After hearing calls for change from Islanders, the Vineyard’s state representative has filed a bill that would make it harder to rent a moped.

Rep. Thomas Moakley, a Democrat from Falmouth, crafted legislation earlier this year that would require people driving mopeds to have a motorcycle license.

Vineyarders have argued against moped rentals for years in response to several tragic deaths and injuries aboard the two-wheeled vehicles.

Across the state, mopeds fall in a gray area between bicycles and motorcycles, according to Mr. Moakley. They are allowed to be driven at high speeds on the road, but don’t require specific knowledge on how to operate them.

The current requirements to drive a moped are to either have a driver’s license or a learner’s permit.

“This bill is all about public safety, ensuring that both moped operators and other travelers on public roads are not endangered by inexperienced operators,” Mr. Moakley said. “Martha’s Vineyard has seen too much tragedy as a result of this legal misclassification.”

The effort has been tried before but hasn’t gained much traction in the legislature. Island moped rental agencies have criticized the proposal, saying they are thinly veiled attempts to put them out of businesses.

“It’s the same story,” said John Leone, a partner in the three moped businesses in Oak Bluffs. “They haven’t been successful in every try.”

Mopeds are popular with daytrippers on the Island, many who likely don’t have licenses for motorcycles.

“It’s just another way to put you out of business,” Mr. Leone said.

Mopeds rental businesses now only exist in Oak Bluffs, after the last business in Tisbury closed and was denied a new license in 2023.

Mr. Leone has raised the idea of selling his businesses to the town in order to get the licenses off the street and said he hoped to go before the Oak Bluffs select board in the coming months about how that could work.

“If they are willing to get rid of mopeds, they can buy them out,” he said.

Crash deaths have spurred challenges against the moped industry for decades. Most recently, a Florida woman died this past summer in a moped crash. 
In 2016, a New Hampshire woman crashed her moped into a dump truck, severing one of her legs. Afterward, a petition was created calling for persons to have motorcycle licenses to rent mopeds, but it didn’t gain traction at the State House.

Legislators in the past have said that the state is hesitant to make sweeping changes to transportation policy based on the issues of one municipality. Eric Turkington, a former state representative for the Island, made repeated efforts in the 1990s and early 2000s to require renters to have a motorcycle license, but the proposals languished at the state house.

In the wake of the 2016 crash, Oak Bluffs submitted a home rule petition that asked the legislature to grant the town the authority to ban the lease or rental of mopeds, as well as prohibit the issuance of licenses to businesses to rent the vehicles to the public.

The request has been filed four times, but never made it into law.

Mr. Moakley’s new bill is purposefully more generic, eschewing the language about moped rentals in Oak Bluffs from the past home rule petitions. He hoped that by targeting rules around operation, the bill would be more digestible.

“It’s an easier to understand law for both operators and law enforcement,” he said.

Mr. Moakley’s bill has been referred to the state joint committee on transportation for further review. A hearing on the bill has not yet been set.