There's a certain cruelty to tragedy that arrives just before the holidays. While most of us were unpacking decorations or arguing about cranberry sauce recipes, Connie Fish's family was preparing to say goodbye. The 87 year old grandmother died last month after her mobility scooter was struck by a car in Little Hulton. Reading her family's tribute feels like receiving a handwritten letter from grief itself. They describe a woman who was hilariously funny, effortlessly kind, the sort of person who collected friends like loose change in a pocket, always there when needed.

Connie's story punches you first in the heart. The image of a vibrant grandmother, reduced to a traffic statistic, feels inherently wrong, like finding a funeral notice written in Comic Sans. But then it punches you in the gut, because her death wasn't some freak meteorological event. It was a mobility scooter accident, one of hundreds that happen every year, barely noticed beyond local news bulletins.

Let's talk about these marvelous, misunderstood vehicles. Mobility scooters aren't medical devices, not quite. They're not bicycles either, though they share pavement space with both pedestrians and cars in a precarious dance. To their users, they're freedom incarnate. Four wheels and a battery pack that mean you can fetch your own groceries, visit the library, see your granddaughter's school play without waiting for a reluctant relative's chauffeur service. They're the mechanical equivalent of that friend who shows up with a casserole when you're sick, reliable and unglamorous.

Yet our relationship with scooters feels oddly conflicted. We celebrate their role in maintaining independence for aging adults or those with disabilities. Retailers market them with sunny images of silver haired couples gliding through farmers markets. But mention mobility scooter safety at a dinner party and watch the conversation falter. It's like discussing stairlift fatalities or the mortality rate of rocking chairs. We'd rather not imagine Grandma's chariot becoming a death trap.

Here's where the hypocrisy peeks through the hedgerows. For decades, we've cheered as mobility scooter adoption soared. Over 300,000 scooters now navigate UK roads and pathways, their numbers swelling as our population ages beautifully. Cities encourage cycling with dedicated lanes, pedestrian zones blossom with benches and floral displays, but when was the last time you saw infrastructure designed specifically for mobility devices? These vehicles that keep millions independent are treated as afterthoughts, squeezed between baby strollers and delivery bikes on sidewalks never widened to accommodate 21st century reality.

The data, when you dig for it, tells a sobering story. Transport Research Laboratory figures suggest over 700 mobility scooter users are seriously injured annually in the UK. Around 30 die. Each number represents someone's Connie, someone who started their day planning to buy milk and ended it in an ambulance. Many accidents involve collisions with cars, but others result from poorly maintained pavements, unexpected curbs, or that modern nemesis, the distracted smartphone zombie stepping into a scooter's path.

We could dismiss this as statistical noise, tragic but inevitable. Except human stories unravel that complacency. Like the woman in Brighton who drowned after her scooter plunged off a poorly marked harbor path. Or the Yorkshire man who died trying to cross a road where the pedestrian crossing timer didn't account for slower moving vehicles. Infrastructure and policy failures masquerading as accidents.

What burns brightest in Connie's story isn't the sadness, though there's oceans of that. It's the family's description of her essence, that hilarious, caring spirit. I keep imagining her mid joke, maybe teasing her grandchildren about their appalling music taste while navigating Manchester Road. Her warmth becomes the counterpoint to a cold reality. We build entire transportation systems around cars, invest billions in cyclist safety campaigns, yet the vehicles carrying our most vulnerable receive about as much planning consideration as supermarket trolleys.

The police report subtly underscores this systemic shrug. Connie was on the pavement when her scooter suddenly began to cross into traffic. The phrasing makes it sound whimsical, like the scooter developed sentience and fancied a jaunt. But mobility scooters don't sudden begin anything. They're operated by human hands, often hands stiff with arthritis or unsteady from medication. Hands that might struggle with poorly designed controls near a busy intersection. Or eyes that couldn't see an approaching Volvo because the pavement's slope forced the scooter into an awkward angle.

This isn't about assigning blame. It's about recognizing that millions now rely on mobility devices, and their safety shouldn't depend on luck and lightning fast reflexes. We wouldn't tolerate this negligence if it involved school buses. Why accept it for mobility scooters?

Solutions exist, if we care to look. Some towns have introduced mobility lanes alongside cycling paths. Others run mandatory training sessions for new scooter users, covering basic road safety. Simple modifications like brighter mandatory lights, standardized controls, even seatbelts could prevent countless accidents. Then there's the big stuff. Urban planners incorporating mobility device needs from day one. Subsidies for newer, safer models. Public awareness campaigns that treat scooters not as quirky accessories but vital transport.

But perhaps the hardest fix is shifting our cultural lens. There's an unspoken hierarchy in how we view transportation safety. Formula One drivers get fireproof suits. Cyclists get helmets and dedicated lanes. Scooter users get thoughts and prayers when things go wrong. The subtext whispers that at 87, maybe Connie had lived well enough. That mobility scooter incidents are just nature taking its course with extra steps. Except Connie wasn't ready to go. Not while she still had jokes to tell and great grandchildren to embarrass with over affection.

Several years ago, a Danish urban design firm proposed the walking equivalent of Michelin stars, rating cities by their pedestrian friendliness. Imagine extending that philosophy. How many stars would your town earn for mobility scooter safety? Are crossings timed for slower speeds? Are pavement surfaces consistently smooth? Do drivers look twice for lower profile vehicles? Does public transport accommodate scooters seamlessly?

Such changes wouldn't just protect our Connies. They'd create better spaces for parents with double wide prams, delivery robots, slow walkers enjoying their last decades. Designing for the most vulnerable users tends to elevate conditions for everyone. It's the architectural version of choosing the restaurant with a wheelchair ramp because you know the pancakes will be phenomenal.

There's a photo that sometimes circulates in urban planning circles. Taken in Tokyo, it shows an elderly woman on a mobility scooter waiting at a pedestrian crossing. The pavement slopes gently down to road level, no abrupt curb to negotiate. The crossing signal includes both visual and auditory cues. A small overhang provides shelter from rain. When the light changes, drivers actually wait. It looks utterly mundane. It's also a masterpiece of compassionate infrastructure.

Connie's family asked for privacy but shared her story hoping it might prevent others suffering similar losses. That's heroic in its own way, turning grief into advocacy. As a society, we owe it to them to listen beyond the headlines. To stop treating mobility scooter accidents as inevitable tragedies and start viewing them as policy failures we can fix.

So next time you see someone buzzing past on a mobility scooter, resist the eye roll about pavement hogging. Instead, picture this. A woman who may have your grandmother's smile, your uncle's terrible puns, someone's entire universe tucked into that vinyl seat. Then ask yourself. Are our streets worthy of her?