Daily Herald opinion: Valuable regulations: State and local actions will help ensure that e-bikes are safe as well as fun

Many recreation and health experts have praised the advent of electric bicycles and scooters for their ability to help get people outdoors and exercising, especially older folks or people with mobility issues. But amid the growing popularity of the vehicles, we also are seeing dangerous misuses and increased safety risks stemming from lack of education and unclear policies about how and where the e-bikes can be operated.

Illinois law reflects these concerns and attempts to establish some sort of balance acknowledging the benefits e-bikes can have for recreation, while establishing a framework for regulating their operation. While defining them as “bicycles,” the law also divides them into distinct classes based on their potential speed and means of operation and sets basic rules for riders.

The state requires any e-bike rider to be at least 16 years old, and riders of a Class 3 electric bicycle, capable of reaching speeds of 28 mph or more, must be at least 18. E-bikes are prohibited from riding on sidewalks and required to adhere to all laws applying to regular bicycles.

It is an important foundation.

Wisely, communities throughout the suburbs are building on it with with actions of their own. For example, while the state merely recommends use of helmets, some local communities are requiring them.

Measures like these reflect towns that are committed to safety.

Schaumburg became one such earlier this month when the village board approved an ordinance requiring riders to wear helmets and use lights at night. It set a minimum age of 16 for riders and, reflecting state direction, prohibiting the use of e-bikes on sidewalks. Elk Grove Village’s ordinance takes effect July 1 and will require e-bike users to have a driver’s license, while prohibiting them for riding on streets with a speed limit over 35 mph. Other towns also have enacted their own safety measures, including Hoffman Estates, Streamwood, Roselle, Huntley and more.

Parks and forest preserves are getting into the act as well. A partnership of agencies in several collar counties are joined in an initiative to educate riders about rules and reinforce standards of safe riding.

Without such attention, the merits of e-bike use have been often overshadowed by dangerous behaviors that were becoming all too common.

“It’s basically reckless driving that’s going on right now,” Schaumburg Mayor Tom Dailly told our Eric Peterson for a story we published on Tuesday.

One problem, of course, is enforcement. Dailly noted that even with some substantial fines and additional concentration on e-bike riding, “No matter what we do, enforcement is going to be difficult.”

Even so, it will be important to brig rogue riders into line, and all riders will do well to remember that while e-bikes may fit a certain definition of bicycle, they also are in practice something more than that. Obeying local laws and using common sense will help them better integrate with other types of traffic and trail use, and ensure that the vehicles and their riders live up to their potential for convenient travel and enjoyable recreation.