Powered Micromobility Devices

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR <SUBAGY>National Park Service</SUBAGY> <CFR>36 CFR Parts 1, 2, and 4</CFR> <DEPDOC>[NPS-WASO-38853; GPO Deposit Account 4311H2]</DEPDOC> <RIN>RIN 1024-AE79</RIN> <SUBJECT>Powered Micromobility Devices</SUBJECT> <HD SOURCE="HED">AGENCY:</HD> National Park Service, Interior. <HD SOURCE="HED">ACTION:</HD> Proposed rule. <SUM> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUMMARY:</HD> The National Park Service proposes a management framework for the use of powered micromobility devices within the National Park System. The proposed rule would define powered micromobility devices separately from motor vehicles, traditional bicycles, electric bicycles, and human powered coasting devices, and create rules for where and how they may be used in units of the National Park System. Examples of powered micromobility devices include electric scooters (e-scooters), hoverboards, and Segways. </SUM> <EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">DATES:</HD> Comments on the proposed rule must be received by 11:59 p.m. eastern time on March 17, 2025. </EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">ADDRESSES:</HD> You may submit comments, identified by Regulation Identifier Number (RIN) 1024-AE79, by either of the following methods: (1) <E T="03">Electronically:</E> Go to the Federal eRulemaking Portal: <E T="03">https://www.regulations.gov.</E> Follow the instructions for submitting comments. (2) <E T="03">By hard copy:</E> Mail to: Jay Calhoun, National Park Service, Division of Regulations, Jurisdiction and Special Park Uses, MS-2472, 1849 C Street NW, Washington, DC 20240. <E T="03">Instructions:</E> Comments will not be accepted by fax, email, or in any way other than those specified above. All submissions received must include the words “National Park Service” or “NPS” and must include the docket number or RIN (1024-AE79) for this rulemaking. Comments received may be posted without change to <E T="03">https://www.regulations.gov,</E> including any personal information provided. <E T="03">Docket:</E> For access to the docket to read comments received, go to <E T="03">https://www.regulations.gov</E> and search for “1024-AE79”. <FURINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:</HD> Jay Calhoun, Division of Regulations, Jurisdiction and Special Park Uses, National Park Service; phone: (202) 513-7112; email: <E T="03">waso_regulations@nps.gov.</E> Individuals in the United States who are deaf, deafblind, hard of hearing, or have a speech disability may dial 711 (TTY, TDD, or TeleBraille) to access telecommunications relay services. Individuals outside the United States should use the relay services offered within their country to make international calls to the point-of-contact in the United States. In compliance with the Providing Accountability Through Transparency Act of 2023, the plain language summary of the proposal is available on <E T="03">https://www.regulations.gov</E> in the docket for this rulemaking. </FURINF> <SUPLINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:</HD> <HD SOURCE="HD1">Background</HD> Powered micromobility devices, such as e-scooters, hoverboards and Segways, are appearing on lands administered by the National Park Service (NPS) with greater frequency, especially in urban locations. Units of the National Park System, such as the National Mall and Memorial Parks in Washington, DC, are filled with e-scooters on a daily basis as visitors use them to access, leave, and travel through the park, including on sidewalks and paths that are shared with pedestrians. Other System units with considerable use of e-scooters and other powered micromobility devices include Golden Gate National Recreation Area, San Antonio Missions National Historical Park, Mississippi National River and Recreation Area, and Cape Cod National Seashore. The U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) Federal Highway Administration provides a fact sheet with an overview on micromobility, along with links to additional resources. <SU>1</SU> <FTREF/> U.S. DOT also funds the Pedestrian and Bicycle Information Center (PBIC), which has a website containing a volume of information about active transportation, including micromobility devices. The information in this Background section is a basic overview of powered micromobility devices that is found on the PBIC website. Please visit <E T="03">https://www.pedbikeinfo.org</E> /for more information. <FTNT> <SU>1</SU>  U.S. Department of Transportation, Federal Highway Administration, Fact Sheet on Micromobility. </FTNT> The U.S. DOT and PBIC classify traditional and electric bicycles as micromobility devices; however, the use of traditional and electric bicycles in units of the National Park System is already governed by regulations in 36 CFR 4.30 and therefore is not addressed in this proposed rule. As used in the Background section of this proposed rule, the term “powered micromobility devices” does not refer to traditional bicycles, nor