Testimony of Sindhu Bharadwaj, Senior Policy Analyst to New York City Council Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure Oversight...

Testimony of Sindhu Bharadwaj, Senior Policy Analyst to New York City Council Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure Oversight Hearing

On behalf of New York City Comptroller Brad Lander, thank you to the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure and Chair Brooks-Powers for convening this hearing. The use of micromobility vehicles has skyrocketed since their statewide legalization in 2020. E-bikes and e-scooters have given thousands of New Yorkers a convenient, low-cost way to get around the city and make a living. Unfortunately, their popularity and novelty have outpaced New York City's regulatory regime, enforcement efforts, and infrastructure while fueling a sense of chaos and unease on city streets.

In light of the city's changing transportation landscape, the Comptroller's Office recently issued a report titled Street Safety in the Era of Micromobility offering a strategic set of recommendations to improve safety and quality of life, while preserving the mobility benefits e-bikes and scooters offer New Yorkers. We are pleased to support Intro 1131, which advances one of our recommendations to generate better e-micromobility data that can inform safer street design and infrastructure for all.

Our report is grounded in data about micromobility safety, provided by NYC DOT. Data on crashes, fatalities, and injuries involving e-bikes and e-scooters reveals that riding these vehicles is much more dangerous than sharing the road with them. 76 e-bike and e-scooter riders died in crashes between 2020 and 2023. Despite the perception that micromobility is uniquely dangerous to pedestrians, e-bikes and e-scooters account for just 1.3% (6 out of 449) of pedestrian deaths and 2.6% of injuries (912 out of 34,335), since their statewide legalization in 2020. For context, cars, SUVs, and trucks caused 96.6% of pedestrian fatalities over the same period. However, fatalities and injuries involving e-bikes and standup e-scooters were virtually nonexistent prior to 2020 and the current numbers represent a significant uptick since their statewide legalization. This trend, combined with a void of proactive management around micromobility, contributes to a sense of chaos, disorder, and lawlessness on city streets.

As e-micromobility becomes a permanent fixture of New York City's transportation system, a proactive approach to regulating micromobility, improving street safety, and enhancing quality of life is essential. Our report puts forward recommendations that address the root causes of micromobility safety issues that integrate supply-side regulations, corporate accountability, effective but non-carceral enforcement, and infrastructure interventions. We urge the City Council to advance a package of bills to enact the following changes:

• Cut off the supply of unsafe, illegal vehicles in New York City and beyond through strategic supply-side enforcement actions. It is currently very easy to purchase an illegal (non-street legal) e-bike off of Amazon or from dealerships selling equipment imported from abroad that do not meet domestic safety standards. Riders looking to bypass existing registration and licensing requirements for mopeds already and easily do so in the same manner. The NYPD and other law enforcement agencies are already empowered to confiscate illegal devices, including e-bikes, from riders.
• Hold the app-based delivery industry accountable. The rise of the mobile app-based delivery industry has fueled reliance on e-bikes and mopeds among a large population of low-wage, precarious workers, with no accountability for the app companies profiting from those trips. These companies require workers to complete high volumes of orders as quickly as possible, and workers who do not complete a certain number of orders within a fixed time face the risk of having their accounts deactivated. These unreasonable productivity and efficiency requirements incentivize delivery workers to engage in risky riding behavior to meet their quotas or risk losing work. The City must regulate this industry via a licensing program that features safe operation accountability protocols, a sizable disposal fee/penalty for illegal mopeds seized while operating on a trip for the app, and stronger worker protections.
• Invest in high-quality infrastructure, street design, and curb management solutions to support the safe integration of micromobility into New York City streets, including wider protected bike lanes, traffic calming, e-bike parking, and neighborhood loading zones. Globally, cities with high volumes of cyclists and e-bike usage like Amsterdam and Copenhagen, bike lanes up to 12 feet wide are the norm. Wide lanes give riders space to ride side-by-side and safely pass one another, a critical need where traditional bikes and e-bikes are sharing space.

Beyond these recommendations, our office remains concerned that requiring registration of e-bikes, e-scooters, or electric mobility devices at the city or state levels would fail to address the root causes of reckless driving among micromobility users. Such a mandate would burden individuals and public agencies with unenforceable and ultimately ineffective administrative requirements. We instead urge the Council to take a comprehensive approach, addressing the supply-side, labor, traffic enforcement, and infrastructure issues associated with micromobility safety.

Thank you once again to Chair Brooks-Powers for your work on this critical issue. We appreciate your consideration of our testimony.

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