Posted on 08/11/2004 10:08:03 AM PDT by Willie Green
Allegheny County District Attorney Stephen A. Zappala Jr. today launched an awareness campaign against potentially dangerous motorized scooters, warning people that they are illegal to drive on streets and highways.
"We're seeing more of these put into the stream of commerce," Zappala said during a news conference outside the Green Tree police department. "These items lack the most basic safety features."
Upon Zappala's request, the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation looked into the legal issues surrounding motorized scooters and determined that they are illegal to use outside private property.
(Excerpt) Read more at post-gazette.com ...
ping
You may only travel by paying tribute to your rulers! Kneel, serf!
Nearly hit 3 kids in the last week buzzing around on these damned things in the streets.... one of them couldn't have been 7 years old.
I hope the cops do some cracking down on the derelict parents... you know when one of their kids gets plowed by a motorist after they zip out from behind a parked car they are going to be the first folks filing civil lawsuits against the driver for compensation.
I live in Pittsburgh, and in some neighborhoods you can't go a block without seeing 2 or 3 kids on these things doing stupid stupid things.
Do the property rights SIG have a problem with this?
What else would you do with one of those things if not ride it on the streets ?
They are "Unsafe At Any Speed" !
There are some that are street legal in my town. They have a horn, turn signals, hi/lo beam headlight and a working brake light. They can be no larger than 50cc. The rider must be at least 16 and wear a helmet. IMO they are too underpowered to be safe.
ping
SUVs will win....
Exactamundo....but its for the children....or anyone else who tries to ride without paying...
They zoom through the quiet residential streets here on some weekends. Boys and girls. I get a kick out of seeing how much fun these kids (12 year olds) are having. I will leave the safety issue to others. None wore bicycle type helmets.
LOL! Yeah, I saw a kid about the same age on one of these things a couple nights ago at the local shopping center. He was riding around the parking lot with a small group of kids on regular bicycles. I gotta admit, I was curiously amused when they stopped to chat among themselves for a minute or so. It gave me a chance to get a better look at that little motor. Darn cute little thing! Maybe ¼ the size of a lawnmower engine. Then when the kid started it back up, the little guy just yanked on a rope like a power mower. It took surprisingly little effort and.... VOOOOOM! off he went! I had to really chuckle in amazement, despite how inherently dangerous those little scooters can be. (That little sucker must have a pretty good muffler on it too, because it wasn't as loud as what I expected either!)
Nothing like having a pre-teen on an ATV come flying out of the woods directly in front of you to test your anti-lock breaks. It's happened to me.
(In a related incident, I remember putting along at 35 mph next to an aparment complex. I spotted a kid on a bicycle racing down a long (~100') sloping driveway directly towards the road in front of me. The closer I got to the driveway, the more he looked like he was going to come crashing out into the street. I kept slowing down, till as I got to the driveway, I was nearly completely stopped. Sure enough he came flying across the street, kinda looking a me with a mix of surprise and reproach on his face as he crashed into an old low stone fence on the other side of the street. Apparently his plan had been to time it so that he would swoop on to the street just as I passed, and follow in the slip stream behind my vehicle, sort of the way an old Volkswagen follows a semi. He's verrry lucky there wasn't a car coming the other way. )
assuming the 16 has a license as well.
just watch for the kid named Al Queda with the backpack on.
assuming the 16 year old has a license as well.
many of the Disneyland daddies in my hood buy their kids these too and they run up and down the streets on them.I'm sure they'll sue me if I ever accidentally hit one.
just watch for the kid named Al Queda with the backpack on.
I wonder what the authorities' view of an electric golf cart on a quiet cul-de-sac street would be? They already stopped my son from using his go-kart, despite the fact there is no car traffic.
soon they'll have a "monster's garage" show for scooters.
custom paint and a blown,injected chainsaw motor.
I'm sure it'll be an X Games event somehow.
They're already popular in some inner cities for purse snatching and liquor store getaways.Can you get them with the On-star system yet?
My son broke his scooter and I decided not to fix it after a friend of mine told me his 11 yr old daughter had been riding her scooter on the sidewalk and hit the edge of an uneven sidewalk and went flying. When she didn't come home for dinner they went looking for her and found her in a pool of blood. She was even wearing a helmet. Fortunately, she survived, but was in the hospital for three weeks. I decided that I didn't want to go through that kind of anguish with my son and refused to fix his scooter.
I was thinking of something a little more suburban. On US Route-1 in Attleboro, there's a place where it crosses a powerline right of way, and the kids on their ATV's come roaring accross the road, apparently without looking. Like I said, had a couple of tests of the ABS.
Portsmouth boy killed after scooter, SUV collide
This happened a couple of towns over.
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