Traffic Violations Involving E-scooters Remain High in Japan: Reports
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Tokyo, Dec 3 (NationPress) Electric kick scooter traffic violations are still a major concern in Japan, even after the relaxation of regulations that followed changes to the road traffic law in July of last year, according to local media reports on Tuesday.
Daiki Okai, president of Luup Inc., a Tokyo-based e-scooter sharing service, told Jiji Press that some users have consistently breached the law. He proposed that imposing harsher penalties on repeat offenders could be effective in reducing such incidents.
As per data from the National Police Agency, law enforcement addressed 25,156 e-scooter traffic violations between July 2023 and July 2024. More than half of these violations involved scooters being unlawfully operated on sidewalks, as reported by Jiji Press.
Current regulations mandate that e-scooters must travel on vehicle lanes. However, they may use sidewalks under certain conditions, such as not exceeding a speed of 6 km per hour, according to Xinhua news agency.
Okai is hopeful about decreasing violations. Since June 2024, Luup has introduced stricter measures against violators in cooperation with law enforcement and other organizations.
