CHARLOTTE (QUEEN CITY NEWS) — Following the death of a teenager riding an electronic scooter in Uptown Saturday night, some scooter users are thinking more deeply about rider safety.

When renting an e-scooter, apps like Bird will often have the rider confirm that they have read and understood the safety rules and guidelines. However, when Queen City News polled riders in Uptown Sunday, all of them said they either did not read the safety guidelines or do not follow them.

E-scooter company Bird recommends riding scooters in the street and in bike lanes whenever possible. In fact, the City of Charlotte requires that all riders stay in the street when inside the boundaries of Church Street, Stonewall Street, College Street, and 7th Street. However, some riders, like Adrian Bueno, say he is not always comfortable riding in the street and therefore, chooses not to follow that rule.

“I feel like people with cars don’t necessarily respect people on motorcycles the way they do with a car. So, being on a scooter in the street is definitely dangerous,” he said.

Vanessa McQueen says she used to ride scooters often but stopped after falling off of one and injuring herself. She also admits that while she knows rules exist, she nor any other rider show knows actually follow them.

“I know you’re not supposed to ride them on the sidewalks, but everybody does. I think even the rules say that you’re supposed to wear a helmet or something like that, and I’ve never in my life seen somebody have a helmet on while riding the scooters,” she said.

Bird offers riders a free helmet from their app, so long as they agree to pay a shipping fee. They will also offer free credits to riders who share a selfie wearing a helmet after a ride.

“It’s actually pretty terrifying, and there’s not a lot of bike lanes unfortunately in Charlotte. And there’s a lot of construction, so there’s a lot of areas where part of the street is closed off, so you’re forced to go into traffic,” said McQueen.

According to the Bird App, Saturday’s fatal crash happened less than one block away from Uptown’s “Slow Zone,” an area that automatically slows scooters down to eight miles per hour.