Chelsea Councilor-at-Large Leo Robinson recently got off the bus in Bellingham Square and immediately saw a number of incidents involving scooters and electric bikes, he told the city council at its regular meeting on Monday night.
“The kids with the scooters and the bikes were out of control,” said Robinson. “There were a couple of incidents where people were carrying food out of the stores that they were probably going home to eat, and they got run over by scooters and the food when all the way up in the air that they paid for; there was just so much activity going on and they have no regard for how they travel and where they travel,”
Robinson introduced a successful motion on Monday night asking for a meeting of the public safety committee with the police department to discuss scooter and electric bike safety and regulation enforcement.
“I’ve seen kids who are 10 years old driving motorized scooters with no helmets and having another person riding on the scooter with them,” said Robinson.
Robinson said the city needs to figure out how it can control the issue.
District 5 Councilor Lisa Santagate noted that the Boston Police Department recently undertook a concerted enforcement effort to rein in the motorized scooters and bikes and suggested that Chelsea police look at a similar program.
“I think what this boils down to is a pretty significant safety issue, both for the kids riding these things, and for pedestrians,” said District 1 Councilor Todd Taylor. “This isn’t good for anyone just to have this be the wild west.”
Taylor said the council needs to insist that the city manager directs the police department to take enforcement measures on the issue before someone gets killed.
“We had one person almost get killed by the train tracks this past year and because a truck hit him, it didn’t see him,” said Taylor. “Somebody’s kid is going to get hurt if we don’t do anything. With all due respect, I know we sometimes get yeah-yeah-yeahed by some departments, and I don’t intend to be yeah-yeah-yeahed on this and I will go to the mat to this one with the city manager and the police department because they have to do something with this problem because somebody is going to get hurt or killed.”