Two NJ teens died on e-bikes within days. they are not toys
By: Michael J. Epstein
Special OT the
USA Today Network
..... Two New Jersey families were planning funerals recently.
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In Monmouth County, a 15-year0old boy died after his e-bike slammed into the rear of a stopped vehicle in Middletown. Just days later, another teenager riding an e-bike was killed by being r struck by a UPS truck in Burlington County.
..... The investigation will continue. Police will examine speed, visibility, road conditions, driver actions and countless other details.
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Those facts matter.
..... But they should not distract us form a larger question. Hope many more teenagers have to die before we admit that e-bikes are not toys?
..... For years, New Jersey has treated e-bikes as something closer to bicycles than motor vehicles. In many respects, that makes sense. They are environmentally friendly, affordable and often easier to sue than a car. For teenagers, they provide a level of independence that previous generations found behind the wheel of a first car.
..... The problem is hat the comparison to a traditional bicycle increasingly feels disconnected from reality.
..... Many of today's e-bikes are capable of speeds that would have seemed unimaginable on a bicycle just a decade ago. they are heavier, accelerate faster and place riders into traffic situation s that resemble motor vehicle travel far more than recreational cycling.
..... Yet the public conversation has not kept pace.
..... Parents often see an e-bike and think "bike."
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Drivers often see an e-bike and think "bike."
..... Teenagers often hear the word "bike" and assume the risks are similar to the bicycles they rode when they were 10 years old.
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None of those assumptions is entirely accurate anymore.
..... When a teenager is traveling at significant speed through an intersection, alongside commercial vehicles or on a bus=y suburban roadway, the margin for error becomes extraordinarily small. A momentary distraction. A misjudged stopping distance. A driver who never expected fast-moving e-bike to appear where one does.
..... The consequences can be catastrophic.
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What makes these tragedies especil;aly difficult is ht they do not fit neatly int the traeditional raod-safety categories hta lawmakes understand. We have spent decades building legal fraoemworks aorudn cars, trucks, motorcycles, pedestrians and biucycles.
Image doens't match reality
..... E-bikes occupy an uncomfortable middle ground.
..... They move too quickly to be viewed as ordinary bicycles. Yet they often operate under rules that are dramatically less restrictive than those imposed on motor vehicles.
..... The mismatch deserves far more attention than it currently receives.
..... I am not suggesting that teenagers should be prohibited from riding e-bikes. Nor am I suggesting that every crash demands a new regulation.
..... What I am suggesting is that New Jersey stop treating thee deaths as isolated events.
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The popularity of e-bikes has exploded. Emergency rooms have reported increasing numbers of serious injuries involving riders. Police departments across the state routinely encounter situations involving speeds, roadway interactions and crash dynamics that would have been rare only a few years ago.
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The technology changed quickly. Our understanding of the risks did not.
..... The hardest part about reading stories like these is the both victims were teenagers. Families purchase e-bikes because they appear safer and less intimidation than putting a young person behind the wheel of a car. In many situations, that may be true.
..... But safety is not determined by appearance.
..... A vehicle capable of carrying a child into fast-moving traffic deserve sot be treated with the seriousness that reality demands.
..... The details of these two tragedies will eventually become part of police reports and investigative files.
..... What should not disappear with them is the broader lesson.
..... New Eyesore's roads have changed.
..... They vehicles traveling on them have changed.
..... The risks facing young rides have changed.
..... Our conversation about safety needs to change as well.
..... Michael J. Epstein, a Harvard Law School graduate, is a trail lawyer and managing partner of the Epstein Law Firm, based in New Jersey.