E-Scooter Tragedy
June 26, 2023
By Paul Homewood
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This was an accident waiting to happen:
An e-scooter rider has died following a collision on Blackpool promenade.
The man, in his 30s, died at Royal Preston Hospital after sustaining serious head and chest injuries. His next of kin have been informed.
Police were called to the incident on Sunday at 12.40pm, near the Grand Hotel on Middle Walk.
Specialist officers are now supporting his family.
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The police have made it clear that they do not know all the facts yet. But it has been clear for a long time that these e-scooters are fundamentally unsafe, both for riders and pedestrians.
Would they have ever been allowed for use in public, if it had not been for the obsession with Net Zero?
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NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT 
At least it was his choice, i.e., he didn’t kill someone else.
‘Specialist officers are now supporting his family.’
Wuh? When did that become a police job?
In the UK a large number of the police are actually social workers in a uniform. This is especially true of the senior officers who also happen to be female. In the days when we had a police force that provided a service to the public – as opposed to now having a police service that is useless – senior officers trained on the job. I had the pleasure of knowing a senior police officer who started as a bobby on the beat and ended his career as a Chief Superintendent.
Jobs for the girls.
I believe that they are still illegal, except on private land, and am pleased that they haven’t taken off as much as I feared. Round these parts they are ridden mainly by young men that look like drug dealers.
At least one of our industries is raising productivity.
Undertaking?
No privately owned battery scooter is legal on the public highway. Only those taking part in government backed trials run by highway authorities are legally allowed on the public highway – excluding the footway of course. However, since the changes made to the traffic signs to permit the scooters made them the same as pedal cycles, where there are shared surfaces they are permitted. Given that many councils have an obsession with closing streets to motor vehicles to make life difficult for businesses and residents, there are an increasing number of streets where the scooters can mix with pedestrians. My experience was in London where a geo-fence system was used that could either reduce the speed down from the maximum permitted 15.5mph to 5mph, or power them down completely.
They are a menace around the lanes where I live in kent. invariably the rider is wearing dark clothes has headphones or earpieces and a comlete and utter disregard for road law/manners. several times but for the grace of god I have have one on the bonnet of my vehicle.
I don’t think that you can really pin this on the net zero obsession. Technology has made e-scooters cheap and affordable and many people are using them illegally. There seems to be a steady supply of stories involving fatalities being caused by the things.
Yes, it is. The morons who work in transport departments at councils think that people which switch from cars to battery scooters, in the same way that they have allowed battery powered bicycle hire schemes to clog up the streets. You have to work with them to believe just how stupid they are. A section manager I worked for seriously believed that cargo bicycles were the answer to all the problems the City of London had created for brewery drays to deliver to pubs and bars. I was elated to get early retirement on a full pension and leave the lunatic asylum.
We have them in Christchurch NZ where they share footpaths created for sharing with pedestrians, Cyclists are more of a menace because they are silent. meanwhile the traffic roars by on the roads which are now being upgraded so that pedestrians have a chance to cross at the lights
I think the e scooters keep motorbikes and scooters off the roads where they were a danger at road crossings.
The net zero obsession means that the politicised police ignore certain illegal things (unless there’s an uproar and they need to ‘prove’ they don’t with a 2 minute ‘crackdown’).
Pavement cycling. Escooters. Just Stop Oil nutters.
Everyday the seafront patrol put out the ‘no escooters on the promenade sign’, everyday they ignore dozens zooming by the sign. It’s just for show you see. The escooters have a higher moral authority.
The politicians know every escooter journey is 20 times more likely to result in injury than any other form of motorised transport.
Shapps hopes to legalise them by stealth, allow illegal use to become so common that there’s no way to put the genie back in the bottle.
You misunderstand the intent: A company wants to make money from a product. It deluges the politicians with a paid campaign and gets social media to filter what the politicians see on social media so they get the impression there is overwhelming public support. Company gets idiot politicians to push their scheme and make a lot of money. It happened with ID cards (which then failed), it happened with the climate scam, with covid, with the arms industry. These silly schemes don’t come from nowhere, they are the result of intense and expensive media campaigns by big business which stands to make a lot money.
Did I mention defibrillators in schools … about the last place you’d need them. So, how did they get all that public money out of us?
Since defibrillators became financially practicable and reliable there seems no good reason not to have them available in areas where the public congregates — which includes schools.
There is a difference between widespread availability of things that save lives and things that take them.
I agree crony capitalism, lobbying, self-serving interests, whatever, are also factors. It’s not necessarily just one thing.
