Community rallies for action against NYC e-vehicle crisis
UPPER WEST SIDE, Manhattan (PIX11) -- The NYC E-Vehicle Safety Alliance held a town hall meeting Tuesday to address what organizers are calling an e-vehicle and moped crisis unfolding on city streets.
Advocates at the meeting expressed urgent concerns about the number of pedestrians injured and even killed across New York City by e-bikes, e-scooters, and mopeds.
At the town hall on the Upper West Side, the NYC E-Vehicle Safety Alliance stated that 91 of their members had been injured by e-vehicles. Pictures of some of the victims were displayed throughout the room.
Marian Lewis recounted her experience from 2021 when she was struck by an e-bike in Central Park.
“His handlebar caught my puffy winter jacket, threw me into the air about three feet up and I crashed onto my left hip,” she said. “... and I am screaming. Nobody saw him. It was hit and run.”
After being thrown into the air and landing on her side, she said it took months to recover and learn to walk again.
“I got blood clots that nearly killed me from going into my lungs and they had to put something up to my chest, a filter to save those,” she added. “They told my daughter to go home and get my end-of-life papers ’cause I was going to die.”
Lawmakers at the town hall are now pushing for legislation that would regulate e-bikes by requiring them to have license plates and be registered with the DMV.
New York State Assemblymember Jenifer Rajkumar highlighted the problem.
“We all have had the experience of walking on the sidewalk and an e-bike is coming the other way and we almost get hit," said Rajkumar. "So, this is a problem that needs to be solved.”
Rajkumar introduced Priscilla’s Law in the state assembly last year, a bill named after Priscilla Loke, who was tragically killed by an e-bike running a red light in Chinatown last fall. The proposed law seeks to create consequences for dangerous riding that can be monitored by traffic cameras.
“This will make sure that all e-vehicles are held accountable,” Rajkumar continued. “When an e-vehicle crashes into somebody, we’re going to know who the driver is because there’s going to be a license plate. We can identify who it is.”
Despite this push, several transit advocacy groups have opposed the regulation of e-vehicles. Transportation Alternatives has expressed concerns that the measures would create unnecessary burdens on bikers and lead to racial profiling if enforced by police.
Organizers said the town hall meeting was all-encompassing and raised issues related to crimes committed with e-vehicles such as robberies. According to the NYPD, mopeds and e-scooters have been used in more than 400 robberies in the city this year alone.