E-Bikes and E-Scooters in King Township: Let’s Sort Out the Confusion
I want to start by saying I understand why these are everywhere.
For a lot of families in King Township, an e-bike solved a real problem. We’re a township of villages with distance between them and limited transit. A teenager on an e-bike can get to a friend’s house, a summer job or the community centre without a parent dropping everything to drive. Parents get an hour of their day back. For people who can’t manage the hills on a regular bike, an e-bike put cycling back on the table. These are good reasons, and the families who bought them were solving a problem I hear about constantly.
So this isn’t a piece telling anyone they made a bad decision. It’s a piece about rules that most people have never been told, because these devices arrived faster than anyone explained them. E-bike vs. e-scooter rules in Ontario: three machines, three sets of rules. Most of the confusion comes from lumping them together. An e-bike has working pedals, a motor of 500 watts or less, and tops out at 32 km/h. Riders need to be 16 or older with an approved helmet. E-bikes are permitted on most roads where regular bicycles are permitted. If this is what your family has, you’re in the most straightforward category.
An e-scooter is the stand-up kind with no seat and no pedals. Ontario only permits these in municipalities that have passed a bylaw allowing them. King hasn’t gone through that process, and most Ontario municipalities haven’t either. Right now that limits them to private property, which genuinely surprises almost everyone who owns one.
The third group is growing fastest and causing the most trouble: high-powered machines sold online that look like e-bikes but have no pedals and can reach highway speeds. Under the law these are motor vehicles, with all the licensing that implies. Plenty of parents bought one believing it was an e-bike.
That’s not carelessness. The marketing is genuinely misleading.
Are e-bikes allowed on King Township parks and trails?
King’s bylaw treats e-bikes and e-scooters as motorized vehicles, so they aren’t permitted in township parks or on township trails. Our paths are narrow and shared with young children, dog walkers and seniors. That one is about space more than anything else.
Why I’m raising it: e-bike and e-scooter injuries are rising.
The injury numbers are climbing, and they’re landing on young riders. Researchers at SickKids found nearly half the young people treated for e-scooter injuries were between 10 and 13, and more than half weren’t wearing helmets. Their case count for two summer months tripled in a single year. Broader research shows e-bike and e-scooter injuries rising steadily while injuries from regular bicycles have stayed flat.
Speed is the common factor in nearly all of it.
E-bike and e-scooter fines in Ontario: a few things worth knowing
The province, not the township, sets most of the penalties here, and they catch people off guard. Under the Highway Traffic Act, letting a rider under 16 use an e-bike carries a $110 fine, and so does carrying a passenger on one. Under Ontario’s e-scooter pilot rules, fines can range from $250 to $2,500. The detail most families don’t know is that these tickets typically go to the adult who owns the device, not to the young person riding it. I’d rather you heard that from a blog post than from an officer.
The simplest check: pedals or no pedals, and how fast does it go. Those two answers tell you which set of rules applies to your machine.
Where I stand on e-bike safety in King
Helmets on every ride, lights and a bell, one rider per device. None of that is complicated. What I’d like to see is clearer information available to residents, so families know what they’re buying before they buy it rather than after. I’ll keep working with York Regional Police on getting the word out, and I’ll keep listening as this area changes, because it’s changing quickly and the rules are still catching up.
These devices are part of how King gets around now. I’d rather we sort this out ahead of a serious injury than after one.
Steve Pellegrini