does it refer to electric bicycles, nor to human powered coasting devices such as roller skates and skateboards, which are governed by NPS regulations at 36 CFR 2.20. It does refer to electric standing or sitting scooters (e-scooters) and devices such as electric skateboards, electric skates, and one-wheeled or two-wheeled electric self-balancing devices ( <E T="03">e.g.,</E> balance wheels, hoverboards and Segways). According to the PBIC, powered micromobility devices share three common characteristics. <SU>2</SU> <FTREF/> First, powered micromobility devices are motorized. They can be fully motorized or motor-assisted, in which the rider can provide some human-powered propulsion, such as by kicking. They usually involve a battery-powered electric motor that provides 750 watts of maximum power. Second, powered micromobility devices are operated at low speed. Most powered micromobility devices are designed to travel at or below 20 miles per hour (mph), although some can reach 30 mph. <SU>3</SU> <FTREF/> Others may be regulated to lower maximum speeds, such as 8 mph or less, to be compatible with sidewalk use. Third, powered micromobility devices are small in size. Most powered micromobility devices are three feet wide or less to fit within the standard width of a bike lane or sidewalk. Most powered micromobility devices weigh less than 50 pounds. Due to their weight and size, most powered micromobility devices are designed to be used by single riders. <FTNT> <SU>2</SU>  Sandt, L. (October 2019). The basics of micromobility and related motorized devices for personal transport. Pedestrian and Bicycle Information Center: Chapel Hill, NC. </FTNT> <FTNT> <SU>3</SU>  The Society of Automotive Engineers classifies powered micromobility devices as those with a top speed of less than 30 mph. See Taxonomy and Classification of Powered Micromobility Vehicles J3194_201911 issued November 20, 2019. </FTNT> Users can own or rent powered micromobility devices. Rentals account for the majority of use in urban areas due to the deployment of shared fleets by private companies such as Uber, Lyft, Bird, and Lime. Shared fleets provide users with on-demand access to powered micromobility devices, which operators typically unlock using a smartphone application. Powered micromobility devices that are part of shared fleets are most commonly parked in public rights-of-way, such as sidewalks. In some cases, parking areas or docks may exist for grouping devices when they are not in use. Powered micromobility devices are mostly used in cities and serve a variety of transportation and public health goals. Shared powered micromobility devices provide communities with healthy, affordable, and low- or no-emission transportation options. <SU>4</SU> <FTREF/> Powered micromobility devices can help close first- and last-mile gaps to transit and offer individuals greater access to jobs, health care, and other services. <SU>5</SU> <FTREF/> This may be particularly true for underserved communities. <SU>6</SU> <FTREF/> Powered and adaptive micromobility devices may increase mobility for older adults or individuals with disabilities because they are less strenuous to operate than traditional bicycles or scooters. <SU>7</SU> <FTREF/> San Francisco, Portland, Kansas City, and Washington, DC, expressly align e-scooter use with the goal of reducing carbon emissions and air pollution. <SU>8</SU> <FTREF/> Powered micromobility devices serve the NPS's goal of promoting alternative transportation systems in System units that use modes of travel other than private motor vehicles. Alternative transportation systems can help connect communities to parks, manage congestion and ease parking shortages, improve air quality and soundscapes, and reduce collisions between automobiles and wildlife. Shared powered micromobility devices continue to become more prevalent and popular. The North American Bikeshare and Scootershare Association estimates that 62.2 million trips on e-scooters were taken in North America in 2021. <SU>9</SU> <FTREF/> <FTNT> <SU>4</SU>  U.S. Department of Transportation, Federal Highway Administration, Shared Micromobility and Equity Primer. </FTNT> <FTNT> <SU>5</SU>  U.S. Department of Transportation, Federal Highway Administration, Fact Sheet on Micromobility. </FTNT> <FTNT> <SU>6</SU>  Id. See also U.S. Department of Transportation, Federal Highway Administration, Shared Micromobility and Equity Primer. </FTNT> <FTNT> <SU>7</SU>  U.S. Department of Transportation, Federal Highway Administration, Fact Sheet on Micromobility. </FTNT> <FTNT> <SU>8</SU>  Blickstein, S. <E T="03">et al.</E> (December 2019). E-Scooter Programs: Current State of Practice in US Cities. </FTNT> <FTNT> <SU>9</SU>  NABSA 2021 Shared Micromobility State of the Industry Report. </FTNT> <HD SOURCE="HD1">Existing Regulatory Framework</HD> ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Preview showing 10k of 44k characters. Full document text is stored and available for version comparison. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━