As Elk Grove rolls out e-bike program, residents and leaders say safety should be a priority

Keith Hayes was riding his electric bike on the sidewalk along Elk Grove Boulevard near Bruceville Road on a busy afternoon when he was nearly struck by a driver who wasn’t paying attention.

The Elk Grove resident said he felt like the car wasn’t going to stop. It didn’t, but luckily his bike was already in brake mode.

“I kid you not, (I was) one inch from being hit, one inch,” Hayes said. “My tire touched the car. I hit my brakes so hard I broke the cable on the brakes to stop. It scared me so bad.”

Hayes has shifted his exercise routine to early in the morning to make up for the lesson he learned almost four years ago.

As the city of Elk Grove rolled out its new e-bike program, Hayes was there to celebrate the milestone, check out their bikes and see what rebates the city would be offering to get more riders on the road.

But Hayes said that as the city incentivizes more people to share the road on two wheels, safety should be a priority.

“We need more protection, like downtown Sacramento,” Hayes said. “They have bike lanes that people can ride in. They don’t have to worry because they have barriers there. We don’t have any of that and I think that will help a lot if we have the barriers with the bike lanes.”

Elk Grove’s e-bike program is novel. The city will lend residents e-bikes for up to three weeks and help those who qualify purchase an e-bike through the city’s voucher program.

Hayes went out to the ceremony Tuesday with his own electric bike that he purchased around the time of his run-in with a motorist. He was interested in getting another e-bike through the voucher program.

“I went to this bike because it has bigger tires and ... has more stability,” said Hayes, who switched from a mountain bike to make exercising a little easier as he got older. “You can cheat more on the electric bike. So if you don’t want to pedal, you don’t have to. This particular bike, you have four pedal assists, but you also have full throttle where you don’t have to pedal at all.”

But with opportunity comes danger, he said.

“There’s so much distracted driving out here,” Hayes said. “People are rushing, trying to get to where they’re going, not paying attention. You’ve got to look both ways, they tell you, you’ve got to look both ways.”

Unlike Sacramento, for example, Hayes said Elk Grove only has bike lane barriers on Elk Grove Boulevard along the overpass between Four Winds Drive and Franklin Boulevard. Hayes said more riders would give the community the juice needed to demand more protections.

“If we get more bikers out here, then we can go to the council and say, ‘OK, we need more bike lanes,’” Hayes said.

Elk Grove Councilman Sergio Robles, who was also at the program kick-off, said he is aware of the need to increase bike safety in the city. He’s even witnessed an accident near Elk Grove and Franklin boulevards. It prompted a discussion, he said, among city officials about how to create a safe space for everyone.

“Our trails committee is working really hard on making sure that there are really good bike lanes,” Robles said. “I saw an accident there. It was a Prius that stopped in front of the bike lane and the bicyclist actually (ran) into it.”

Others who came out to see the e-bikes Tuesday echoed the same concerns.

Elk Grove resident Cheryl James said that drivers and bicyclists both have to know the rules of the road.

“When it comes to the crosswalks, people don’t realize that even if making a right turn and someone is walking in the crosswalk, you have to wait for them to clear the crosswalk, because what if they decide to change their mind and need to run back and get something. Now you’re hitting somebody.

“We have lost way too many children in an intersection,” she said.

Elk Grove resident Jessica Jones said she’s seen kids not pay attention to the road while riding a bike — some without helmets, which is state law.

Around Harriet G. Eddy Middle School, “kids have run into cars because they’re not paying attention, they’re rushing to get through or they have on headphones and are distracted 100% of the time,” Jones said. “Or it’s a driver in a hurry trying to get somewhere. And really they don’t see our babies in their blind spot.”

Jones said if the city is going to encourage more riders through programs like the e-bikes, they should come with safety equipment and lessons.

“You can put them on bikes, but you have to put them in helmets, and you have to train people,” she said. “You have to give them education and knowledge, retraining the driver and the rider.”

Councilman Darren Suen said that improvements to roadways and more bike lanes are poised to spring up in the future.

“It’s in our Bicycle, Pedestrian and Trails Master Plan to improve our trails and bike lanes, which I think will happen when you get more people on bikes,” Suen said. He added that the program was an investment beyond e-bikes and would help the city translate demand into future infrastructure. “I think as a city, we will need to react and be proactive, but prioritize those funds so that we invest in putting more safety in those bike lanes.”

Another part of that master plan, according to Suen, are improvements such as an accessible trail that could take cyclists from El Dorado Hills to Elk Grove, similar to the Capital Southeast Connector Expressway except with trails along the American River Parkway.

“The vision is you can start up in El Dorado Hills, ride down along the American River, along (Highway) 50 ... come down the Sacramento River, through the Pocket ... all the way down the south side of Elk Grove on Kammerer Road, and then back up Grant Line (Road).”

“The vision is there,” Suen said. “We just need to start implementing, and it costs a lot of money — but that’s what we need to do.”

This story was originally published September 6, 2024 at 11:53 AM.