People riding electric kickboards can be seen easily these days. These shared electronic kickboards have been furnished in most cities in South Korea since 2019. Citizens' interest and usage have been higher especially in 2020. However, most of the users riding them do not put on their safety helmets, and some ride them narrowly in the walkway. Moreover, teens without licenses started to ride them dangerously. Since this problem has been a big issue, the necessity for the new regulation was asked for the safety of users and also pedestrians.
From May 13, new traffic laws on electric kickboard have gone into effect. Riding an electric kickboard without a helmet has a fine of 20000 won, riding with another person in one kickboard is 40000 won, and riding without a license is 100000 won. On the first day of the guidance, lots of users who did not follow the new law said they did not know about the new law, and some of them also said they will not ride these electric kickboards if they have to put on a helmet.
Since the new regulation has appeared, enterprises running these shared electronic kickboards are in a panic. Now, only Neuron Mobility placed a helmet on their kickboard. Beam Mobility has spoken out that they had placed 300 helmets for explain system, but 200 helmets were missing and 50 of them were damaged so much that they could not be used anymore. Also, Lime Korea said they were wondering if they would give a helmet to those who have a large amount of usage or sell a helmet in good quality at a cheap price.
However, according to one survey, "Electric kickboard's safety helmet Recognition Survey" which was participated by 2000 adults in the metropolitan area, 99 percent gave a positive response to the question, "Do we need more new regulations on electric kickboard?" Also, 10.5 percent answered that they would not use a shared electric kickboard if the helmet is needed.
The micro-mobility industry got a strike since the number of users of the shared electric kickboard has decreased, but since lots of the safety accidents are caused by electric kickboard, it is certain that more regulations are needed.
May 22, 2021
By Kim Won Hwi
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