Bring back freaking school buses
The crazy thing to me was a parent saying that she’d have to drive her kid to school now. Why? What about a regular bike, or the bus?
I am against a stupid ban like this, but what is the logic of no ebike = have to drive?
A lot of people can’t afford multiple bikes, if they bought their kid an ebike, which was okay at the time but now they can’t… It puts some people into a hard spot. Imagine if the school said ‘no more vehicles with hoods taller than the students’ to keep the kids safe. Would it make it safer for kids, definitely; is it going way overboard, again definitely.
As long as they exist kids are still going to use them. You’d think it would be more beneficial for everyone if they decided to maybe teach the kids how to operate bikes and and e-bikes properly and safely instead. (Including care and basic maintenance and how to recharge batteries without burning your house down.)
You know, life skills.
A kid riding an ebike is safer than a 17 year old driving a hatchback by a large margin.
TF are you talking about; this is a school, we don’t educate people around here… Especially not on life skills. Shut up and enjoy your history class; that we’ve conveniently re-written to suit our current ideals/goals.
You mean public test-prep prisons?
We should definately fire the history teacher to afford classes to teach a portion of the student body how to not be pricks. What good is history anyway? I mean California is just indoctrinating kids anyway. just listen to this drivel.
Wherever possible, the past should be explored through the eyes of women, men, and children from a variety of historical groups. Viewing the past from the perspectives of those that lived it is best done through a variety of primary sources. Throughout the year students should be introduced to sources presented in different formats. They should begin to understand that people in the past had different perspectives, and that one goal of learning history is to understand why people in the past lived the way they lived. It is also intended for students to begin to understand why the current world is structured the way it is
I guess sarcasm really is lost on people when you don’t spell it out for them…
“/S”
Happy now?
Admittedly, California is reasonably good; but I was highlighting the fact that (generally, not specifically California, not even just America) many modern schools often fail to teach students useful life skills like road safety or personal finance, instead teaching things like modified versions of history such as holocaust denialism.
History is ofc important and students should be learning about it accurately; but I’ve always thought there should be a bigger focus on immediately useful life skills.
Knowing what happened in the 1860s (US civil war) is good and all, but not very helpful if you misunderstand where/how you’re supposed to safely ride your bike otw to school and die in a car accident at 13yo because of it.
thank you, I wasn’t sure if you were being sarcastic or not. I don’t really get sarcasm, you could probably tell that my my response which should be taken 100% at face value.
You could say the same about cars but millions die each year because of them.
Imagine how much worse it would be if you didn’t need any training or license whatsoever for a car.
You don’t need training or a license to operate a car. You need training and a license to operate a car legally.
Fuck carbrained assholes. The kids are trying to help, and they want to ban the “newfangled machine that we didn’t have as kids.”
To be clear this is directed at the school board more than the residents of the neighborhood.
I think it’s a bit more complicated than that.
District Attorney Todd Spitzer’s office said injuries involving e-bikes and e-motorcycles in Southern California had increased 430% over four years. The office has also pursued cases against parents accused of knowingly allowing children to operate electric motorcycles illegally.
I see these electric dirt bikes everywhere, kids usually aren’t wearing helmets, and they’re pretty reckless with them. These are “bikes” that do not conform to e-bike standards for riding on the road without licensing. Fun, yes, but an accident waiting to happen. I think the school overreached, and should allow ebikes that conform to legal requirements to ride them unlicensed, but they are fighting a legitimate problem. They should have police there ticketing and impounding the illegal bikes and let the parents sort it out. I’ll bet many of the parents don’t even know their kids are illegally riding what is effectively a motorcycle, and there is no insurance to cover their liability.
I find statistics about how e-bike accidents have surged by X% irritating. They are often cited by people who want to see them banned, but there is never any context included. How much has ridership itself increased? What percentage of these involved unlicensed e-motos? What proportion of these accidents showed definite fault on the part of the cyclist? How do the figures compare to scooters (e or not), regular bikes, skateboards, inline skates, etc.
I’m not saying there isn’t a problem. More regulation/education/infrastructure may be needed if there is an obvious trend in say total hospital visits surging since children got access to e-bikes or e-scooters. But it’s never framed that way in articles. They always read that e-bike-related accidents are on the increase. That alone is hardly surprising when they were much less available in the first place a decade ago.
