By Rory Dulock | Staff Writer
Motorized scooter storage and charging are no longer permitted inside Baylor campus buildings, according to traffic, transportation and parking policy changes.
Regarding storage, the policy states motorized scooter parking is only permitted in designated areas on campus.
“These areas are identified by the presence of bicycle racks or other devices designed for bicycles and/or motorized scooter parking,” the policy reads. “Some areas are designated by the posting of signs indicating the space as a motorized scooter parking area.”
Electric scooters and other motorized wheeled devices cannot be charged inside any building on campus. According to the policy, an exception to this can come with written consent from the director of Parking and Transportation Services.
These changes come after many universities have encountered problems with motorized scooters and become concerned about the safety risks they pose to students.
Matt Penney, director of Parking and Transportation Services, said a whole new section was added to the traffic, transportation and parking policy to address the issue.
“There have been some discussions for some time about scooters being parked in miscellaneous places inside of buildings. We’ve had several complaints in the fall about them being inside of buildings,” Penney said. “That correlated with an emergency management team looking at fires and fire hazards that were appearing at other universities. Because of that, we decided we needed to take quick action to create a policy of our own to make sure that those weren’t inside of buildings and didn’t cause a problem.”
Penney said finding an alternative for motorized scooter storage was easy, since they can be parked at bicycle racks. However, he said finding an alternative for charging is a little more challenging.
“Any time you … try to plug something up and run electricity to it in an outdoor environment, that’s more challenging,” Penney said. “We’re still working through how we can assist and what our role should be in that process.”
Dr. Rob Engblom, associate director for resident learning, said Campus Living and Learning had to update its Guide to Community Living because of the policy.
“The edit we made was to clarify the motorcycles, mopeds, motor scooters and hoverboards policy, and what we did was we added the fact that electric motored scooters and hoverboards are no longer permitted in the residence halls,” Engblom said.
Engblom said it is not typical for Campus Living and Learning to change the Guide to Community Living in the middle of the year.
“When the university changed its overarching policy, that’s when Campus Living and Learning adjusted our policy,” Engblom said. “It’s a bit unusual for us to change the Guide to Community Living during the year, but we’ve had to do that a couple times in the past too. Whenever we do that, we make sure that we send out communication to the students so they become aware of the change in the policy.”
Engblom also said Campus Living and Learning worked fast to change its policy and is encouraging students to follow the updates to avoid any consequences.
“As soon as we kind of became aware of the policy — the policy change during the academic year — that’s when we kind of moved to do that,” Engblom said. “We are encouraging folks to take those home or move them from the residence hall.”
