San Mateo County's new e-bike safety law will carry the name of Ayden Fang, the 4-year-old Burlingame boy killed on a downtown sidewalk in August 2025 when a chain-reaction crash involving an e-bike sent an SUV into a restaurant.
The Board of Supervisors voted unanimously Wednesday, Aug. 12, to pass the ordinance and directed staff to formally rename it after Ayden ahead of a required second reading. The law takes effect in January 2027.
"I wish there was a way we could put Ayden's name on this legislation so that we don't have another Ayden in San Mateo County or anywhere else," Supervisor Lisa Gauthier said tearfully at the meeting, according to RWC Pulse.
What the ordinance does
The measure sets a 5 mph speed limit for e-bikes on sidewalks, requires riders to yield to pedestrians and give audible signals before passing, and prohibits riding in an unsafe manner. It bans tampering with e-bike serial numbers and blocking sidewalks with parked devices.
Fines start at $50 for a first violation, $200 for a second within a year and $500 for each additional offense. Minors who commit a first offense can complete a traffic safety education program instead of paying a fine.
The ordinance also gives the Sheriff's Office authority to impound electric mobility devices and closes a gap in state law that had prevented deputies from citing riders of high-speed electric motorcycles disguised as e-bikes on sidewalks.
Supervisor Jackie Speier, who spearheaded the legislation alongside Supervisor Ray Mueller, said the county drafted it at the request of law enforcement and cities as a model that municipalities can adopt or modify. Because it is a county measure, the ordinance applies only to unincorporated areas, but Speier said Burlingame and Hillsborough could use it as a template.
The crash that started it
Ayden was playing with a friend on the sidewalk outside Truffle Poké Bar on Donnelly Avenue on Aug. 8, 2025, while his parents, Ming Fang and Ting Ting Liu, sat inside the restaurant. An 11-year-old boy riding a Class 2 e-bike with his 10-year-old sister as a passenger collided with a 19-year-old driver's Mazda SUV as she pulled out of a city parking lot. The driver hit the accelerator instead of the brake, sending the SUV across the roadway, onto the sidewalk and through the restaurant's front wall, according to KRON 4. Ayden was killed. A 6-year-old girl was also struck but survived.
Ming Fang addressed supervisors on Aug. 12, calling the ordinance "an important first step" and urging that no more children be hurt.
San Mateo County Sheriff's Office Deputy Chris Larsen testified that e-bike crash injuries now resemble motorcycle trauma, describing broken hips, severe head trauma and lacerations he sees regularly among young riders. E-bike accidents in California rose from two in 2018 to 1,566 in 2024, according to a University of California, San Diego study cited at the meeting.
Community response
A community fundraiser had raised $33,809 as of Aug. 12. The Fang family has also installed a Little Free Library monument on Donnelly Avenue near the crash site, stocked with children's books and bearing Ayden's photo, and established two scholarships in his name.
The ordinance requires a second reading before taking effect in January 2027, at which point it will formally carry Ayden's name.
