Are ebikes legal?

This is a more general interest legal post, rather than specific to immigration. As everybody uses the roads, I hope it is of interest.

I have represented many clients on road traffic and personal injury matters. Many years ago, I represented somebody who had been stopped by the police while having a go on an electric toy scooter on a quiet road during a house party. He was found to be a little over the alcohol limit, and banned from driving all vehicles, plus fined for being in charge of a vehicle that was unlicensed and uninsured. 

I appealed the case to the Supreme Court, where the Court overturned the ban, on the grounds that the vehicle was tiny, and being driven for only a short distance. However, the Supreme Court upheld the fines for being unlicensed and uninsured as, ultimately, this was still a vehicle that came under the Auxiliary Bicycles Act. That case is binding authority on the Magistrates’ Court where traffic cases come up for hearing.

 Fast forward many years, and one now sees many electric bikes and scooters and other exotic vehicles on Bermuda’s roads. They are invariably unlicensed vehicles. They are ridden in many cases by children who are too young to get a licence. In some other cases, they are ridden by the erratic, disqualified, or alcohol-impaired, who think they have found a loophole to be on the road.

 It is not a loophole. Any electrically propelled vehicle with two or three wheels comes under the Auxiliary Bicycles Act. This leads to a few legal implications: