SPOKANE, Wash. – According to the Spokane Police Department, people riding motorized scooters are considered pedestrians on sidewalks and vehicles on the road within city limits.
In early July, 23-year-old Danielle Littrell was hit and killed by a car downtown when she was riding her scooter. On July 12, 37-year-old Gerrand Blomstrom was hit by a car while riding his scooter downtown.
Amid the increase in pedestrian injuries and deaths across the city, more and more scooter riders are becoming worried about their safety when sharing the road. This question stands though, are scooters considered pedestrians or vehicles?
Sergeant Teresa Fuller with the Spokane Police Department (SPD) said technically, it’s both.
“On the sidewalk they’re considered a pedestrian, if they’re in the road they’re considered a vehicle,” Fuller said. “The safest thing is to wear a helmet if you’re going to be on a motorized scooter and to obey all of the traffic laws.”
Fuller said the city’s scooter law differs from the state’s law; under state law, scooters are not allowed to ride on sidewalks. However, local municipalities can regulate scooter use within city limits, so you won’t get in trouble if you ride a motorized scooter on a sidewalk in Spokane.
“Most of our pieces of the law are more restrictive than the states, except for the one where you can ride on the sidewalk,” Fuller said. “If you’re on the sidewalk you can only go up to ten miles an hour, where on the road you can go up to 20.”
According to SPD, scooters can’t be driven on roads exceeding a 30-mph speed limit, and riders must be 16 years old to rent or own a motorized scooter in Spokane. State law also prohibits scooters from being operated on fully controlled limited-access highways.
As the school year approaches fast, Fuller wants to remind pedestrians of all kinds of this:
“Pedestrians, skateboarders, scooter riders, bicyclists, if you’re on the sidewalk, you cannot suddenly leave the sidewalk and enter the road,” she said. “You have to wait for a natural gap in traffic in order to cross and give those cars time to stop before you enter the roadway.”
