POINT PLEASANT BEACH — The borough council discussed plans to draft an ordinance governing the use of e-bikes with the borough at its April 15 meeting.
Council President Mike Ramos said he and Councilwoman Arlene Testa were working to research and develop a comprehensive e-bike ordinance that would include key components like defining different low-speed bicycles, laying out safety requirements and prohibiting the bikes altogether in certain places.
“The mayor, myself, Councilwoman Testa, Chief (Robert) Kowalewski and our attorney, Mike Collins, were all kind of involved in this. Arlene and I took it upon ourselves to work on this and get something to the council by April,” said the council president. “We went back and forth, we looked at a lot of different towns and we picked a lot of the ones which we felt had strong ordinances.”
“In this potential (draft), we are looking at specifically defining the different e-bikes and low-speed bikes. We’re laying out safety features that are required,” said Ramos. “One important thing that we think is more specific to Point Pleasant Beach is prohibiting them at certain locations in town.”
Some places where the council was considering prohibiting the bikes are the boardwalk, Pleasure Park and the bandshell area around Baltimore and Arnold avenues.
“The three key areas that we know have been an issue with e-bikes on the sidewalks, where they’re going very fast in high-pedestrian areas (are): Arnold Avenue from Lincoln Avenue to the corner of Route 35 North; Bay Avenue from Laurel Avenue to Arnold Avenue; and Route 35 South from McLean Avenue to Laurel Avenue,” he said.
“We haven’t finalized anything like that in our heads yet…it’s our starting point,” said Ramos. “I know we just got it to (the rest of the council), so it’s something that we can look at potentially introducing in the not-too-distant future.”
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