I don't know if you have these rental scooters all over your town but Los Angeles is lousy with them. There are all sorts of official rules for their usage — like in some areas, you're supposed to wear a helmet and in some areas, you're not supposed to ride on sidewalks — and from what I can tell, no one pays any attention to any of the rules.
I have eyewitnessed two accidents on them so far, neither of which resulted in injury to the scooterer but they sure came close. About a month ago, I was in a big parking lot and a lady of — I'd say — fourteen years of age was having a helluva lot of fun riding one up and down the aisles…that is, until she ran into the side of a car. She was shaken up and the car sustained one of those dents that's so slight, you don't want to bother getting it fixed. Still, it was scary.
A second collision of scooter and, in this case, Toyota Corolla was right outside my house. A gent on a scooter was racing along and he zipped across a street so rapidly that an oncoming car apparently didn't have time to see him and brake fully, nor did he see it coming. The car bumped him and he sprawled onto its hood. Both car-driver and scooter-driver were pretty shaken and the guy eventually hobbled off, not scootering. He might have had some sore muscles but he got off easy. A few inches either way though and, like the parking lot encounter, it could have been way more serious.
Yesterday, there was a big car chase in Los Angeles (when isn't there one?) and at one point, the fleeing "suspect" simply hit a guy on a scooter and kept going. Anyone watching on live TV probably thought they'd just seen someone killed…
Culver City police began the pursuit of the driver, who was suspected of assault with a deadly weapon, around 11 a.m. His car, a red Honda Civic, was traveling at slow to normal speeds before it struck a man riding a scooter in the 7800 block of West Manchester Avenue in Playa del Rey about 11:30. The man who was hit was taken to a hospital with injuries that did not appear to be life-threatening, fire officials said. Meanwhile, the chase continued.
And still, the scooters continue with no one paying any mind to whatever regulations may have been instituted. I don't know if anyone's been killed on one yet. It would be amazing if it hasn't happened but even if it hasn't, it will. I've seen some pretty nasty bicycling accidents in my life and these sure look more dangerous than a bicycle.
I don't know why I wrote this. I have no solutions that will prevent these imminent demises. Everyone knows they'll happen. Everyone knows it's a problem. It was just on my mind and if it's on my mind, it's likely to get a blog post here even when, as is the case here, I have nothing interesting to say about it. Let's move on.