Cape Girardeau Police are now fully enforcing the scooter ordinance passed in November of last year.
The new ordinance will require helmet usage, proof of insurance, restrict travel to roads with 35 miles per hour speed limits or lower, and a ban on passengers among a few other regulations.
Since the implementation of the ordinance, police have issued a number of citations, and there have been a couple minor scooter accidents reported. The Cape Girardeau Police Department do not have exact numbers of accidents or citations.
Doug Richards directs the university's Department of Public Safety. He believes the ordinance was necessary.
"With the pedestrian traffic, vehicle traffic, and scooter traffic all mixing, it can be dangerous, and I think anything we can do to protect the riders or drivers of these scooters is needed,” Richards said.
The city adopted the scooter ordinance after a university soccer player died in a scooter accident last year.
Richards believes the ordinance is an instrumental preventative measure.
"We've kind of heard both angles. But I think the underlying factor and the underlying force to this is it's going to help prevent injury and prevent even serious injury, hopefully even fatality, that type of thing,” Richards said. “So it's really a hard argument to argue against."
