The University of Utah’s new policy to ticket cyclists, scooter riders and skateboarders exceeding 10 miles per hour is unlikely to make our campus community safer. Instead, it distracts from the real problem: a lack of safe transportation infrastructure. Policing and penalizing students with additional fees might discourage active transportation, worsen our air quality and increase the campus’ carbon footprint.

It’s true that there have been collisions between pedestrians and rollers. These collisions happen because rollers have been pushed to the sidewalks given the lack of safe roller routes into and around campus. Rollers and pedestrians shouldn’t have to share infrastructure — it’s dangerous and will result in more collisions, especially as an increasing number of students live on campus.

The far more lethal collisions rollers are trying to avoid by riding on sidewalks are those with cars. One of the authors of this article was recently hit by a UTA bus while riding a bike on South Campus Drive. The campus designated South Campus Drive a bike route, effectively claiming it is safe for bikes. However, South Campus Drive lacks any bike lanes at all, let alone protected bike lanes. Rather, South Campus Drive has only the pernicious sharrows that are arguably worse than no bike infrastructure at all. When even a professional driver can’t see a cyclist, the problem is with the infrastructure rather than the drivers.

Rather than blaming the victims of the poor infrastructure, the U needs to rethink its transportation policy to encourage biking, walking and mass transit. To make active transportation safe and pleasant, we call on University of Utah leaders to make five changes.

1. Separate pedestrian infrastructure from roller routes inside campus. 
2. Create protected roller lanes on roads across campus, particularly South Campus Drive from Guardsman Way to Mario Cappecchi Drive. Since some of these roads are state-owned, campus leaders need to work with the Utah Department of Transportation.
3. Create and disseminate an interactive map showing where crashes between different mobility types occurred. This will help identify areas with the highest need for safety improvements.
4. Price parking appropriately and invest the additional revenue into more frequent UTA bus service to the U. Parking at the U is more expensive than at other Utah state schools, but it is significantly cheaper and more convenient than at other flagship public research universities. 
5. Implement the same speed limit for cars as on rollers on campus-owned roads.

In a city among those with the worst air quality in the world on many winter days, the U has an opportunity to become a leader in accessible, sustainable transportation. We must do better to protect our students and community.

— Andra Ghent, Professor in the Department of Finance, Alessandro Rigolon, Associate Professor in the Department of City and Metropolitan Planning, and Katharine Walter, Assistant Professor in the Department of Internal Medicine

The post Guest Opinion: Scooters aren’t the Problem: Ticketing Active Transportation Misses the Mark first appeared on The Daily Utah Chronicle.