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Hot Wheels

Fatal e-bike crashes trigger alarm and push lawmakers to act

By: Patrica Mendoza
Asbury Park Press
USA Today Network

..... The e-bike crashes began to pile up.
..... Reports made news more frequently, as when Joseph Slover,a 54-year-old man from Whiting,[NJ] fell off his bike in 2024 was fatally struck by two cars traveling in the same direction.
..... Then this pass summer [2025] e-bike crashes, some fatal, peppered news across New Jersey.
..... In September, [2025] a 22-eyar-old from Orange [NJ] was hit and killed by a van after crossing into opposing traffic.
..... In August, [2025] a 13-eyar-old on an e-bike in Westfield [NJ] suffered a serious head injury after crashing.
..... In July, [2025] a 14-year-old was killed in Somes Point [NJ] while riding an e-bike and colliding with a car.
..... The same month, a 15-eyar-old riding an e-bike in Montvale [NJ] had to be taken to Hackensack University Medical Center after laming their e-bike into a car.
..... The latest tragedy shocked the community of Scotch Plains in Union county [NJ] in September. [2025] A 13-year-old boy was pronounced dead after colliding with a landscaping truck.
..... All involved riders on e-bikes, seemingly ubiquitous vehicles that have multiplied exponentially overnight on our roads. sidewalks, and even our Jersey Shore boardwalks. and some are being altered to ramp up their maximum speeds to highway standards.
..... Stqat4e and federal lawmakers have taken notice. As did writer Rick Reilly in the Washington Post in October. [2025] The author of "So Help Me Golf" and other books chronicled his near-death experience at the hands of a raclc8itrant e-bike rider.
..... A 2023 study showed that young people are the largest group involved in e-bike accidents, particularly those between ages of 10 and 13 - with children suing helmets less than other age groups and being hospitalized more.
..... The popularity of 'micro-mobility' transportation, including bikes, e-bikes, electric scooters and skate boards, has exploded over the past few years, with approximately 1.7 million e-bikes sold in the U.S. in 2024. that surge is up from between 500,000 and 1 million just four years earlier, according to multiple sources.
..... "We've all seen kids zipping around town on their electric bikes," said New Jersey Representative Josh Gottheimer at a news conference on the dangers of e-bikes. "I used to actually pedal my bike, around the neighborhood as a kid, and I still do, but I guess that's very 20th entry of me. E-bikes are everywhere,, it;s a fast-growing trend."
..... Gottheimer shared studies, including one that showed e-bike injuries across the country surged 293% from 2019 to 2022.
..... A U.S. Consumer Product Safety commission study found that between 2017 and 2022, hospital reported more than 3,000 e-bake-related injuries, the congressman said.
..... He is not along in his quest to tamp down the unlawful and reckless sue of these technologically advanced bikes.
..... Why just because it has an electric motor are we treating things differently?" asked Manasquan [NJ] Mayor Mike Mangan, whose own car got hit by an e-biker in a parking lot.
..... For Mangan, the responsibility for ensuring safety for drivers and pedestrians doesn't fall solely on the riders, but also the manufactures. He pushed for age restrictions for those operating these vehicles, arguing that they have always existed for other motor vehicles.
..... In September, a Masquan [NJ] minor whose age was not released, was changed with multiple traffic violations on an e-bike in not only Manasquan [NJ] (where he lives), but also in Bay Head and Soring Lake. [NJ] In addition to recklessly driving the bike, the teen also attempted to prevent police form pulling over a car.
..... The minor was sentenced to a mandatory driver safety course, two years of probation and a one-year loss of driver's license when of legal age.
..... It was later revealed by the Manasquan Police Department that the teen had the bike's engine altered to reach speeds of up to 8- mph, quadruple the legal limit.
..... "The reality is that the state needs to go after manufacturers to make suer that these bikes are limited to a certain speed," said Mangan. "The police are ahivng a tremendously difficult time trying to figure out how fast any individual bike is capable of going, and therefore the things that can happen as a result.
..... While he applauds the state's effort for greater education on operating e-bikes, Mangan emphasized the need for striker manufacturer regulations that clearly distinguish what bikes are legal and what bikes are illegal, starring the key difference between a regular bike and an e-bike is the way an e-bike can be maneuvered and altered to be more dangerous.

What New Jersey lawmakers are planning

..... New Jersey Senate President Nicholas Scutari, D-Union, offered a legislative initiative to tighten New Jersey's e-bike regulations.
..... If passed, Scutari's bill would prohibit minors under 17 from operating any electric vehicle that can exceed 18 mph and is not classified as a Class I, low-speed vehicle. It would also reclassify e-bikes depending on their speed, and require the state Motor Vehicle Commission to cerate an electric bicycle legislation and sticker system.
..... State Senator Vine Polistina, Assemblywoman Claire Swift and Assemblyman Don Guardian, Republicans for the 2nd legislative district, also called for legislation further monitoring the use of e-bikes after the 14-year-old from Somer Point [NJ] was fatally struck by a car in July. [2025]
..... Polistina and Scutari are pushing for more education for riders.
..... "More training and regulation. If we can educate people, we think that'll go a long way," Polistina said.
..... Polistina's legislation proposes a certificate system that would be required for anyone operating an e-bike, similar to those required for motorized boats
..... Ken Seigler, owner of E-bike King NJ in Asbury Park, [NJ] has been selling e-vehicles since 2001, and electric skateboards going back to the 1980s. He's concerned that the rule-makers are bit informed enough of the reality if the e-bike landscape.
..... "We're having issues with people tat don't know what they've talking about making rules and regulations. that's like me going to a tropic and making laws on something that I have no idea what it really is about," he said. "the only thing we've worried about is that they're trying to make us register and insure them (e-bikes) - that's good if they're doing it to make safety issues, but if they're doing it to ban money, just to make revenue, that's not cool."

