Streets for People / Commissioner Lee Is Right. It’s Time To Get Fast Moving E-Bikes Off Our Promenades

It’s time for the City to get fast-moving and dangerous e-vehicles off the island’s heavily used promenades on N. and S. Roosevelt Boulevards and other multi-use paths and into the streets where they belong. Commissioner Donnie Lee is leading a common sense charge to get something done as he docketed discussion on the subject at the City’s first Commission meeting of the new year this Tuesday. Good for him!

Electric bikes and scooters (the stand up kind) have been around for a while now, but it really wasn’t until the 2020’s that their sales and usage really took off. That’s when conflicts started as vehicles that easily go upwards of 20 mph started scaring the heebie-jeebies out of pedestrians and people on slow-moving pedal bikes on the formerly bucolic promenades and paths. Just like with our cars and trucks, the e-vehicles get bigger and faster each year, and it just becomes more and more obvious to people using these facilities that someone’s going to get hurt if we don’t act. Let’s take a look at the recent history of this problem, constraints that seem to hamstring our leaders and potential options for the City to make our promenades and paths safer.

E-Vehicles ARE a Good Thing – They Just Should Be In the Street

We start this discussion by stating e-vehicles are indeed a good thing. And they are here to stay. Especially as the technology gets better and prices come down. On a tiny little historic island with small streets, we’d rather people, if they aren’t walking or pedaling, move around by e-vehicles than cars as cars just take up way too much space. And for those who complain about not having the stamina to pedal, worry about arriving to work sweaty on a pedal bike or who simply don’t have the money to own and operate a car, e-bikes and e-scooters are a great and practical option for our beleaguered work force. Just keep em off ALL the sidewalks, including the promenades and muti-use paths.

Commissioner Lee was clear that he thought e-vehicles were good, and that he didn’t want to take this option away from workers, he simply wanted them to use the streets.

Firsts Attempts By the City to Address E-Vehicles

About 5 years ago, e-vehicles became a thing locally and also a menace at the same time. Facebook, the Citizen Voice and the local papers were filled with gnashing of teeth over the seemingly sudden proliferation of e-scooters. Beginning in 2020 the City Commission put a moratorium on new rentals of motorized and non-motorized vehicles as they worried about a deluge on our sidewalks.

A new Florida Law effective July 1, 2020, provided for three classifications of e-bikes or pedal assist and throttle bikes and gave them all the rights, privileges and duties of human powered bikes, meaning they could operate anywhere a regular bike could, including sidewalks. Remember this for later. But the new law also gave counties and municipalities the ability to regulate their use on sidewalks.

This prompted Commissioner Sam Kaufman and then Mayor Teri Johnston to pursue an effort to update the City’s own ordinance to comply with the new State rules and make our sidewalks safer. At their October 2020 meeting they extended the moratorium by another 180 days or longer to provide time for a new ordinance to take effect.

In the summer of 2021 the City Commission passed the “Electric Bicycle, Motorized Scooters and Micromobility Devices” law or Ordinance 21-12 that updated the City’s code, banned e-vehicle use on City sidewalks and restricted their speed to 15 mph on the promenades and multi-use paths.

When a Sidewalk Isn’t a Sidewalk

At the time, neither Mayor Johnston nor Commissioner Kaufman were satisfied with the ultimate outcome of the newly passed ordinance because the City Attorney’s office interpreted State law as saying the City couldn’t ban the use of e-vehicles on State facilities that were designated “Multi-Use Paths.”

So, while the N. and S. Roosevelt Promenades look like sidewalks and act like sidewalks, they have been designated as Multi-Use Paths, not sidewalks, by the State who “owns” them. And according to the State, e-vehicles in the 3 classes ARE allowed to operate on them. Or so said the City Attorney’s Office. So, all the City, at the time, thought it could do was regulate the speed on Multi-Use paths and thus we got the 15 mph on the promenades. Everyone knew the issue would fester but calls for studies seemed to placate the masses. But…

The E-Vehicle Problem Continues…

Not even a year later, in March of 2023 the City Commission held a special E-Bike Hearing (2-hour YouTube video of it here) and citizen after citizen got up and complained about how dangerous it was on the multi-use paths and promenades for pedestrians and pedal bikes. Again, everyone asked why the City just couldn’t get an exception to the FDOT rule or lacking that, asked why there could not be a separate space for these vehicles off of the promenades. Alas, taking space from cars is like the third rail around here so, City staff proffered signage, education programs and studies and again, that seemed to soothe at least some of the people in the audience. Fast forward to today.

(All of the above was covered in gory detail in our 2022 article “Here’s the Real Lowdown on the Do’s and Don’ts for E-Bikes and E-Scooters in Key West” if you want to dive down the rabbit’s hole. We’ve written about attempts to get bikes off of South Roosevelt Promenade many times and this was the latest: “Is It Really Too Late For Bike Lanes on S. Roosevelt Boulevard?” )

…And Continues

And so here we are today, two years later. It’s baaaack. This time new Commissioner and former Police Chief Donnie Lee has said “enough!” He docketed an E-Bikes Discussion at the January 7 meeting and lo and behold everyone from citizens to staff to commissioners repeated what they’ve been saying for the last five years. Here’s just a couple of the many comments, as an example, submitted to the Commission prior to the hearing:

“Hello and thank you Mr. Lee for speaking out about the dangers of throttled E-vehicles on our sidewalks. In my view the increased use of E-Vehicles has done nothing to diminish our current traffic congestion and parking problems. Hotels, schools, restaurants and construction sites that once were full of bicycles are now full of E-Vehicles, bicycles are all but gone.

