A Parksville man was injured after police he allegedly did not have the right of way when he struck a car at a Parksville intersection on Tuesday, Jan 2. (rdnewsNOW)

By Ian Holmes

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PARKSVILLE — Oceanside RCMP say a man was taken to hospital with non-life threatening injuries after he ran into a car at a busy downtown Parksville intersection.

Oceanside RCMP Sgt. Shane Worth said it happened on Tuesday, Jan 2, shortly after 1 p.m. at McMillan St. and Hirst Ave.

“The Investigation determined that the person on the e-scooter had travelled through the intersection believed to be on a red light and struck a vehicle.”

The operator of the scooter, a 39-year-old Parksville man, was attended to on scene by paramedics and Parksville Fire Rescue personnel before he was transported to hospital, Worth said.

It wasn’t clear if the scooter rider was wearing a helmet, Worth noted.

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The intersection has pedestrian crossing activation buttons and sidewalks at all sides.

Worth said many people likely don’t realize that riding electric scooters is currently not permitted on Parksville’s roads, as well as in many other communities in the province.

“There’s some communities in the province where e-scooters are allowed on the travel portion of the roadway, Parksville is not one of the communities that’s in the pilot project.”

Thirteen communities are currently enrolled in the pilot project to help the B.C. government determine if and how electric scooters should be permanently used in the province.

As it stands now, the devices are banned from streets, sidewalks and parking lots in the province for non-pilot project community participants, according to the B.C.’s Motor Vehicle Act.

Nanaimo is the only Vancouver Island community enrolled in the e-scooter pilot project, which was launched in 2021 and recently extended to the participating municipalities as of April 5, 2024.

While e-bikes are legally widely used in B.C., it’s technically illegal under the province’s Motor Vehicle Act to operate electric skateboards and other similar electric assist devices on roadways and sidewalks throughout the province.

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