“Those things are going to kill me one day,” Adam Peck said to his wife, Michele, after narrowly avoiding an e-bike rider on the sidewalk next to them. 

At that time, Adam was working as Illinois State University’s (ISU) assistant vice president for student affairs.

Just a few days later, he was walking through a plaza south of the university’s main quad in Normal when he was struck by a cyclist, causing him to fall back and hit his head on the sidewalk. 

Four days later, he passed away from injuries sustained in the accident.

Illinois state law states “you may not operate an e-bike on sidewalks.” Despite this, there is virtually no legislation that recognizes e-bike accidents as a crime or requires them to be filed as such by police departments, neither at the state or federal level. 

“He died from the injuries, and the person who rode the bike didn’t even get a ticket,” Michele Peck said in an interview with CU-CitizenAccess.org, while recalling his prediction of being hit and killed.

She said the bike rider has had zero legal repercussions pertaining to the accident.

“You can kill somebody, anybody, and get away with it,” Michele said.

E-bikes are just one of many micromobility devices that have become staples on college campuses in recent years. Lightweight, compact and electronically powered, they offer a sustainable and quick transportation alternative for students. 

Despite their prevalence and potential benefits, Michele points out, there remains very little rules for their usage. The bikes, scooters and skateboards do not require insurance, licenses, or any sort of permit for usage.  

“Do we see the value of having this affordable mode of transportation, absolutely. But what are we doing to keep people safe?” Michele said. “You’re not required to have insurance; you’re not required to have a license. You’re capable of killing yourself or others by riding it with no repercussions.”

Because the accident took place on the Illinois State University campus, jurisdiction fell onto the university’s      police department. Michele said the officers did not sign the police report and they allowed the rider of the bike that struck Adam to leave the scene. The only record that exists to confirm that Adam died from injuries sustained from an e-bike accident is the coroner’s report. 

“I felt like there needed to be something that acknowledged it was wrong. It’s not like a ticket would have made a lick of difference, right? But to me, it was about there being some sort of accountability,” Michele said.          

Just 55 miles from ISU’s campus, on the streets of University of Illinois Champaign-Urbana, those same e-bikes can be seen strewn across sidewalks.

The bikes are popular on campus, to the point the university also has a partnership with Veo, an e-bike-sharing company, and recently signed a contract to bring a similar service to campus with Bird’s bike-share program.

Veo bikes first came to campus in 2018, with 500 pedal bikes available to rent. Currently, the service only provides class-1 and class-2 e-bikes in the area. Class-1 e-bikes have no throttle and class-2 e-bikes are throttle-assisted. Both can reach speeds of 20 mph.  

[Insert screenshot of classes from IL bicycle rules of the road]

Veo bikes and Bird bikes are similar, and both are accessed as rentals through apps on users’ phones.

Over the summer, the university signed a contract to bring 500 class-2 electric Bird bikes to campus. 

This is despite the fact that, as evidenced by Adam Peck’s story, injuries from riding micromobility devices can be severe, even leading to hospitalization or death. 

Leading research leaves victims struck behind

In addition to the inherent dangers of e-bikes, not using proper safety equipment has proven to be prevalent among micromobility device users.

According to a 2024 report published in JAMA Surgery, an international peer-reviewed journal, “only 44% of injured e-bicyclists wore helmets, with proportionally fewer wearing helmets each year.” 

There were an estimated 360,800 emergency department visits relating to micromobility devices from 2017 through 2022, the report shows.

Yet, as Michele pointed out, most data pertaining to e-bike accidents only acknowledges injuries to the rider, not damages incurred by those hit by the bikes, like Adam was. 

“When the rider is in an accident, people talk about how it’s so dangerous for the rider, but there is no data about the injury sustained by people who are hit by the riders,” Michele said. 

While there is no record to indicate anyone has been seriously injured or killed by an e-bike accident on University of Illinois Champaign-Urbana’s campus, e-bike dangers are still not unheard of. 

This year, nine accidents involving bicycles have been reported, with at least two incidents involving an injury, University of Illinois Police Department data showed. However, in a previous interview with CU-CitizenAccess, its former senior strategic communications officer, Patrick Wade, explained it’s hard for police to document and penalize e-bike misconduct as they have no specific incident code.

Police officials, in response to a Freedom of Information Act request, said the department’s policy regarding thefts and accidents does not change based on whether the item involved is motorized. 

“For instance, a car versus a bike accident is treated the same way regardless of whether the bike is motorized,” the department said in its response letter. “Similarly, the theft of an e-scooter is treated like the theft of a regular scooter in our internal processes; the primary difference lies in how the incident is reported to government entities.”

In contrast to state law, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign’s bicycle ordinance states bicycles are allowed on university sidewalks, including “low speed” electric bicycles. As for e-scooters and e-skateboards, the policy only mentions that they must be used in accordance with university policy and used safely.

Legislation issues also lead to insurance ones, Michele said. Due to the lack of legislation around micromobility transportation, insurance companies also lack coverage for accidents involving them. 

“The National Highway Transportation and Safety Administration doesn’t track the number of accidents sustained by e-bikes and e-scooters right now and so, neither do insurance agencies,” Michele said. 

After her husband passed, Michele’s insurance company, State Farm, argued that the accident was not covered by her policy. 

“State Farm doesn’t recognize e-bikes as motorized vehicles. They’re recognized as bicycles, they say, because they’re not developed primarily for use on the road,” Michele said. 

Yet, e-bikes, under Illinois law, cannot be driven anywhere other than on the road or a bike trail. By classifying them as vehicles that are not made for use on the road, the company has created a loophole with which to deny not just Michele, but any victim of an e-bike accident, coverage. 

After her husband’s death, the insurance company classified her household as high risk, Michelle said. After leaving State Farm, there was a month where she could not find another insurance company to cover her family. This, she said, was due to her family being blacklisted by State Farm. 

“I ended up paying way more because I’m on this weird, like, don’t insure list, which friends of mine in the insurance agency say last for years and years,” Michelle said. 

Her claim with State Farm over her husband’s death is still open and being argued in federal court. 

State Farm did not return requests for comment.

It is yet another hurdle to the consequences of the bikes being used on campuses. Furthermore, it is yet another painful problem for families who could be dealing with the grief of losing a loved one, like Michele. 

Ultimately, Michele hopes that people will remember her husband Adam’s life as one dedicated to the students he worked with every day. She hopes his death will bring awareness to the potential dangers of e-bike usage, and the need for legislation and regulation regarding them, to avoid tragedies like these. 

“[Adam] wasn’t just important to our family; he was important to thousands of people.  Students around the world and colleagues and just the body of work he had been contributing to, that just ended instantly. There was no way to prepare for that,” Michele said.