We can’t scoot around this issue

It is a wide-ranging debate that has seldom traversed the middle of the road. Except, of course, when it comes to the vehicles in question taking to that particular stretch of some of our inner-city thoroughfares. For the most part, discussion has been polarised, on the fringes, the footpaths. Which is exactly where, many critics believe, the electric scooters with the green livery should not be permitted. ‘‘E-scooters are dangerous to both their riders and pedestrians and should therefore be banned,’’ said one letter. Short, emphatic. Oh, like cars? Or motorcycles, bicycles, skateboards etc?

On the other hand, there have been calls for the current trialling of the electric scooters in Auckland and Christchurch to be ‘‘celebrated’’, not panned. The fun police are out in force, some have suggested.

So should the stories of users of the

Lime scooter being badly injured, including one facing a possible root canal after hitting the pavement face-first while avoiding pedestrians, or of near collisions with other public space users, be written off as the inevitable ‘‘teething problems’’ that come with an edgy, fun new transport alternative? Would the answer to that have been different if there had been an even more serious outcome?

In reality, the ongoing animated chatter about Lime e-scooters, already used in numerous cities globally, is an extension of a much wider debate about how we should get around our inner cities, and perhaps even the centres of our larger towns, in future.

It’s a debate that traverses our reliance on fossil fuels, and the cars we drive that primarily rely on them, burning more petrol or diesel, and thus generating more greenhouse gases, in stop-start downtown driving than on the open road.

Given the gloomy report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change several weeks ago, and the need for urgent action, a significant reduction in the burning of fossil fuels in our cities has to be positive. E-scooters are one way to do that, as are the Onzo dockless fixed-gear bicycles now available for use in Auckland and Wellington, where they saw nearly 6000 trips made in their first week. The capital also has the Mevo hybrid electric car share scheme, set to expand to Auckland soon.

Our biggest cities are on a learning curve when it comes to transport in their congested CBDs and there will have to be rapid adjustments. The Lime trial has already raised the vexed question of so-called ‘‘low-powered vehicles’’ cruising footpaths at up to 27kmh, causing problems for pedestrians, and potentially also mobility scooter users.

Numerous under-age users have clearly been able to access the app-enabled scooters, presumably via their parents’ credit cards (they’re not cheap, at about $18 per hour). Those aren’t reasons to ban the scooters, but they do show Auckland and Christchurch need to look carefully at the regulations around them, and how they’re policed.

In our inner cities of the future, cyclists, pedestrians, scooter and mobility scooter riders, and the drivers of electric cars and buses, will need to co-exist safely. If we learn to make that happen while the landscape is still so dominated by fossilfuel burning vehicles, it should make the future that much easier to adapt to.

‘‘In our inner cities of the future, cyclists, pedestrians, scooter and mobility scooter riders, and

the drivers of electric cars and buses, will need to co-exist safely.’’