I will take exception to Covid Vaccinations being included. It gives this blog a bad name when such ideas are conflated . Try to contain the next big virus outbreak without overloading hospitals without vaccines ,which will have to be brought into use without the usual two years of testing. Vaccines and keeping people apart can do a lot to prevent diseases spreading ,as your mothers knew in measles and chickenpox epidemics. Think of the diseases which killed off so many in the Victorian era. Anti medical prejudice has no place on a climate discussion blog.
Very sad. I feel for his family. The story does not mention if the rider was wearing his brain-bucket when he crashed. Perhaps the security cam footage will shed some light on the situation.
Small wheels, potholes, any governor software bypassed, and of course no protective clothing and headwear, not even gloves. The result is inevitable.
The perfect example of a solution to a problem that doesn’t exist.
They’re not.
Quicker than walking, no problems with parking, cheap to run.
Exactly why they are such a dumb/wrong idea. Shapps et Al sell them as reducing road congestion. But it has been shown the vast majority of users are otherwise pedestrians. And the majority of those are young/male, underage/illegal, too immature to be on the road. And another useful tool for the drug dealing/mugging gangs.
“Cheap to run, and no problem with parking.” Great fun, just don’t even think of bringing the thing into your flat for a re-charge, as most landlords forbid them do to the fire hazard they pose. Just throw a cord out the window and charge it in the parking lot of your building, and hope it don’t get nicked.
At present on holiday in Cyprus.
Latest trend here is an electric rental four wheeler which looks like a stretch mobility scooter. Hired either by yob plus partner or more frequently by a morbidly obese couple in their fifties, often with a couple of grandkids, one standing in front of each adult.
These are quite lively and can be seen dicing it along harbour promenades or mingling with taxis, lorries, rental cars on public highways and travelling at 30mph minimum. Hard hats seem to be provided by seldom worn.
I wonder how good the brakes are? I also wonder what insurance cover is like?
Plenty of “normal” electric scooters and also three wheelers. Often riden by obvious pre-teenagers and again riden at speed.
All helps save the Planet, I suppose.
Helps the planet by population reduction through natural selection
Small wheels, narrow handlebars on an overly tall stem and a rider standing platform all point to a disastrous weight distribution and handling package.
That said they’re probably great fun to ride….until you come off. Then people are finding out the hard way that lamp-posts, kerbs or vehicles don’t give way to humans.
One guilty party in the pothole saga.
Pothole damage from electric cars is double that of petrol, Telegraph data show
Excessive weight could exacerbate problem on already damaged residential roads that are not designed to cope
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/06/26/pothole-electric-cars-damage-roads-double-petrol-telegraph/
During my involvement with these nasty things, the subject of potholes was raised during TfL discussion as a problem for the small wheels. Is there an irony that Genghis Khan and his ULEZ would see more battery cars on the road.
Out of interest it appears that Chinese manufacturer Aiways is in financial trouble and it is not alone in Chinese battery car manufacturers not making a profit.
China has just extended tax breaks for EVs to 2027 at an estimated cost of £56.9bn in an attempt to bolster its industry. China’s largest EV maker, Nio, has recently cut prices to boost sales after making considerable losses. It has also dropped its free 6 battery drop out scheme. Not sure if this involves cancellation of its plans to build 1000 battery swap out stations in China this year.
China, of course, is far and away the world’s largest EV market with more than half of all EVs worldwide on the road there according to the IEA ‘Global EV Outlook 2023’. Europe is the second largest market and US third
Very interesting. You did not mention America’s favorite CCP apparatchik, Elon Musk, who is wholly funded by the CCP, and does their bidding by slashing Tesla prices in the U.S. in a blatant attempt to bankrupt Ford and GM. And it is working as planned–kiss the Big Three goodbye as they line up for yet another taxpayer funded bailout. Small world.
Try this idiot on a motorway with e-scooter
https://www.dublinlive.ie/news/dublin-news/e-scooter-rides-along-dublins-27101532
Feel sorry for his family, of course.
The things are inherently unsafe. Everyone must know that. Hit anything taller than a tennis ball and you are likely to come off, and then its like a cycle, small moped crash.
I’d make them legal , but under same laws as mopeds – ride on road only, insurance, min age 16 , max power same as 50cc . Think they would fare badly in direct competition with a basic electric push bike.
This is surely extraordinary:
Note that Harrabin was there too – so much for his retirement. The impartial BBC you can trust – not.
Packham, another extremist in the midst of the BBC. Watch the video.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12129129/Eco-warrior-Chris-Packham-slams-abusive-motorists-trying-past-Just-Stop-Oil-clowns.html
The Beaver: Whatcha doin’, Eddy?
