Some communities have expressed public concern over e-bikes in their villages and cities, but Palos Park intentionally stayed silent.
“This topic had come up, and we had been holding off a little bit on where we were going to go just because we knew the governor (JB Pritzker) was coming down with his version,” Palos Park Mayor Nicole Milovich-Walters said at the Sept. 14 village council meeting. “We didn’t know what powers we would have.
“And it’s apparently none.”
On Aug. 26, Pritzker signed a bill regarding e-bike regulations and laws that will take effect Jan. 1.
“As these high-powered devices become faster and more common in our streets and sidewalks, the stakes are simply too high to leave them unregulated and outpacing public safety,” said Secretary of State Alexi Giannoulias in a statement.
While the spirit of the bill is safety-based, the local municipalities will not have a say in the laws regarding their streets.
Village Manager Jeannine Smith summarized a 52-page bill from the state on the topic.
“One paragraph that repeats itself is that no unit of local government, including a home-rule unit, may regulate road speed for electric bicycles,” she said. “What originally started as the state giving us some authority – they have now stripped us of that authority.
“It’s not the greatest bill, but we will do what we can.”
Milovich-Walters said there are some areas of concern that the village can possibly regulate.
“Maybe, maybe, maybe we can regulate it around the playground and the Village Green and things like that,” Milovich-Walters said. “But that means we cannot regulate it on the interior streets of the village that aren’t state or county streets.”
While it’s not an ideal situation, there are some rules the state has come up with that e-bikers should follow.
“If your e-bike goes in excess of 20 mph, you are going to need to be licensed and you are going to need to be (at least) 16 years of age,” the mayor said. “That’s just one of the many things that are in there.
“We will make sure that (the information) gets posted so that people are aware.”
