House Transportation Committee hears testimony on bill to authorize municipal e‑scooter programs

Harrisburg — The House Transportation Committee held a public hearing on HB 1633, a bill by Representative Emily Kinkade that would allow municipalities to authorize shared electric scooter programs while setting rules for private ownership.

"E‑scooters are, first and foremost, a micromobility option," Representative Emily Kinkade said in opening testimony, saying the devices filled first‑and‑last‑mile gaps in parts of Pittsburgh and supported late‑night workers when buses were not running. Kinkade described her bill as a framework that lets municipalities opt in to shared‑scooter programs while providing local governments and PennDOT tools for oversight.

Kinkade said the bill is modeled on lessons from Pittsburgh’s pilot and would not force cities to participate. "It is entirely optional for the e‑scooter share," she told committee members, explaining that private ownership would remain legal but that municipalities choosing to allow commercial deployment would need to meet program requirements.

Insurance industry witnesses said the commercial expansion raises enforcement and coverage concerns. Jonathan Greer, president and CEO of the Insurance Federation of Pennsylvania, told the committee the bill would broaden commercial deployment to many 3rd‑class cities and urged assurances of enforcement capacity. Greer said the bill includes commercial coverage references and that he has concerns about rider protections in operators’ user agreements; he quoted a company agreement that warns "use of these services may result in bodily injury ... and death." He also noted the draft bill’s commercial liability and auto references ($2,000,000 and $1,000,000 respectively) and said first‑party coverage for individual riders appears limited.

Several members pressed the insurers on how a personally owned scooter could be insured and whether drivers would bear disproportionate costs after collisions. Insurers responded that most personal‑line auto and homeowners policies are not written to cover non‑motor‑vehicle e‑scooters and that tailored products for personal ownership are uncommon, while commercial deployment policies require specific auto endorsements.

Representatives from Pittsburgh and operators described program design and local safeguards. Ryan Seifert, curbside and shared mobility program manager for Pittsburgh’s Department of Mobility and Infrastructure, reviewed the city’s July 2021–July 2023 pilot: more than 1,000,000 rides, roughly 230,000 unique users, 1.4 million miles traveled, and average trips of about one mile. He said 44% of riders used scooters to get to work and that 85,000 trips occurred in designated "access zones" targeted at lower‑income or transit‑poor neighborhoods.

Seifert said Pittsburgh prohibited sidewalk riding and parking during the pilot, built hundreds of dedicated scooter parking corrals, tested sidewalk‑detection technology, and used geofencing to prevent scooters from operating in tunnels. Those operational controls, he said, helped reduce sidewalk parking and allowed rapid removal of incorrectly parked devices.

Operator representatives echoed the value of local controls and revenue sharing. A Lime representative said operators commonly include geofencing, speed caps and per‑trip or per‑vehicle fees that can fund enforcement, parking corrals and staff oversight. The company offered to provide incident and insurance data to the committee for follow up.

Committee members also discussed a separate amendment offered by Representative Jen O’Mara that would impose helmet requirements and age limits for minors (the proposed amendment contained age tiers including a 16‑to‑18 helmet requirement). O’Mara cited the recent death of a 12‑year‑old in Delaware County as a motivating factor for stricter protections for minors.

Members asked for additional information before further action: the Pittsburgh pilot report, incident and enforcement data, details on insurance availability, and clarification about how local governments without specialized mobility departments would meet program requirements. The committee requested the pilot closeout report and follow‑up materials from both insurers and operators.

The committee did not take a vote at the hearing. Chair closed the session after members said they would continue stakeholder outreach with PennDOT, local governments, law enforcement and the insurance industry.