Posted by Dear Mr. Mayor,
I would like to thank you for banning electric scooters from the streets of Nashville. Scooters can certainly be a dangerous and disruptive mode of transportation and it’s important that we recognize this fact. Eight people have now been killed while using these machines, and many more have been injured. Obviously, the numbers show a troubling trend that we cannot ignore.
Furthermore, as you stated in your cease and desist letter to e-scooter service providers, the clutter, improper riding and parking issues are also very common complaints with regard to these devices. It is very important that our streets and sidewalks remain places where safety, aesthetic appeal and easy access are in abundance.
While I am thrilled with your decision, I would like to make an additional request. I ask you to also ban all cars from the streets of Nashville. More than 40,000 Americans died from automobile collisions last year. Two-and-a-half million were seriously injured. Furthermore, 23 Nashville pedestrians were killed by cars in in 2018.
As you well know, a man was tragically killed on a scooter in Nashville last May. He had twice the legal limit of alcohol in his system. Clearly, this makes Scooter riding even more dangerous. But in your state alone, over 250 people died from alcohol related auto crashes in 2017. Yet I still believe the streets are open to daily automobile use.
And while we strap our kids into their car seats without thought every day, we do so knowing that automobile crashes are the leading cause of death in children and teens. That’s more than guns and childhood cancer.
From the perspective of clutter, improper parking and negligent piloting, cars are a horrible nuisance! Fifty-to-sixty percent of the space in many of our American cities has been devoted to cars. They are literally everywhere, speeding, breaking laws, parking where they shouldn’t… We’ve built our urban centers around the accommodation of these massive vehicles that disrupt the fabric of our cities.
Clearly, automobiles, like e-scooters, are tremendous threats to human life and the wellbeing of our communities. If we are to employ the same logic used in banning e-scooters from the streets of Nashville, I respectfully ask that you ban these dangerous and disruptive cars and SUVs from the city as well. Please understand that I am a firm believer that our streets should be safe for all modes of transportation and pedestrian travel. Banning one mode when the real problem lies deeply within another is simply not logical.
Thank you for your consideration, I look forward to the day when Nashville’s streets are made safer via the banning of all automobiles.
Sincerely,
Arian Horbovetz
TheUrbanPhoenix.com