{"id":279746,"date":"2026-09-05T14:38:08","date_gmt":"2026-09-05T14:38:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/279746\/"},"modified":"2026-09-05T14:38:08","modified_gmt":"2026-09-05T14:38:08","slug":"lawmakers-wrestle-with-the-proliferation-of-e-scooters-on-pennsylvania-roadways","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/279746\/","title":{"rendered":"Lawmakers wrestle with the proliferation of e-scooters on Pennsylvania roadways"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Whitney Downard, Pennsylvania Capital-Star<\/a>
September 1, 2026<\/p>\n

This story was updated on Sept. 2 at 1:55 p.m. to update the spelling of Scott Bohn\u2019s name.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Advances in battery technology and other innovations have made small, lightweight e-scooters designed to travel short distances cheaper \u2014 and faster \u2014 than ever, but Pennsylvania\u2019s legal code and safety regulations haven\u2019t kept up.<\/p>\n

The increasingly popular devices aren\u2019t legal to operate on public streets in the commonwealth, and critics say car and truck drivers may be unprepared to share the road with their smaller counterparts.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s like the wild west out there,\u201d Scott Slingerland, the executive director of the Coalition for Appropriate Transportation, told state legislators in the Lehigh Valley on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

Some lawmakers have proposed limiting who can drive e-scooters and where they can ride, similar to laws passed in over two dozen other states. Sen. Tim Kearney (D-Delaware) said thousands of people used e-scooters or similar vehicles across the commonwealth, but educating riders \u2014 especially minors \u2014 about safety considerations isn\u2019t typical.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can buy them online or in-store with ease \u2026 Retailers market e-scooters as a kid\u2019s toy \u2014 Walmart even lets you filter for teen, tween, child and even toddler e-escooters,\u201d Kearney said. \u201cThe reality is that e-escooters are not going away, and we cannot put the proverbial toothpaste back in the tube.\u201d<\/p>\n

Stakeholders agree that the vehicles should meet some minimum standards for braking, lights, reflectors and a \u201csound signal,\u201d as described by Henry Beaver, who assists with multimodal transportation planning at the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation.<\/p>\n

Beaver added that operational requirements are critical for the safety of all road users, such as maximum legal speed limits, minimum ages to drive and where low-speed e-scooters can operate.<\/p>\n

\u201cSuch as within bike lanes, but not between lanes of traffic or on roads with posted speed limits above a certain threshold,\u201d continued Beaver.<\/p>\n

But while Beaver said e-scooters should not be considered motor vehicles, thus making them exempt from state registration, titling and inspection, some law enforcement officials urged lawmakers to reconsider.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur association believes the clearest and most enforceable statewide standard remains a prohibition on electric scooters on public roadways. But if the General Assembly determines that prohibition is not an option, Pennsylvania should not settle for partial regulation,\u201d said Scott Bohn, the executive director of the Pennsylvania Chiefs of Police Association.<\/p>\n

Registration should be a statewide requirement if the commonwealth legalizes e-scooters, Bohn said, alongside a requirement for driver education or safety training before use.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe measure of any micromobility law should be straightforward: does it reduce the risk for riders, motorists, pedestrians and police while giving officers a law they can realistically enforce? If Pennsylvania cannot answer that question with confidence, the commonwealth should choose \u2026 prohibition,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

The importance of education<\/p>\n

Others who spoke to lawmakers emphasized the utility of micromobility options like e-scooters. Whether going to school, a job or the doctor\u2019s office, e-scooters, e-bikes or other vehicles can be more affordable and healthy for users.<\/p>\n

Ngani Ndimbie, the director of programs for Mobilify Southwestern Pennsylvania, shared examples of people she\u2019d met in communities across the state who used e-scooters or e-bikes, including an older man who didn\u2019t have the strength for long walks, a young man in a suit commuting for work and a family utilizing a city trail.<\/p>\n

\u201cSome of the benefits of these types of trips are increased mobility for the (older man) and the employer of the (young man) doesn\u2019t need to provide an additional parking space,\u201d said Ndimbie.<\/p>\n

Ndimbie noted challenges for police enforcing separate laws for e-bikes or e-motorcycles, which can look very similar but have vastly different capabilities.<\/p>\n

These similarities \u201cpresent difficulty for our officers in identifying what they\u2019re really looking at. We don\u2019t have a fast and accurate way,\u201d said Allentown Police Chief Charles Roca. \u201cIt might be a feeling, but we don\u2019t have a\u00a0 weight on it. We can\u2019t predict how fast it\u2019s going.\u201d<\/p>\n