When I see stats like that it just reminds me how disconnected most people are. I don’t doubt for a second that injuries related to them have increased, but many more ebikes/scooters/eucs/etc. are there on the road now vs 4 years ago? I’d be willing to bet it grew by a few million (just from a cursory Google search it claims 4.5-6 million more on the road than in 2022).
It’s like how they say ‘90% of accidents happen within x distance of home’; no shit most the accidents happen where I’m most likely to be.
Year 1: 8 ebike injuries Year 2: 24 ebike injuries
Report: EBIKE INJURIES ARE UP 300%!!!
First of all, I agree that powerful e-motorcycles being misrepresented as bicycles is the vast majority of the problem here.
That said, even legitimate Class 1 and 2 e-bikes aren’t legal to operate by people under age 16 in some places.
Injuries involving ebikes increased 430%? Sounds alarming. How much has ebike use increased over that period?
Another interesting statistic would be how frequently kids are out side and/or active.
Had the number of affordable ebikes also tossed 430%? I wouldn’t be surprised. I hate ebikes but I prefer kids riding those to being in cars.
From a quick search we had like 1.5-2 million ebikes on the road in 2022 and between 6.5-8 million now so I’d say there are around 400% of the total ebikes on the road from 2022, being ridden now. Over the past 4 years the average age of riders seems to be getting lower too… Maybe that is playing into the numbers a bit.
So enforce the laws and get those illegal e-motos off the road. Also ticket the parents of children who refuse to use a helmet. If it’s good enough for Tony Hawk, it’s good enough for you.
So we should be mad at the article for not distiguishing
I’d say you should be mad at the school district; they’ve failed to distinguish and instead put in a blanket ban on electric bikes/scooters of all types, legal or not.
Some kids/parrents break the law and ride unsafely or use devices that exceed legal standards, so nobody gets cheap convenient and efficient transport. - School District
Those are car crashes. The cara hit them, then we blame the bikes
Are you saying that a bicycle can’t be at fault?
I can’t speak to what they are or are not saying, but bicycles (electric and manual alike) often get blamed when they are not at fault, that is an undeniable trend.
Clearly it’s a snowboarders fault.
By: Author Olivia Richman
Posted on Last updated: September 1, 2026
Categories News
A California school district wanted electric bikes away from its younger students’ campuses. The bikes did not necessarily disappear. Some of them moved across the property line.
Students at Ensign Intermediate School in Newport Beach who continue riding e-bikes to school have been parking them on nearby public streets, and CBS Los Angeles found residents dealing with groups of as many as 20 bikes outside their homes. Some parents, meanwhile, say their children have faced confrontations and other problems after being pushed off school property.
The situation follows a new Newport-Mesa Unified School District policy prohibiting students in transitional kindergarten through eighth grade from possessing or operating e-bikes and e-motos on school property, including the campus periphery. High school students can still bring e-bikes to campus after meeting the district’s safety requirements.
The policy was intended to address safety concerns surrounding young riders. Less than two weeks into the school year, however, Newport Beach is dealing with another question: Where exactly are all those e-bikes supposed to go?
Across The Street
The district’s new bicycle and e-bike policy took effect with the 2026-27 school year. Students in TK through eighth grade cannot possess or operate e-bikes on school property or around the campus perimeter, while traditional bicycles remain permitted.
The school board approved the policy 6-1 in April after months of debate. High school students were treated differently, in part because board members recognized that older students may rely on e-bikes to reach jobs and after-school activities.
At Ensign, at least some younger riders found a straightforward workaround. They ride to the neighborhood around school and leave their e-bikes there.
Resident Janet Montgomery told CBS Los Angeles that the bikes have appeared in groups of up to 20 at a time. She said they initially blocked walkways and have interfered with residents trying to garden or move their cars.
That has created a new dispute over bikes that were previously stored on school grounds.
Two girls told the station that somebody deflated the tires on their e-bikes. Parent Tim Middleton said someone left a note on his son’s bike warning that it would be impounded if it was parked in the same location again.
