|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
Student bike safety has been a topic of ongoing conversation among local schools in San Mateo County, but the rise in popularity of a new type of bike has reshaped the debate.
Electric bicycles, or e-bikes, are capable of moving as fast as 28 mph. School leaders are worried about the car-like speeds that students now travel. School administrators, local law enforcement and the San Mateo County Office of Education are all working on regulating, educating and guiding the community toward safer e-bike practices.
“The rapid rise in student e-bike use has created new challenges and schools were not fully prepared for this surge. Students need proper training to ride safely, and parents play a key role in making sure their children are ready,” said Safe Routes to School Coordinator Theresa Vallez-Kelly. “We wouldn’t put a young person in a car and simply tell them to drive. They are trained first.
“The same approach needs to apply to kids and e-bikes,” she said.
Recently, a 16-year-old Menlo-Atherton High School student was hospitalized after colliding with a car while riding an e-bike. In June, a Stanford University undergraduate student riding an e-bike, died after being struck by a vehicle.
Apart from e-bikes, general bike safety in cities such as Menlo Park continues to be a concern. In 2022, there were 22 reported bike crashes resulting in injury or death, and nine were among children under the age of 15, according to the California Office of Traffic Safety.
As e-bike popularity skyrockets, so have injury and accident rates. A 2024 University of California, San Francisco, study found that e-bike “injuries dramatically increased from 751 in 2017 to 23,493 in 2022.” Researchers also noticed that the risky behavior and lack of helmets was common among electric scooter and bike users.
Local jurisdictions are currently considering ways to regulate the use of certain e-bike models that are not legal in California. E-bikes are classified in three categories, differing in maximum speed and pedal or throttle assisted functions.
Class 1 bikes are low-speed pedal-assisted e-bikes that are not capable of traveling over 20 mph. Class 2 are pedal or throttle-assisted bikes that can travel up to 20 mph without pedaling. Class 3 bikes are restricted to ages 16 and older, equipped with a speedometer and can travel up to 28 mph.
In July, the Woodside Town Council held a study session to evaluate community concerns about e-bike ridership by teens and children. Council member Jenn Wall stated during this meeting that she frequently observes kids in town riding throttle-assisted e-bikes with no pedals, which are illegal to ride on California roads.
Capt. Frank Dal Porto with the San Mateo County Sheriff’s Office said during that meeting that the biggest issues are the lack of education and awareness in parents purchasing the bikes and the delayed update in laws that help regulate e-bikes.
The Atherton Police Department has also conducted checks at school campuses, looking for e-bike models with additional legal requirements and ensuring that students are following traffic laws, according to the M-A Chronicle.
Local school districts are also doing their part in promoting awareness of basic bike and e-bike safety through workshops in collaboration with police and Safe Routes to Schools.
Menlo Park City School District has hundreds of students biking to school on busy roads such as Santa Cruz Avenue and Middlefield Road. Its Safe Routes to School Superintendent Advisory Committee frequently hosts bike rodeos for younger students and offers regular safety training for middle schoolers.
For e-bikes, MPCSD has provided parents with information on online e-bike safety classes through PedalAce, “urging parents to learn more about e-bikes, including the different types and age recommendations for use,” said MPCSD spokesperson Parke Treadway.
“Technology has outpaced the law when it comes to student safety and e-bikes, and we are now in a place where it feels like education is not enough,” said Menlo Park Superintendent Kristen Gracia in a written statement.
According to the district, e-bike will be a topic of discussion at an upcoming school board meeting at 6 p.m. on Oct. 9 at the board office, 181 Encinal Ave., Atherton.
The San Mateo County Office of Education has also created an online e-bike toolkit to provide schools with educational materials, resources and guidance on laws to help educational leaders increase awareness among students and parents.
Guest Opinion: Has the Sequoia Union High School District Board of Trustees lost its way?February 1, 2026 1:50 pm
Should also be noted, ebike/moped technology has outpaced the car centric infrastructure that the city and county continue to drag their heels on when it comes to student and community safety.
I respectfully disagree that the problem is education. It’s true that few people know, exactly, what the limits class 1,2,3 ebikes are and where they are allowed to ride. The article doesn’t do a great job of explaining either. But parents mostly know these bikes are illegal.
The problem will be solved by enforcement, should we have the guts.
We have a large number of moving violation laws which are simply not enforced.
The number of laws broken – by a child – by riding a “class 3+” ebike (one that can be put into a better-than-3 mode, even if not in that mode), is staggering. It’s a motorcycle without a VIN, it’s unregistered, it doesn’t have proper safety equipment, it’s driven without a license, by someone underage, it’s driven without a DOT motorcycle helmet, it’s driven without insurance. That’s assuming no other laws (eg speeding, stop signs, riding on a sidewalk, riding in a bike lane) are broken.
None of these are “crimes”, just infractions. They don’t ruin a kids life, but the fines are steep.
Did I mention that if you’re a parent, you might be up with “contributing to the delinquency of a minor” if you knew the bike was against the law, and told the kid to do it anyway? That’s an actual crime.
Simply getting the 3+ bikes off the road, and the 3 bikes out of the hands of kids, as the law states, would likely help our accident rates.
Enforcing these laws is a lot to put on a kid, tho! No one wants to be the bad guy. How about warnings? Atherton cops handed out warnings, and there was outcry. Warnings – while knowing what bike models are legal and illegal – is probably the right answer.
But without enforcement, we have people driving with covered license plates, people driving with tinted windows, people driving with placards obstructing their view, people with earbuds in, people holding their cell phones, people driving with expired registrations. All of which you see constantly. Because…. police are too expensive?
A little enforcement goes a long way. You won’t have to catch everyone, just enough to make a point.
This story seems to have a buried lede.
“A 2024 University of California, San Francisco, study found that e-bike ‘injuries dramatically increased from 751 in 2017 to 23,493 on 2022.”
That incredible statistic, if verified by a second source, should be in the first or second graf along with the possibly relevant calculation that this trend reveals an increase of 3,028 percentage points. Exclamation point!
It’s not that incredible since e-bikes for children basically did not exist in 2017.
The statistic however does reflect that our esteemed city council members are clearly not prepared for this. Experts, professionals, parents, residents, even lawmakers have been telling local politicians for the last 10-20 years now that this wave is coming and they need to prepare with better bicycle infrastructure.
That number shows us they have not listened.
“That number shows us they have not listened.”
That number shows nothing of the kind. What it shows is that parents are putting their unprepared kids on what amounts to a motorcycle. That statistic is not for regular bike injuries it is for ebike injuries. Until we recently became flooded with ebikes the accident and injury rates for regular bicycles was much lower. With the same “inadequate” bike infrastructure. What changed? Ebikes. And parents willing to put their children on them with inadequate training, inadequate safety equipment and inadequate parental oversight. Take the kids off the ebikes and put them back on regular bikes and you will see the injury rates go back down.
The police departments need to focus on enforcement of the law in regards to ebikes. I see many children riding what are clearly type 3 ebikes. These are capable of exceeding 30 mph. With a little modification easily found on the internet they can go even faster. One has to be 16 to ride them and the kids I see on them routinely are well under 16. The police need to stop and cite them. Yes, the outcry from parents will be loud. Too bad. The alternative is the outcry from those same parents when their child is injured or killed due to their own negligence. And the lawsuits they will file blaming the city for not providing the proper “infrastructure” for their children to break the law.