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Trying to make sense of EUC regulations in NYC

Published on 2024-06-19

I just saw an old video titled "Electric Unicycles are Illegal in NYC". It claims, with a screenshot at the 2m5s mark, that mopeds without plates, electric skateboards, segways, hoverboards, electric unicycles, and Onewheels are illegal in NYC.

I checked out the PDF myself and noticed that they removed the column that contained the list of illegal vehicles. The page that links to the PDF does not mention electric unicycles at all.

Eventually, I found the Governor's traffic safety committee's page about E-Bikes and E-Scooters and it says:

Other Devices - Devices such as mopeds, electric skateboards, segways, hoverboards, and electric unicycles are not
considered E-Bikes or E-Scooters and are illegal to operate on the highways in New York State or subject to other laws
or regulations.

While some clarity is nice to have it would be really nice if they could just cite the section of the law that explains this. I'm not a lawyer, but I'm pretty sure that the law is not as simple as "electric unicycles are illegal". I'm not a fan of other people interpreting the law for me especially since with other laws I hear the same incorrect interpretations over and over again:

Fine, I'll do it myself

Since nobody official seems willing to show their work, here's the chain of statutes I think they're actually relying on. Still not a lawyer. This is the reasoning I wish they had published, not advice.

It starts with the definition of a motor vehicle in VTL § 125:

Every vehicle operated or driven upon a public highway which is propelled by any power other than muscular power,
except (a) electrically-driven mobility assistance devices operated or driven by a person with a disability, (a-1)
electric personal assistive mobility devices operated outside a city with a population of one million or more, (b)
vehicles which run only upon rails or tracks, (c) snowmobiles as defined in article forty-seven of this chapter, (d)
all terrain vehicles as defined in article forty-eight-B of this chapter, (e) bicycles with electric assist as
defined in section one hundred two-c of this article, and (f) electric scooters as defined in section one hundred
fourteen-e of this article.

An electric unicycle is propelled by something other than muscular power, so it is a motor vehicle unless it fits one of those exceptions. It fits none of them.

(a-1) is the Segway carve-out. VTL § 114-d defines an "electric personal assistive mobility device":

Every self-balancing, two non-tandem wheeled device designed to transport one person by means of an electric
propulsion system with an average output of not more than seven hundred fifty watts (one horsepower), and the
maximum speed of which on a paved level surface, when propelled solely by its electric propulsion system while
ridden by an operator weighing one hundred seventy pounds, is less than twelve and one-half miles per hour.

Two non-tandem wheels and under 12.5 mph. An EUC has one wheel and goes considerably faster, so it fails twice over. And read the exception in § 125 again: even a device that does qualify is only excepted outside a city with a population of one million or more. There is exactly one of those in New York State. The Segway exception was written so that it doesn't apply in NYC.

(e) is the e-bike carve-out. VTL § 102-c requires operable pedals. An EUC doesn't have pedals in the sense the statute means.

(f) is the e-scooter carve-out, and it's the closest call. VTL § 114-e:

Every device weighing less than one hundred pounds that (a) has handlebars, a floorboard or a seat that can be stood
or sat upon by the operator, and an electric motor, (b) can be powered by the electric motor and/or human power, and
(c) has a maximum speed of no more than twenty miles per hour on a paved level surface when powered solely by the
electric motor.

Note there's no wheel count here at all, and the EUC's footplates are arguably "a floorboard." What kills it is the last two prongs: a hundred pound weight limit and a 20 mph ceiling. A modern EUC is often over both, sometimes way over both.

So it's a motor vehicle. Which brings in VTL § 401:

No motor vehicle shall be operated or driven upon the public highways of this state without first being registered in
accordance with the provisions of this article, except as otherwise expressly provided in this chapter.

And as a practical matter DMV will not register one. There's no category for it, and no manufacturer's certificate of origin to register it with. So the actual chain is:

  1. An EUC is a motor vehicle under § 125, because it's electric and fits none of the exceptions
  2. Motor vehicles must be registered to be operated on a public highway, per § 401(1)(a)
  3. You cannot register an EUC
  4. Therefore you cannot lawfully ride one on a public highway

And "highway" is not just the interstate. VTL § 118:

The entire width between the boundary lines of every way publicly maintained when any part thereof is open to the use
of the public for purposes of vehicular travel.

That's every street in the city. Penalty under § 401(18) is a fine of $75 to $300, up to fifteen days, or both.

That's the whole argument. No statute anywhere says "electric unicycles are illegal." It's an accident of a definition written for Segways in 2002 and a registration requirement written for cars, and nobody has updated either one.

The legislature seems to agree with me

If you want evidence that this reading is the operative one, look at the bills written to undo it. S332 of 2017:

Provides that hoverboards and electric unicycles shall not be deemed to be "motor vehicles" under the vehicle and
traffic law; regulates the operation of hoverboards; directs the consumer protection division to monitor and
investigate reports of electric unicycles and hoverboards that explode.

You don't write a bill exempting something from a category it was never in. The sponsors clearly believed EUCs are currently caught by the motor vehicle definition, and wanted them treated more like skateboards. The bill was stricken on 2017-02-28. An earlier version, A8656A of 2015, went nowhere either.

The NYC ban everyone cites probably doesn't even apply

Here's the part I find genuinely funny. When people say EUCs are banned in NYC specifically, they're usually pointing at NYC Administrative Code § 19-176.2, the motorized scooter ban, which carries a $500 civil penalty and lets them impound the thing. But look at the definition:

any wheeled device that has handlebars that is designed to be stood or sat upon by the operator, is powered by an
electric motor or by a gasoline motor that is capable of propelling the device without human power and is not capable
of being registered with the New York state department of motor vehicles

It has to have handlebars. An electric unicycle doesn't have handlebars. So the famous NYC motorized scooter ban appears not to reach an EUC at all. The thing that actually makes it illegal is the state registration requirement, which is a much more boring answer, and I suspect that's exactly why nobody leads with it.

Would adding a seat help?

Seated EUCs are a thing, and § 114-e literally lists "a seat" as a qualifying feature, so it's a reasonable question. The answer is no, and it's instructive about how the whole scheme is built.

A seat satisfies prong (a) of the e-scooter definition. But prong (a) was never the problem, since the footplates plausibly count as a floorboard already. The prongs that disqualify you are the hundred pound weight limit and the 20 mph ceiling, and a seat makes the weight worse while doing nothing for the speed. Seats also tend to show up on the big fast machines, which are the ones furthest from qualifying in the first place.

What a seat does resemble is a moped. VTL § 121-b defines a limited use motorcycle:

A limited use vehicle having only two or three wheels, with a seat or saddle for the operator.

A seat or saddle is a defining element there, and limited use motorcycles can actually be registered. But it requires two or three wheels, and you have one.

That's the pattern once you've read all of them. Wheel count is the trap: one wheel is fatal under § 114-d, which needs two non-tandem, and fatal under § 121-b, which needs two or three. The only definition in the entire scheme with no wheel count requirement is the e-scooter one, and that's gated on speed and weight instead. There's no way through for a fast EUC, seat or not.

Although, by my reading, a sub-100-pound EUC limited to 20 mph with a seat bolted on would satisfy every prong of § 114-e, making it an "electric scooter," excepted from the motor vehicle definition by § 125(f), and perfectly legal. Which is a machine that essentially nobody who rides these things wants to own.