An e-scooter rider crossing Bay St. in Toronto’s Financial District is photographed on Sept 5, 2024.Fred Lum/The Globe and Mail
“As free as a bird,” or so the saying goes. It should be “As free as an e-bike.” Birds, despite being able to fly, have constraints (think: migration instincts). E-bikes, along with e-scooters (electric kick scooters) and e-mopeds do not, at least not in practice. That’s why, it seems, e-bikes and e-scooters are almost universally loathed. It is the only thing drivers and cyclists can agree on.
This week, while driving south on Woodbine Avenue in Toronto’s East End, I watched a guy on an electric cargo scooter swerve across four lanes, hop onto the sidewalk, drive along the sidewalk to the Queen Street East intersect, cut across Queen Street diagonally and hop onto the sidewalk and proceed to drive due east.
The best thing I can say about him is that he didn’t appear to be drunk. In 2024, an e-scooter was filmed driving on Highway 1 in Metro Vancouver. Last year one was spotted on Highway 403 in Mississauga.
Before we delve into the bias against them, let’s consider the different types of two-wheeled electric and gas-powered transport.
E-bikes: Have pedals and are considered power-assisted vehicles under Canadian federal law. No license or insurance is required so long as the maximum speed does not exceed 32 kilometres an hour. The are generally allowed on roads, bike lanes and trails, but not sidewalks.
E-scooters: Most come in the traditional “L” shape with a “standing deck” and two small wheels. Portable and easy to store. They are not allowed to be ridden on public streets, bike lanes, sidewalks and parks in Toronto but you see them everywhere. Electric cargo scooters can haul goods and look like e-bikes.
E-dirt bikes: These resemble motocross bikes and are fully motor-powered, no pedals. They go faster than 32 km/h and are illegal to drive on Canadian public roads but, as the North Shore News reports, people do anyway.
Electric (and gas-powered mopeds): Vespa-style. Think: “What if an e-bike went to the gym and worked out.” They frequently require a registration and licence and are considered a motor vehicle. As a result, they are generally allowed on roads but not bike lanes.
While irksome, e-scooters, e-mopeds and e-bikes are not even close to being as lethal and dangerous as automobiles. Not even close. Cars cause far more death and carnage. So why prejudice against them?
If I were to guess, it is because e-bikes and e-scooters are hybrids. An e-bike is a bicycle when its rider wants to use the bike lane. It’s a pedestrian when the road is blocked because of traffic and its rider pines for the sidewalk. It’s an everyday vehicle when its rider wants to drive on main roads because that is the fastest way.
Meanwhile, the rest of us are stuck obeying one set of laws based on our transportation method.
The three days that count as spring in Canada have passed, or are about to pass, in most of the country. The bike lanes, which were barren during the winter, will be full of cyclists along with e-bikes and e-scooters. That means this summer may see a spike in “E-accidents.”
Last summer was bad. This summer may be worse. It’s not a uniquely Canadian problem. The Guardian reports there is an increasing number of traumatic injuries from e-bikes in the United States.
Many of those injured riding e-scooters are kids. Between 2021 and 2024, the Canadian Hospitals Injury Reporting and Prevention Program (CHIRPP) at Toronto’s Hospital for Sick Children found “e-scooters were associated with 85 per cent of serious injuries from battery-powered mobility vehicles.”
Suzanne Beno, medical co-Director of the trauma program and emergency physician at SickKids said in a statement, “High speed, a lack of helmet use, young age and interaction with motor vehicles all place children and youth at risk of serious injury if there is a fall or collision.”
In July 2025, pediatric emergency physician Daniel Rosenfield of SickKids told The Globe and Mail, “These are not minor scrapes. We’re talking about kids who need our full trauma team – severe head injuries, intra-abdominal trauma requiring surgery, hospital admission and even ICU care … These are very, very sick kids.”
Again, let me be very clear, cars are worse. Far, far worse, but we now have more wheeled machines to fear.
As a society, we need to address the challenges e-scooters and e-bikes present. We need to investigate dedicated lanes and reduced speed zones (in areas where bikes and pedestrians mix). We need to make it safer for cyclists and e-bike rides to get around while at the same time requiring they obey traffic laws.
We need to require the use of hardware speed-limiters on e-scooters, the same kind that are already required on e-bikes to automatically cut the motor off at 32 km/h and harsh penalties for hacking the machines to go above that limit.
We can’t allow riders to self-limit. We need better rider education programs, age restriction enforcement and parents to think twice before buying their children powerful e-dirt bikes, e-scooters and e-bikes. Whatever happened to walking five miles to school, uphill both ways, in the snow, barefoot?
Well, that’s E-nuff for now. Time for me to order dinner through an app and then complain about the e-bike delivery guy taking too long.