Transit Agencies Providing or Subsidizing Innovative Micromobility Projects: Legal Issues (2024)
Chapter: Transit Agencies Providing or Subsidizing Innovative Micromobility Projects: Legal Issues
TRANSIT COOPERATIVE RESEARCH PROGRAM
Sponsored by the Federal Transit Administration
Transit Agencies Providing or Subsidizing Innovative Micromobility Projects: Legal Issues
This report was prepared under TCRP Project J-05, “Legal Aspects of Transit and Intermodal Transportation Programs,” for which the Transportation Research Board is the agency coordinating the research. The report was prepared under Topic 21-02 by Matthew W. Daus, Windels, Marx, Lane & Mittendorf LLP, New York, NY. The opinions and conclusions expressed or implied in this digest are those of the researchers who performed the research and are not necessarily those of the Transportation Research Board; the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine; or the program sponsors. The responsible senior program officer is Gwen Chisholm Smith.
Background
The nation’s 6,800 plus public transportation agencies need to have access to a program that can provide authoritatively researched, specific studies of legal issues and problems having national significance and application to the public transportation industry. Some legal issues and problems are unique to transit agencies. For example, compliance with transit-equipment and operations guidelines, FTA financing initiatives, private-sector programs, and labor or environmental standards relating to transit operations. Also, much of the information that is needed by public transit attorneys to address legal concerns is not summarized in a single source. Consequently, it would be helpful to the transit lawyer to have well-resourced and well-documented reports on specific legal topics available to the public transportation legal community.
The Legal Research Digests (LRDs) are developed to assist public transit attorneys in dealing with initiatives and problems associated with transit start-up and operations, as well as with day-to-day legal works. The LRDs address such issues as eminent domain, civil rights, constitutional rights, contracting, environmental concerns, labor, procurement, risk management, security, tort liability, and zoning. The transit legal research, when conducted through the TRB’s legal studies process, either collects primary data that generally are not available elsewhere or performs analysis of existing literature.
Foreword
The use of scooters, bicycles, e-bikes, and other forms of micromobility has accelerated due to the COVID-19 pandemic, urban congestion, and parking restrictions. Some transit agencies provide or subsidize micromobility to bridge the gap between transit stops and destinations beyond a comfortable walking distance. While bikes and scooters are not new, micromobility has only recently been used in public transit. In this digest, micromobility refers to small, low-speed, human- or electric-powered vehicles, including bicycles, scooters, electric-assist bicycles (e-bikes), electric scooters (e-scooters), electric skateboards, and adaptive versions of these devices.
This digest presents practices for transit agencies to consider when implementing shared-use micromobility systems to provide and support public transit, including accessibility, safety, regulation, jurisdiction, service quality, theft, insurance, liability, security, tracking, licensing, permitting, franchising, billing, maintenance, environmental justice, and compliance with civil rights laws. This digest also provides examples of cities regulating bike and scooter share programs and transit agencies participating in such programs.
This digest will be useful to lawyers representing public transportation agencies of all sizes, transit operators, administrators, planners, and risk managers.