Middleton said he has told his son to keep parking responsibly, avoiding red zones, keeping the bikes near the curb, and respecting the people who live nearby.
Another student’s experience shows that simply finding a public bike rack may not settle the matter.
CBS reported that a student who left an e-bike at nearby John Wayne Park received a notice from Newport Beach Public Works warning that the bike would be confiscated if it was not removed within 24 hours.
Parents Push Back
The parking dispute comes as some Ensign parents are mounting a broader challenge to the district’s policy.
Alex Williamson, whose son continues riding an e-bike to school, told CBS that he believes students are less safe parking away from campus because they are now interacting with people outside school grounds and leaving expensive bikes more vulnerable to theft.
Williamson and another Ensign parent, Sarah Middleton, went considerably further in an Aug. 27 community opinion piece published by Voice of OC, calling for the district to rescind the policy and restore e-bike access to campus racks.
The two Costa Mesa residents argued that the policy did not eliminate students’ e-bike trips. Instead, they said, it moved the parking onto public streets while adding more cars to school drop-off and pickup traffic.
They also pointed to a distinction at the center of the disagreement. The district controls its campus and bike racks, but it does not generally control what students ride on public streets before arriving at school.
Their position is not the only one among parents.
When the ban took effect, some families told CBS Los Angeles that they welcomed the change. One father said the district’s decision helped his family resist pressure to buy his daughter an e-bike, while another parent said losing the transportation option meant she expected to be late for work because she would have to drive her child through school traffic.
The disagreement was already apparent before the policy passed. Parents and students spoke against the proposal at board meetings, while supporters argued that younger riders lacked the experience needed to safely operate the increasingly popular electric bikes.
A Bigger Crackdown
Newport-Mesa’s policy did not emerge in isolation.
Orange County has been escalating its response to e-bikes and more powerful electric motorcycles following serious and sometimes fatal crashes involving young riders.
In May, the Orange County District Attorney’s Office announced a dedicated e-bike and e-motorcycle prosecution unit to review potential criminal cases involving juveniles, adults, and parents who knowingly allow children to operate illegal electric motorcycles.
District Attorney Todd Spitzer’s office said injuries involving e-bikes and e-motorcycles in Southern California had increased 430% over four years. The office has also pursued cases against parents accused of knowingly allowing children to operate electric motorcycles illegally.
Newport Beach itself has tightened the rules.
City regulations that took effect in January require e-bike riders to travel at reasonable speeds, follow traffic controls, yield when required, and use bike lanes where posted. The city specifically prohibits behavior including weaving through pedestrians, performing wheelies, riding distracted, carrying passengers on devices not designed for them, and riding without required lighting.
Violations can result in citations, fines, and possible impoundment.
The city has also specifically prohibited riding e-bikes and several similar devices on the Newport Elementary School playground during designated hours, and its municipal code allows bicycles and e-bikes left in city parks or attached to city property for 48 hours or longer to be treated as abandoned and impounded.
So the argument playing out around Ensign is taking place in a community that has already spent considerable time deciding where e-bikes can be ridden, how they can be ridden, and who should be responsible when young riders break the rules.
Now it may have to decide where students can leave them.
Finding A Spot
Newport Beach Councilmember Erik Weigand supports the school district’s e-bike ban, but he told CBS that the current parking situation may require some adjustment.
Weigand said city staff are researching ways to find a middle ground. One possibility could involve one- or two-hour parking restrictions, although he acknowledged that those restrictions could have consequences for residents as well.
There is another connection between the city and the school district: Weigand’s wife, Krista Weigand, sits on the Newport-Mesa Unified School District board and voted with the majority that approved the policy.
The lone opposing vote came from Trustee Ashley Anderson. Voice of OC reported after the April vote that Anderson had questioned whether the district was moving ahead before Newport Beach and neighboring Costa Mesa had aligned their approaches to e-bikes.
Her concern now looks particularly relevant.
The school district can keep younger students’ e-bikes off its property. Newport Beach controls the streets, parks, and other public spaces surrounding Ensign. Residents have their own expectations about what happens in front of their homes.
The students and their bikes are sitting directly in the middle of all three.
If it were my house, I’d install bike racks.
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Good. Fight the power