Municipal governments are restricted from using radar to measure vehicle speed in Pennsylvania.<\/p>\n

Other states have mandated brightly colored tags to distinguish between types, Ndimbie added.<\/p>\n

Car dealerships are obligated to sell road-safe vehicles, but when it comes to the vast variety of micromobility options, Ndimbie said, \u201cit is so easy to go online and buy something that is so far from safe and is so far from legal.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOne solution is education, making sure that residents understand what the product specifications are for what they\u2019re trying to buy. This, I want to note, is I think a huge part of the problem \u2026 It\u2019s really easy to buy something overpowered,\u201d Ndimbie said.<\/p>\n

Slingerland, with the Coalition for Appropriate Transportation, noted that PennDOT\u2019s driver\u2019s manual had a section on sharing the road safely with all users, including pedestrians and cyclists.<\/p>\n

But \u201cthe challenges we see on the street are often not from new drivers,\u201d he continued. \u201cAs a bicyclist, personally, a lot of the animosity would come from older (drivers) \u2026 and that comes from confusion about understanding a bicyclist\u2019s place on the road or pedestrian yield laws.\u201d<\/p>\n

He noted that Pennsylvania requires continuing education for many professions, including engineers like himself, lawyers, doctors and cosmetologists. The same could be done for drivers renewing their licenses, he continued.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf there was something that were not very onerous, like watching a five-minute video from PennDOT when you renew online or at the driver\u2019s license center, we could introduce high-priority safety topics like work zones, emergency vehicle yield laws, aggressive driving and things on vulnerable road users,\u201d Slingerland said.<\/p>\n

Kearney\u2019s proposal<\/p>\n

Kearney\u2019s proposal, Senate Bill 1008<\/a>, wouldn\u2019t allow those under 16 to drive, and minors must wear helmets. Additionally, e-scooters would have a maximum speed of 20 mph, similar to the state limit on electric bikes, and could only carry one person at a time.<\/p>\n

The legislation is named \u201cAbby\u2019s Law\u201d after Abby Gillon, a 12-year-old who died when she was struck by a car while riding an e-scooter with a friend in Delaware County. Neither girl was wearing a helmet, and testifiers emphasized that helmet use is \u201cvery, very low\u201d for e-scooter users.<\/p>\n

When he first publicized the bill, Kearney said some of the earliest responses came \u201cfrom people in their 30s and 40s who were using them for last-mile transportation.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThey don\u2019t want to drive the mile to go to the train station and then pay to park it,\u201d said Kearney. \u201cThey could pop over on their e-scooters and just fold it up and carry it with them. Or lock it (up). It\u2019s a benefit we want to keep. We want to make sure it works that way.\u201d<\/p>\n

In response to Bonn\u2019s suggestion about mass registration, Kearney said others pushed back because it would be a \u201cbureaucratic nightmare\u201d when similar vehicles such as bicycles aren\u2019t registered. Additionally, e-scooters and e-bikes don\u2019t come with individualized identifiers \u2014 such as a car\u2019s VIN \u2014 which would complicate proposals to register the vehicles.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not sure what the (line) is, but as the power grows stronger and the speed grows faster \u2026 then the need for registration becomes much more important,\u201d said Kearney. \u201cWe feel like we need to make a step very soon to try to provide that kind of clarity across the commonwealth.\u201d<\/p>\n

He emphasized that he was open to discussions. His bill, which has bipartisan support, hasn\u2019t yet had a committee hearing.<\/p>\n

\u201cClearly the legislature has lots of work to go to put us in a better track here. I\u2019m eager to get our legislation moving instead of languishing in committee,\u201d Kearney continued, urging municipality leaders, families and stakeholders to pressure lawmakers on both sides of the aisle \u201cto stop stalling and take action.\u201d<\/p>\n

]]><\/p>\n

Pennsylvania Capital-Star<\/a> is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Pennsylvania Capital-Star maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Tim Lambert for questions: info@penncapital-star.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Whitney Downard, Pennsylvania Capital-StarSeptember 1, 2026 This story was updated on Sept. 2 at 1:55 p.m. to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":279747,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[28,30,29],"class_list":["post-279746","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pennsylvania","tag-pennsylvania","tag-pennsylvania-headlines","tag-pennsylvania-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279746","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=279746"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279746\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/279747"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=279746"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=279746"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=279746"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}