This story by Jason Starr was first published in the Williston Observer on June 11, 2026.
There is a fading line between electric bikes and electric motorcycles — and cycling advocates, government officials and law enforcement are struggling to keep pace.
Recently in Williston, a resident of Village Grove behind Williston Central School was startled by two students who were racing electric motorcycles “way above the speed limit” and “nearly killed” the resident’s dog.
The resident, who posted about the incident on Front Porch Forum but wished to remain anonymous, said he heard from numerous other residents who had seen the riders.
“There were a lot of people concerned about it,” he said, noting that he hasn’t seen the behavior before or since.
“My guess is that parents saw the post and had a conversation and said, ‘You shouldn’t ride here. Let’s find a safer place to ride,’” he said. “I’m sure the kids got the message.”
The incident mirrors others taking place across the Burlington area and urban and suburban zones nationwide. They are underpinned by confusion in the personal electric vehicle market about what is regulated as a bicycle with no age limit, riding restrictions or license requirement, and a motorcycle with all the regulatory restrictions of owning a car.
A key differentiator between e-bikes and e-motorcycles (also known as “e-motos”) is their top speed and acceleration capacity. E-motos can reach 65 mph and have no limit on their engine horsepower. Most e-bikes top out at 20 mph. A visual cue of an e-moto is the lack of bike pedals. Existing statewide law bans e-motos from sidewalks and recreation paths.
Local Motion, a Burlington-based bike and pedestrian advocacy group, called a meeting about the issue Monday. Local Motion’s Jack Evans noted that e-motos are being marketed online to kids with an emphasis on speed and fun, and to parents in a way that misleadingly positions them as e-bikes, obscuring their legal status.
The result is that “these newfangled things are all over the place,” said Local Motion Executive Director Christina Erickson.
On the Burlington Greenway — the waterfront bike path — young e-moto users are riding in packs.
“I see what I can only call gangs of teenagers riding illegal bikes at 30 to 40 mph on the bike path,” said Burlington resident Hank Prensky. “Attempting to engage with them gets the middle finger every time.”
Evans said local police departments are in the process of learning how to distinguish between e-motos and e-bikes.
Officer Jareco Coulumbe of the Milton Police Department said e-moto riders are tearing up the town’s parks and clashing with pedestrians on sidewalks.
“They are being highly destructive as well as just buzzing by people on the sidewalk,” he said.
Off-road e-motos are also encroaching on mountain bike trails. The Vermont Mountain Bike Association released a position statement in May explaining the different legal statuses of the different classes of electric vehicles, saying “e-motos are never allowed on non-motorized natural surface trails.”
“Uneducated consumers are increasingly showing up at mountain bike trail systems with these electric dirt bikes, damaging non-motorized trails and threatening the safety of themselves and others. … These are categorically different vehicles and are not e-bikes,” the statement said.
Local Motion is calling for the consistent enforcement of existing laws that prohibit e-motos from sidewalks and bike paths and enforcement of the 16-year-old age minimum along with licensure and insurance. It is also ramping up a public education campaign to help people distinguish e-bikes from e-motos.
“I have a feeling these are going to stick around no matter what,” said Jason Stuffle, who attended the Local Motion meeting.
He advocated for developing locations for people to safely ride e-motos.
In Williston, the resident who was rattled by the e-moto riders behind the school agreed.
“I see them as off-road motorcycles that just happen to have electric engines,” he said. “I don’t want to take that away from anybody. But if you’re going to ride a motorcycle, you have to go to a place that is safe for motorcycles.”