Scotch Plains [NJ] mayor says it's 'moral obligation'

..... In response to these recent tragedies, including the one in his won town, Scotch Plains [NJ' deputy Mayor Matthew S Adams told the Asbury Park Press it's time for some action.
..... "It's a moral obligation for both officials and lawmakers to ensure that our laws, rules, and societal guardrails must be constantly revisited, reevaluated, and re-examined to ensure that technological advancements have not outpaced our regulatory structures."
..... Adams suggests that education on the advancements of e-vehicles at a stat4e level is important, commending Scutari's efforts to tighten New Jersey's e-bike regulations.
..... In Asbury Park, [NJ] where the music and food scene draw many people permitting e-vehicles like electric scooters, Mayor John Moor said the age restitutions are nearly impossible to enforce.
..... The town partners with Veo, a micro-mobility service that also has contracts in Newark and Rutgers University in New Brunswick. Asbury's local ordinance states that one must by 18 to operate an electric scooter, but people find ways around this.
..... "Somehow people are beating the system left and right," said Moor, citing an example of minors having access to credit cards that enable them to purchase time on an e-bike.
..... For Asbury Park's [NJ] transportation director James Bonanno, the collisions in his town warrant tougher regulations.
..... "The true solution to e-bike safety lies in the education of the public, the engineering of safer, more inclusive roads and enforcement," Boanonno said. None of the e-vehicle accidents in his town have been fatal, he said.
..... While he understands government's desire to register vehicles to promote safety, Bonanno advises caution for such actions, as electric vehicles are a toll to shorten the gaps in New Jersey's urban sprawl and uplift the communities by providing greater access to services.
..... "Requiring registration of these lower speed vehicles (specifically Class 1 and 2 e-bikes) many cerate an administrative hurdle that hurts our lower income residents," said Bonnano.
..... Seigler of E-bike King also has some perspective on who is riding some of the vehicles.
..... "A lot of people sue these because they don't have a car. I have people 72 and 82 years old still riding e-bikes, because they don't have a car and ride them through winter. if they crack down on these people, they;re going to put a lot of people out of their transportation," he said. "That's the away they keep their household running. Even people use them to go to work. We got people all the time. it's like, can I get it done today? Because this is what I used to go to work."

What are the rules?
Depends on the class of e-bike

..... In New Jersey, the low-speed electric bicycle is categorized into two classes, Calls 1 or 'Pedal Assist' or Class 2 e-bikes or "throttle' bikes solely depend on a motor.
..... With this legislation, both class 1 and 2 electric bikes in New Jersey are vehicle with two or three wheels and fully operable pedals that can achieve a maximum speed of 20 mph and be 750 watts or less.
..... These bikes can be parked on sidewalks without blocking pedestrian traffic and don't require a license, registration or insurance. operators must still abide by traffic laws and helmets are required for those under 17. there is no age minimum for Class 1 and 2 vehicles.
..... Under state law, [NJ] motorized bikes such as mopeds are considered Class 3 and follow stricter regulations, such as prohibition form prating on public and interstate highways divided by a grass or concrete median, as well as highways with speed limits over 50 mph.
..... These vehicles have a gas or electric power source and have a maximum speed between 20 and 28 mph.
..... A license and registration is required for motorized bikes, as will as helmet sue at all times. Operators of these vehicles must be at least 15.
..... The updated title 39 legislation also outlined what defines the low-speed electric scooter as "a scooter with a floorboard that can be stood upon by the operator, with handlebars, and an electric motor that is capable of propelling the device with or without human propulsion," according to njbikeped.org .
..... Low-speed electric scooters must follow the same rules as traditional bicycles and can achieve a statewide minimum speed of 19 mph. Like e-bikes, e-scooters can be parked on sidewalks as long as they don't obstruct the flow of pedestrian traffic. Like Class 1 and 2 e-bikes, there is no minimum age requirement for operation e-scooters.
..... Under New Jersey law, motorized scooters include but are not limited to pocket bikes, super pocket bikes, scooter, mini-scooters, sport scooters, mini choppers, mini motorcycles and motorized skateboards.
..... These vehicles have motors that are "not in compliance with Federal Motor
Vehicle Safety Standards and which have no permanent Federal Safety Certification sticker affixed to the vehicle by the original manufacture," according to njbikeped.org .
..... Statewide, motorized scooters are prohibited on public streets, highways and sidewalks. though they are generally not street-legal, exceptions for operators with mobility-related disabilities are sometimes allowed. The maximum speed allowed on these devices is 15 mph, with a minimum age requirement of 12.
..... And when it comes to selling e-bikes that minors will be suing, Seigler has no problem dropping the hammer on those who are abusing the intention of the vehicles.
..... "We tell their parents, oh, OK, we rat everybody out. We rat the kids out. When they're dong wheelies, like, they tell their parents, 'no Dad, I don't really blah blah,' but there's evidence all over the bike."

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