Eddy Haskel: Go play in the traffic, kid.
Despite the poster, BBC staff/Labour MPs did NOT appear on stage.
JSO put out a tweet their bosses had banned them.
One Labour MP appeared in the Labour stage, another spoke just to camera.
Osthumous Darwin award for the poor guy. Lest I sound callous, As i write this i am lying flat onmy back with spinal fractures and i too am a Darwin laureate
I was in Nottingham recently and they have them for public hire, presumably via the local authority. I had a quick go on one along a very quiet road and it was great fun. However. Negotiating with one in traffic for 20 minutes would, I suspect, would terrorise me!
It’s meant to be a mode of transport, not fun in a dangerous environment.
Driving at 90 mph down a residential street is fun, there’s reasons you don’t do it.
The trial stats are in, they are extremely dangerous, other schemes, like in Paris are being cancelled, Shapps refuses to see the danger, blinded by ideology.
@MrGrimNasty
Shapps is blinded by stupidity
The scooter involved in the accident in question can be seen to be an Illegal Privately owned scooter that has no Public Liability Insurance. At the age of 78 and recovering from a heart attack I have used the Official Scheme Scooters when unable to walk back home. I carry a helmet, yellow reflective vest and gloves and use them within the law. They are great fun and used sensibly can be safe. I have until recently, when threatened by a yob on an illegal scooter, always politely pointed out to offenders that there can be a £200 fine, 6 points on your driving licence, confiscation of the scooter, and careless driving charges if on the pavement. I confronted the local Police Commissioner at a Public meeting on June 1st, regarding the total lack of action from the Police regarding the Law breaking going on. Every day I see more than 10 illegal scooters. There is a general lack of law enforcement for whatever reason. Shoplifting is a massive epidemic and is included in this general disregard for the Law, and it is very bad for us all.
Was in Oxford for a reunion with friends earlier this year. Lots of E scooters being ridden along the pavements
Because I’ve recently been researching how we might deal with medical problems caused by a nuclear war, I’ve suddenly become interested in the medical details. So, isn’t it strange how little information is given: “serious head and chest injuries”. What is that supposed to be?
Guess: fractured skull, broken ribs plus possibly punctured lung. Lots of skin abrasion.
They are a quandary. The tech works really well, they are cheap, convenient and useful. I’ve seen them in Liverpool which has most infrastructure at sea level , then a big hill , and make the commute much easier for many residents. Unfortunately, they are just dangerous. Wish they would use the tech in boris type bikes, and make them road use only, like bicycles.
Hi Paul,
Even the Swiss are following the herd…
Government wants to speed up construction of renewable energy plants [wind turbines on high Swiss mountain pass] Voter approval of a new climate law means Switzerland needs to accelerate production of renewable energy. (c) Keystone / Olivier Maire read aloud X
The Swiss government has approved a plan to speed up construction of solar, wind and hydroelectric power stations to reduce Switzerland’s dependence on foreign suppliers.
This content was published on June 23, 2023June 23, 20232 minutes RTS/Keystone-SDA/jc
A bill drawn up by the economics ministry and approved by cabinetExternal linkhttps://www.admin.ch/gov/fr/accueil/documentation/communiques.msg-id-95916.html includes speeding up planning and authorisation procedures for power plants of national interest. Appeal procedures will also be shortened. The bill needs to be approved by parliament, which the government hopes will happen this autumn.
According to Frank Rutschmann, head of the Renewable Energies section at the Swiss Federal Office of Energy (SFOE), it can currently take up to 20 years from the launch of a project to its completion.
On June 18, Swiss voters approved a new lawhttps://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/swiss-to-decide-on-net-zero-climate-law/48593158 that seeks to speed up the country’s shift from fossil fuels and reach zero emissions by 2050. Stephan Scheidegger of the federal development planning office said approval of the Climate Protection Act means that more electricity will have to be generated in Switzerland from renewable sources.
Solar panels gain ground
Meanwhile, solar panels gained ground in Switzerland last year, the solar industry’s trade association Swissolar announced on Friday. More systems were built and put into operation than ever before.
Solar energy is becoming increasingly important in the Swiss electricity mix, it says. Swissolar estimates that solar power contributed 5.8% to the country’s electricity supply last year, compared with 4.9% in 2021. The association expects further growth in construction of new plants of about one fifth in 2023. The order books of most companies are full, writes Swissolar.
What are they going to do with all the solar panels at end of life.
They don’t have any deserts to bury them in, nor do we.
Maybe we can deport them to Australia like we did the convicts 🙂