Accidents involving electric scooters have tripled in Russia

The number of accidents involving electric scooters and personal mobility devices (PIMs) in Russia is growing at an alarming rate. Over the nine months of 2023, according to data from the Ministry of Internal Affairs, there were more than 2.6 thousand accidents involving them – three times more than in the same period last year. Moreover, most of the accidents occurred with the participation of kick-sharing devices.

According to data published yesterday by the Scientific Center for Road Safety (SC Traffic Safety Center) of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, over the nine months of 2023, 2.64 thousand accidents were registered in the Russian Federation (+215% compared to the same period last year) involving SIM. 31 people died (+63.2%). 2.72 thousand people were injured (+213%), including 919 children under the age of 16 years. 26% of incidents occurred on sidewalks, pedestrian paths, pedestrian zones, another 22.8% – at controlled pedestrian crossings.

The most accidents with SIM were recorded in Moscow (665, +235% compared to the same period last year), in the Tyumen region (184, +308%), St. Petersburg (172, +48%), Nizhny Novgorod region (123, +215 %).

The leader in the anti-rating for incidents with a fatal ending was St. Petersburg (four), in other regions there were one or two deaths each since the beginning of the year. In one of the accidents (the region was not specified in the review of the National Traffic Safety Center), two citizens riding on the same electric scooter were killed at once, which is prohibited by the rules.

42% of victims of road accidents with SIM are young people under the age of 20 years. In 69.6% of accidents, electric scooters were low-power (with an electric motor of up to 0.25 kW); in 30.2% of accidents, electric scooters with a motor with a power of 0.25–4 kW were involved. Devices more powerful than 4 kW were involved in only eight accidents. It is noteworthy that the share of accidents involving kick-sharing electric scooters this year for the first time exceeded the share of accidents with private SIMs: 51.8% versus 47.3% (a year ago it was 32.4% versus 67.6%).

The high level of accidents with SIM has been worrying the authorities for several years. On March 1, 2023, amendments to the traffic rules came into force, by which SIM users were prohibited from accelerating faster than 25 km/h, entering areas marked with special signs, driving on highways, etc. Already in the summer, the Ministry of Transport admitted that this was not enough and began to prepare a new set of measures, which was transformed into the government “road map” for 2023–2025 (“Kommersant” wrote about this document). The next event provided for by the card is an increase in fines for violating traffic rules by electric scooters. Now the maximum amount of sanctions is 1.5 thousand rubles. The government has a draft amendment by Senator Artem Sheikin: to establish a fine of 20-30 thousand rubles. for riding an electric scooter while intoxicated, 3-5 thousand rubles for speeding, 3 thousand rubles for traveling together and other sanctions. It is these amendments, according to Kommersant, that are planned to be taken as the basis for the road map. At the same time, the Ministry of Transport is preparing the next batch of amendments to the traffic rules, and the regions, within the framework of their powers, are installing signs prohibiting the passage of SIM, and agreeing with kick-sharing operators to limit the speed of traffic in parks and pedestrian areas.

“Practice has shown that it is necessary to limit the total number of scooters in cities with a population of one million,” Alexey Tsivilev, head of the St. Petersburg Legislative Assembly Commission on Transport, told Kommersant. “Our city is not able to withstand more than 42 thousand devices, and now there are actually more of them.” . And if there is an increase, then the accident rate will also increase.”

The parliamentarian also suggests that the authorities “invest” in bicycle paths to separate traffic flows from pedestrians: perhaps, Mr. Tsivilev believes, even a separate federal program will be needed. “And where there are no lanes, it is necessary to reduce the permitted speed to 10–15 km/h,” the parliamentarian is sure. “Kicksharing companies are already doing this, now we need to think about how to track private devices.” The Ministry of Transport, we recall, plans to oblige owners of all SIMs to register in a digital register, which will be created in 2024–2025.

“Accident rates are increasing, which is bad. At the same time, all market participants are making efforts to ensure that the situation changes for the better,” says Ksenia Erdman, director of the Association of Micromobility Operators. The expert explains the increase in the number of road accidents by the doubling of the number of trips on SIM (more than 200 million according to preliminary results of the season) and the number of devices (the total fleet of taxi sharing SIMs already exceeds 300 thousand). The expert also notes that after the amendments to the traffic rules came into force, the rules for recording road accidents also changed: previously, if an electric scooter hit a pedestrian, it was considered an accident with a pedestrian, now this is a separate category of road accidents with SIM, which is reported to the Ministry of Internal Affairs. “On the one hand, we see statistics that are close to reality, on the other hand, the numbers, of course, frighten those who are not immersed in this topic,” notes Ksenia Erdman. Two main conclusions can be drawn from the traffic police data, she says: accidents occur due to the lack of infrastructure for driving (as a result of driving on sidewalks or roadways) or gross violation of traffic rules. “And if operators and public organizations make a lot of efforts to work with the formation of a driving culture, then it is definitely not within our power to eliminate the shortcomings of the infrastructure,” she states.

This year, the demand for SIM trips has increased almost 2.5 times, and the fleet of scooters has increased from 40 thousand to 60 thousand, Kommersant was told in the capital’s department of transport.

This year, city authorities introduced an additional 50 “slow” zones, where kick-sharing SIMs are automatically slowed down—there are 250 such zones in Moscow in total. “We are now testing cameras that in real time detect violations when driving on SIM,” said the Department of Transport. “For example, if you are not driving in your lane, do not dismount when crossing the road, or are riding on the same scooter together. We report violations to operators. Soon there will be more such cameras in the city. We also launched educational videos in the metro, hung posters at stops, metro crossings, and screens on the MCD and EDC. We will continue to do everything possible to improve the safety of travel on this popular form of urban transport.”

Ivan Buranov