Electric Scooters Go Up Against U.K. Highways Act of 1835
U.S. e-scooter startup Bird is struggling to get a pilot program underway in London, after trying for months to win over the city’s transit regulator and adhere to highway legislation.
Photographer: David Paul Morris/BloombergThis article is for subscribers only.
Hi everyone, it’s Nate in London, and I’m terribly annoyed today.
Electric scooters taking U.S. cities by storm are illegal on British roads, symptomatic of English legislation that dates back to the year of Mark Twain’s birth — and still in force today. It’s deeply irritating for owners of such devices (read: me) who see inexperienced teenagers permitted to pedal down London’s congested highways, often without helmets,1 sometimes inebriated,2 on bicycles rented3 from a dock on the sidewalk.