Do electric bikes threaten Hilton Head’s safety, ‘tranquility?’ Leaders plan new rules
Hilton Head Island’s pathways are buzzing.
Not just with walkers and talkers, but with electric bikes.
Electric bicycles, or e-bikes, are gaining popularity and becoming more affordable on the island. As they do, the Town of Hilton Head Island has started to discuss how it will control the new speedy bikes.
Since the state set limitations on e-bikes in February 2020, residents have sent letters to The Island Packet about whether e-bikes should be banned from the island’s pathways and beaches.
Hilton Head residents David and Julia Buzzard wrote in June that e-bikes “present a safety issue to others, particularly pedestrians and unpredictable young children.” They said they “value the safety and tranquility of our recreational pathways and beaches,” and therefore thought e-bikes should be prohibited.
Banning e-bikes doesn’t seem to be on the horizon, though.
The Town Council was silent on the issue in 2020, but last in March, Mayor John McCann asked Ward 3 representative David Ames to work with bike shops and safety advocates to build a town policy on e-bikes as the chairman of the public planning committee.
“It’s a safety and courtesy issue,” Ames told The Island Packet. “The e-bikes I suspect are here to stay. How do you make them safe around other people?”
E-bike popularity
The collaboration on e-bikes is a relief to bike shop owners who count on them to keep their doors open.
Jim Hall, who owns Hilton Head Bicycle Company on Arrow Road, said 29 of his 2,000-bike “fleet” of rentals are e-bikes.
His shop can charge five times the rental rate for an e-bike, he said. After a year of booming business due to the coronavirus pandemic, he anticipates e-bikes will be here to stay on the island.
E-bikes, Hall said, were originally pitched as battery-assisted bikes marketed toward older people or people with physical limitations who still want to ride. Since they’ve become more popular in the United States, young people have gotten more interested in riding and renting them on vacation.
That leads to some friction in the community, though.
A recent story about kids racing down the beach at 30 mph and putting beachgoers at risk rippled through the bike community. The story was used to argue that the electric bikes should be banned on the beach.
“For every anecdote of someone going too fast on the beach, there’s a whole lot of people getting back on a bike for the first time ... or using them to get to work,” Hall said.
In the case of the kids racing down the beach, Hall said bike shops can do more to limit how their products are used.
He said when his shop receives new e-bikes, they can go up to 35 mph.
“No one wants to rent bikes going that fast,” he said.
So the shop can tune the bikes to change their max speed. In his case, Hall’s bikes can go only 18 to 20 mph.
That’s still a step up from traditional bikes that are powered by pedaling. Frank Babel, of Bike Walk Hilton Head, said cyclists usually travel between 8 and 14 mph.
Babel, Hall and town staff are working on a set of recommendations to help guide the town’s policy on e-bikes. They may include tuning bikes so their speed is reduced or providing educational materials about how to ride on the island.
“Our pathways weren’t built for bikes that go very very fast. There are too many curves and too many people on them,” Babel said. “Speed is the No. 1 thing that needs to be taken care of. The No. 2 issue is courtesy or etiquette — teaching people how to behave on the pathways. That’s going to involve some safety education.”
What’s next?
Ames’ public planning committee likely will discuss e-bike restrictions at its May 27 meeting.
Those interested can submit public comments regarding the issue online using the town’s Open Town Hall portal about a week before the meeting.
This story was originally published April 21, 2021 at 11:54 AM.
