Will my loophole work?

Here is the deal. My fiance recently bought an electric scooter. It looks something like a cross between a toy and maybe something serious. She rode it up and down the street and I got to hand it to her, the thing actually works well. You simply plug it in overnight and it is good for short commutes. She intends to ride it back and forth to work, a 1.8 mile jaunt.

Now I was against this in the beginning, because I did not want to see her waste her money on some piece of junk, but now I can see that it might work out. The problem is our state law excludes any electric scooters from street use unless they are titled and registered, with the exception of personal mobility devices. Okay fine. I pulled up the ORC (Ohio Revised Code) and the definition of a personal mobility device apart from what is considered an electric motor scooter is this:

(TT) “Electric personal assistive mobility device” means a self-balancing two non-tandem wheeled device that is designed to transport only one person, has an electric propulsion system of an average of seven hundred fifty watts, and when ridden on a paved level surface by an operator who weighs one hundred seventy pounds has a maximum speed of less than twenty miles per hour.

Now what I see as the loophole is this; I can attach these $17 retractable training wheels I saw at Wal-Mart and then this electric scooter now becomes a personal assistive mobility device.

Here's how. The first clause of this law is that it be self-balancing. Any object with 3 or more points of contact with the ground will be self balancing in a static condition. Secondly, with additional wheels, the scooter no longer can be defined as exclusively a tandem two-wheeled vehicle. Also, an average power of 750 watts does not state what the set of data the average is taking into account - this sentence is too vague. Finally, I can limit the current to the motor to assure it will comply with the speed requirement.

Other than this, it has all the functioning safety components required for street operation.

I do not see the reason that something like this needs to be titled, tagged, and insured, just as a bicycle does not need any of this.

Do you think my arguments would win a case if she were cited for riding an electric motor scooter on the street if I made this case that it was a personal mobility device?



[edit on 24-11-2007 by ben91069]

You quote says nothing about weather self balancing only relates to when the vehicle is stationary.

reply to post by Now_Then



A good and not unnoticed point. This is the exact text of the code and is so loosely written that even without extra wheels one could argue that it balances quite well when it is moving.

Me thinks the whole exclusion of electric scooters without licensing is a deterrent to get people to drive gas vehicles and buy into the insurance lobby. Can you believe they require you buy liability insurance also so your 80 lb scooter does not kill anyone? Seriously, it is all about paying the man his money for the right to travel.

The law is not there for us mortal people!

If the powers that be, want to "have you" for driving your scooter, then they will do. They will find laws within laws and then screw you.

MonKey

reply to post by ChiKeyMonKey


Would you believe I think TPTB cannot actually write a law that is unconstitutional, but they find loopholes themselves then write vaguely worded legislation and depend on the goodwill of the people to believe they mean what they say they mean. Take the whole IRS tax code regarding income versus earnings, one refers to a form of capital gain and the other is just compensation for labor. As long as we don't see the difference, we pay them whatever we think we are liable for.

Complete utter nonsense.