It has been said that all politics is local. Whatever of that, the more local that politics is, the more engaging it is. In recent weeks electric scooters have wheeled on to the front pages. The Lord Mayor of Melbourne, facing re-election, ended a trial period and banned them from the city streets. In response two mayors in surrounding local Councils dressed in capes scooting down the street proudly declaring their territory open to scooters. The Victorian Premier politely disagreed with the Melbourne mayor, a team standing for the coming Melbourne Council Election promised to tear up the city bike paths, and residents in other States aired their own grievance with the excess or lack of local regulation.
In commenting on this no doubt tangential issue, I must declare an interest. I regularly cycle very slowly along the bike paths, streets and sometimes footpaths of Melbourne and its environs. In the last few years, I have shared the road with electrical bikes and scooters, occasionally curmudgeonly but most times not, allowing travellers to pass all on steeds of any kind. In the case of young people delivering food on electric bikes, cheerfully so – they give life to the city. And scooters give a little class – standing tall instead of hunched and dressed to the nines, moving ceremoniously like gondolas on speed.
The public conversation about scooters may be of wider interest because it echoes the ways other more important issues are treated. These include the treatment of refugees, of young people who misbehave, of people who express opinions critical of abortion or of Israel’s conduct on the war in Gaza. In these issues there are many things to consider and many different groups with interests in them. Each discussion is also ultimately about values. Some of these values are large, such as concern for the environment. Others are more specific. Each can be framed as an attack on bad behaviour that needs to be stamped out.
The resolution of these complex issues, however, demands that we recognise the different values involved and negotiate them in a way that curbs bad behaviour and respects the claims of others. In practice, however, current conversation often polarises the people concerned, focuses selectively on bad behaviour, disregards evidence about its extent and causes, and sets out to destroy the values and the voice of other participants.
In the case of electrical bikes and scooters there Is no lack of bad behaviour. Most cyclists can tell stories of riders who manage to be inconsiderate, lawbreaking, lairising, risk taking and abusive in the same ride, as they speed down the middle of the road, run redlights, are helmetless and almost wipe out pedestrian and other cyclists as they charge off along the footpath.
Such behaviour is typical of few riders of electric bikes and scooters. The bad reputation for it attaches to them, however, as it has always attached to new forms of travel. Those exploring it have always been accused of having badly or unnaturally. The people of Judah were advised to ‘ride horses no more’. Early cyclists on their ‘ordinarys’ were accused of being show-offs, women who cycled of being unnatural, and flappers who drove early cars of scaring cattle and terrifying children. Young men on motorbikes have always had the reputation of being lawless.
To make policy on the basis of anecdote and popular impressions of lawlessness, or on the assertion of one value to the suppression of others, however, is a mistake. Policy about riding should first of all reflect a vision of what we want the city and society to value. Today in the light of our certain knowledge of the effects of global warming, the policy that must include the goal of becoming carbon neutral. That demands discouraging private petrol-fuelled cars and trucks in the city, encouraging carbon-neutral and efficient form of public transport, and making the city a healthy and encouraging place for walking, cycling and other carbon-neutral forms of transport.
'The costs of a balanced policy that safeguards the community should fall largely on those who profit from the technology. If scooters are rented, the renting companies should be held responsible for technology that will prevent riders and cyclists from exceeding the speed limit and will also ensure that the companies or their customers are financially responsible for their safe parking and removal.'
In order to achieve these goals, transport policy demands regulation that separates the various forms of transport and so ensures that all parties flourish. Footpaths should be kept free and inviting for pedestrians, and also uncluttered by abandoned bikes or scooters. This would require the designation of safe places to leave scooters. Special lanes separated from motor traffic should be reserved for bicycles, both electric and pedal powered, and scooters. The speed and power of electric bicycles and scooters should also be limited to match that of pedal powered cycles. Helmets, which limit the medical costs imposed on the community by accidents as well as protecting the cyclist, should also be compulsory
The costs of a balanced policy that safeguards the community should fall largely on those who profit from the technology. If scooters are rented, the renting companies should be held responsible for technology that will prevent riders and cyclists from exceeding the speed limit and will also ensure that the companies or their customers are financially responsible for their safe parking and removal.
The regulations in Australian States, generally reflect earlier provisions in Europe and are tacked on to regulations for bicycles and motorbikes. They lack any overarching consideration of the place of transport in an emissions-free world. In general, they discourage the use of electric scooters except in areas chosen for trial of their use, and limit their use to scooters hired from approved companies. Except in Tasmania and Western Australia privately owned scooters can be used only on private property. The rules for scooters and electric bikes generally echo those applying to bicycles, requiring lights, bells, helmets and observance of road rules including exclusion from riding on the footpath. They are mostly limited to streets with low-speed limits and to dedicated bike lanes. In order to protect cyclists, they are speed and power limited.
This regulatory framework for electric scooters lacks imagination but should settle into the reasonably lax but effective provision for bicycles. Walkers, riders, scooters and petrolheads will grumble at restrictions and both will from time to time act provocatively, but for the most part they will get on without enlisting in a culture war.
Andrew Hamilton is consulting editor of Eureka Street, and writer at Jesuit Social Services.