It's the falling, stupid.

The Washington Post editorial board weighed in on the issue of scooters with an article this week on how to "make e-scooters truly safe" and there are some questionable ideas in it, although I do agree with their opening premise that we should be welcoming them while also asking how to do so safely. Then we start to depart.

First they go to the science.

They cite a recent study that showed that during a recent period, more people came to the hospital with scooter injuries (249) than with bicycle (195) or pedestrian (181) injuries. [21 of those scooter injuries are to pedestrians]. I have no doubt that walking is safer than biking or scootering. But it's difficult to say if riding a scooter is more dangerous than riding a bicycle without knowing the relative exposure of each, or quantifying the severity of the injury. Still, my gut would say that if bikes are safer, it's because a bicycle is more stable and has larger wheels and such - but I have never ridden one and scooters are very new so I would not be surprised to find out my gut is wrong. But since we're asking it, my gut would say that riding a scooter is probably safer than riding a motorcycle - if not in the frequency of injuries, then in the severity of them. So if the point is that scooters are less safe than other similar options, that is probably true, but it is hardly the least safe thing on the road or unreasonable safe. 

Someone counteracting these numbers, a 2nd study they cite notes that scooters reduced car trips and in so doing might have made roads safer. 

Then s--- goes off the rails.

Failure to use a helmet

The culprit behind many visits was predictable: failure to use a helmet. 

It's true that many riders did not wear a helmet, even when it was required by law. And it's true that many injured riders had head injuries. What they fail to establish is that a higher helmet use rate would have reduced head injuries. In fact the data they cite seems to imply that it would not. They state that only 5% of patients with head injuries were documented as wearing helmets (which seems bad) but only 6% (actually 5.7%) of all scooter riders were observed wearing helmets. When the population of helmet wearers closely matches the population of head-injured riders, that seems to indicate that the helmet ain't doing much.

Furthermore only 4.4% of injured riders were wearing a helmet, which to me indicates that either helmets help you avoid breaking your arm, or people who wear helmets are safer riders than those who don't.

Not to pile on, but it's probably worth noting that they called them "documented" helmet wearers, and from experience I can say that the documented number is usually lower than the actual number. To be accurate they should include only those that are specifically documented as wearing a helmet or not, but they usually pile the "unknowns" into the no helmet group which throws the numbers off.

The rate of head injuries for scooter riders (40%) is about twice what it is for cyclists (20%), but that doesn't necessarily mean that they're more prone to head injuries per mile, only that when they get hurt it's more likely a head injury. 

We can't really say that a lack of helmets is the main culprit behind the high injury rate, which is OK because we know what is. The cause of the injuries is that scooter-riders fall. The number one cause of injuries were falls (80%) and then running into things (11%). Maybe we should try to figure out why scooter-riders fall and prevent those, through safer street or scooter design, rather than focusing on making falls more survivable. 

More promising is the proposal that companies attach headgear to their products.

I mean, OK. I wear a helmet when I bike and I figure this can't hurt. But my main problem is not that helmet wearing isn't a good idea; just that this is hardly the thing that needs to go at the top of the list. It's like saying we need to fight skin cancer and the place to start is getting women to wear long pants in the summer. 

Sidewalk riding puts everyone at risk

Then there is sidewalk riding, which puts pedestrians, as well as scooter riders, who often do not heed city restrictions, at risk.

This is stated without any supporting evidence. It is just true I guess.

In the LA study 11 pedestrians were hit by scooter riders. Were they hit on the sidewalk, in crosswalks, on trails or in their living rooms? We don't know. But we do know that about 25% of all riders are on the sidewalk, which means that the risk to pedestrians seems very low. I'm going to bet that in that same time period there were more pedestrians injured by drivers on the sidewalk. 

There’s a technical fix to this problem: Sensors on curbs could stop scooters in their tracks. 

For now, sidewalk scootering is legal outside the CBD, so maybe we should decide if that's going to remain true before we install sensors everywhere. And, I think the easier way to do this is with geo-fencing built into the scooter. And the better way to do it is to build more on-street infrastructure. The Portland studied showed that there were

lower rates of sidewalk riding on low-speed streets or those with dedicated space for non-motorized users. Users ranked bike lanes as their preferred road type, and sidewalks last.

Scooter riders don't even want to be on your stupid sidewalks. They go there because all the other options suck. The editorial board should have written an opinion piece entitled "Let's make our roads not suck."

To their credit, the Post Editorial Board does eventually make the same point about how bike facilities made biking safer and the same could work for scooters, but it seems like a toss-away line rather than what they should lead with. 

But the point is a little moot since the premise hasn't been proven that sidewalk scootering is high risk. If all injuries to pedestrians by scooter-riders were reduced to zero, that would only be a 4% reduction, and again we don't know how many of these are on the sidewalk. It's also possible that this would result in a net gain of injuries as more scooter-riders ride in the road. I mean, they're choosing the sidewalk because they think the street's not safe, and they're probably right. 

If only there were something we could do that would make scooter-riders and pedestrians safer. Oh we could build safer roads, with more space for non-automobile users and we could get drivers to slow down.

Maybe we could put sensors in the street that slow cars down to an appropriate speed.

Comments

[drumz]

"There’s a technical fix to this problem: Sensors on curbs could stop scooters in their tracks. "

If most of the injuries are from falling then putting in sensors that lead to sudden stops seems like it could backfire.

[fongfong]

I've been riding bikes longer than Washy, since I am old, and riding those scooters terrifies me. The physics are just all wrong and if there is a sudden stop or swerve, off comes the standing rider who is pretty darn likely to hit the ground pretty hard if you are going 20 mph. Brakes are just not accessible having to step backwards.

[darren]

Mineta Transportation Institute presented a paper at TRB on scooters, which showed among other things, that when people e-scooted on sidewalks, they did so at lower speeds than scooters on-street.

[Brendan]

1. 50,000 traumatic brain injuries per year for car passengers. 2. Helmets would obviously reduce that number. 3. Everyone should wear a helmet while riding in an automobile.

Anyone?

[crickets]

So no, I guess.