Also gone are the safe, sidewalks pedestrians and bicyclists once used to go to the store, beach, or to watch the sunrise. They are no longer safe because heavy E-Vehicles with large tires traveling twenty to thirty miles per hour have taken them over. These E- vehicles with two people on them weigh as much as a Harley Davidson. No one is safe, the death last month of an E-Biker and the recent house fires caused by E-Vehicles should be a wakeup call to our public officials that something must be done.

It’s time to ban E-Vehicles with throttles from our promenades and sidewalks and require them to ride in the road with all of the other fast, heavy vehicles. Reducing the speed limit on North and South Roosevelt could help to make this happen as well as save lives.

Thanks, Tom Theisen”

“Mr. Lee, we totally support you in your efforts on e-bikes and pedestrian safety. Please include South Roosevelt sidewalks along with North Roosevelt in your concerns. We used to walk South Roosevelt sidewalk in sunrise hours, and it is now an unpleasant experience due e-bike commuter traffic. No rules of the road are obeyed, no notification or slowing down for pedestrian traffic.

Joan Burnside”

And while it was dispiriting to see everyone in the room going through the motions repeating the same old complaints and solutions yet again, Tuesday’s hearing did provide a glimmer of hope on a number of fronts.

What May Be Different This Time…

  • Acknowledging Education and Enforcement Aren’t Enough
    In year’s past education and enforcement were seen as a panacea and so, City staff would gamely trot out pamphlets and lights and bells and the Police would get some grant money to send out officers to nab speeding bikes or those without lights or those that ran stop signs and everyone would pat themselves on the back that things would be better as a result. So, while it was evident everyone involved will continue the education and enforcement efforts, this time Commissioner Lee and Police Chief Brandenberg agreed that there just aren’t the resources to really solve the problem this way.
  • Maybe the City CAN Ban Some E-Vehicles From the Promenades
    At one point in the discussion the City Attorney seemed to imply that in the past they may have interpreted the State law too conservatively and perhaps, maybe, there’s some wiggle room to ban some e-vehicles. Worth looking into!

    Ryan Stachurski, the City’s Multi-Modal Coordinator thinks there may be some hope of restricting the multi-use paths to only Class 1 vehicles instead of allowing Class 1, 2 and 3 to use them. Class 1 e-bikes are manufactured so they can’t go over 20 mph, they are pedal assist and have no throttle. This too is worth looking into!

  • When An E-Bike Is NOT An E-Bike
    We’ve also noticed that some e-vehicles out there are larger, fatter and much faster (easily going over 20 mph) than e-bikes of old. They have throttles and act more like a motorized scooter than a pedal bike that has electric assist. And in fact, these “bikes” likely don’t meet the 3 classifications of an e-bike that are allowed on Multi-Use Paths.

    Evan Haskell, owner of the WeCycle Bike Shops said E-bike laws may not be keeping up with technology and changing trends. “If it is going more than 20mph and has throttle,” he said, “it isn’t a class 1 2, or 3 bike. Certainly, more bikes go over 20 than 28 but either way, no manufacturer will sell anything in Florida that goes over 20 mph unless it is designated for off-road use.” He also offered: “Lots of bikes are user modified to go over the 20 mph cap the manufacturer/seller installs.” One of the officers at the hearing added of these vehicles “Over 20 mph they are an unregistered motorized vehicle.” And as such they are illegal, shouldn’t be on the paths and could be given criminal citations. It is certainly worth pursuing getting the biggest offenders off of the promenades.

  • Signage
    The Police Chief said he was hamstrung by not being able to put signs up letting vehicles know of the 15 mph speed limit on the promenades. Everyone agreed they’d ask FDOT to allow this. Well, about time.

Slow the Boulevards So E-Vehicles Feel Safe To Use Streets

We’d add that reducing the speed limit and slowing down traffic on N. and S. Roosevelt Boulevards would make it easier for these fast-moving e-vehicles to ride in the street with the cars. We get it. Yes, these e-bikes are going more than 20 mph and shouldn’t be on the sidewalks, but many of these riders are likely too intimidated to ride in the street where cars routinely travel above the 35-mph speed limit. Any solution that moves e-vehicles to the street must also include traffic calming on the Boulevards.

We’ll Be Back Here In Six Months Seeking a Ban     

There was lots of discussion at the meeting about potential solutions from education, enforcement, signs, criminal citations, making bikes get registered and more. The meeting sort of petered out with everyone kinda pursuing many different solutions. Commissioner Lee said unless we get the motorized bikes off of the promenades and paths and into the streets we’ll just be back here in 6 months, and he’ll be leading the charge for a ban at that point. We agree. Time to get this done.

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Chris Hamilton is founder of the local advocacy group Friends of Car-Free Key West & Duval Street/Historic Downtown. Subscribe to the blog. Follow on Facebook and Twitter. A native of the District of Columbia, where for a couple decades+ he led nationally renowned efforts promoting transit, bike, walk and smart growth for Arlington County, VA’s DOT. Chris has lived in Key West since 2015. He lives car-free downtown and works and volunteers for a couple non-profits. You can find all of KONK Life Streets for People column articles here and here.

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