at top speed, or the prohibitions on these types of scooters around the country. The company \u201cshares some responsibility for this and other crashes we see,\u201d Beadle said in a post on Instagram.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou know you\u2019re building a scooter that goes twice as fast as any jurisdiction allows, you\u2019re allowing it to be sold and shipped \u2026 and you\u2019re taking absolutely no responsibility. In fact, you\u2019re telling people it\u2019s \u2018unstoppable, built to rule the streets, has super speed,’\u201d he told Streetsblog. \u201cIt\u2019s the same toxic messaging used to sell guns and cars. On TV we have rules against cigarette, liquor and gun sales. Why don\u2019t we have more rules that prevent this marketing?<\/p>\n

\u201cThere have been lawsuits, against tobacco, firearms, product liability lawsuits based on the fact that you have false advertising and you\u2019re committing a kind of fraud on the public based on that you\u2019re marketing it in an irresponsible way,\u201d Beadle added.<\/p>\n

Step 4: Educate New Yorkers<\/p>\n

Part of the solution is to educate New Yorkers about what they are buying \u2014 and the fact that they are illegal to use on Big Apple streets.<\/p>\n

\u201cEducation is telling people, \u2018Just because you can buy it and you use it doesn\u2019t mean it\u2019s lawful and that it\u2019s safe and appropriate,’\u201d said Vaccaro. \u201cWe need really clear language to talk about these things so people know it when they see it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Thursday\u2019s crash rattled advocates who spent years fighting for separate bike and pedestrian paths on the Queensboro Bridge. The city finally opened<\/a> a separate pedestrian path last year, but illegal, high-speed vehicles like the Blade GT II<\/a> continue to use the safe infrastructure that advocates fought for.<\/p>\n

A rep for Mayor Mamdani said the mayor is committed to getting high-speed e-motos off city streets.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis terrible tragedy is a grim reminder that illegal, high-speed micro-mobility devices, like the stand-up e-scooter involved in this incident, are dangerous and have no place on our roadways or bike paths,\u201d City Hall spokesman Jeremy Edwards said in a statement. <\/p>\n

\u201cEvery New Yorker deserves to feel safe, and the Mamdani Administration will continue working to remove these illegal devices from our streets and bring accountability to micromobility use.\u201d<\/p>\n

Step 5: Take more space away from cars<\/p>\n

It may seem counter-intuitive to once again call for roadway space to be repurposed from car drivers in the wake of a crash that did not involve any cars, but, in fact, car culture and its carnage is certainly implicated.<\/p>\n

Indeed, illegal scooter operator Francis Delball and racing cyclist Dmytro Stechenko were occupying the same space on the Queensboro Bridge bike path simply because cyclists in both directions are still forced to share a single car-width lane of the span, while drivers in both directions are given eight lanes.<\/p>\n

\u201cEngineering\u201d is one of the three \u201cE\u201ds of Vision Zero, as some people posted on social media yesterday.<\/p>\n

Lots of people talking about the scooter but fewer talking about how narrow that bridge crossing is and how the city has refused to give cyclists a lane on the bridge to help. I personally won’t take the QB regardless of scooters, it’s too scary https:\/\/t.co\/MZYS3jzJFi<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Shane (@shaneferro) May 28, 2026<\/a><\/p>\n

Steven Lucy posted that the Queensboro Bridge bike path is just not built to accommodate the kind of traffic it gets:<\/p>\n

I’m sure the illegal scooter was a factor here but how wide is this path and how many riders does it see per hour?I’m guessing the cramped infrastructure and no separation between opposite-direction traffic was a major contributor here.<\/p>\n

\u2014 Steven Lucy (@slucy.bsky.social)<\/a> 2026-05-28T22:15:31.075Z<\/a><\/p>\n

When challenged, Lucy doubled down: \u201c11 feet wide is not sufficient for a bidirectional path with this much traffic,\u201d he posted.<\/p>\n

Indeed, Lucy was pointing out the elephant in the room of New York City bike lane design: For the most part, they are too narrow.<\/p>\n

\u201cTwo-way bike lanes should be at least 13 feet wide to accommodate all types of bicycles, side-by-side riding, platooning, and passing,\u201d according to the NACTO bike lane design guide, an industry standard<\/a>. \u201cMotor vehicle lanes should be narrowed to support the widest feasible bike lanes.\u201d<\/p>\n

Correction: The original version of this story misstated the legal speed capacities for electric bikes and electric scooters in New York City. The former is limited to 25 mph and the latter is limited to 20 mph. Legal speed capacities are distinct from speed limits. Electric bikes and electric scooters must obey a 15 mph speed limit.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mayor Mamdani must crack down on illegal stand-up electric scooters and other devices, safe streets watchdogs said on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":248294,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[75,84,83,9,24,63],"class_list":["post-248293","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-manhattan","tag-manhattan","tag-manhattan-headlines","tag-manhattan-news","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248293","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=248293"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248293\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/248294"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=248293"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=248293"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=248293"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}