NEW WATERFORD, N.S. — A Cape Breton man is fighting a ticket he received after being caught chugging along a sidewalk on a souped-up drink cooler.
Neil Rideout of New Waterford was fined $222 under Nova Scotia’s Motor Vehicle Act last July for driving his motorized red cooler on a sidewalk.
Rideout, 42, said Thursday he intends to fight the ticket at a trial scheduled for Feb. 2 in provincial court.
In the meantime, he plans to keep the cooler parked.
“I’m not in any way going to antagonize the police,” said Rideout, the chairman of the board of a video conferencing company.
“I just wish they’d focus on criminals and not coolers.”
Rideout said he only took his Coleman cooler for a spin on the sidewalk at the suggestion of police, who had told him days earlier he couldn’t ride the four-wheel contraption on the street.
He said he was pulled over while driving to the convenience store on his cooler, which is equipped with a radio, cup holders and a 5.5-horsepower motor.
“The police officer came up to me and said, ’Mr. Rideout, may I search your vehicle?’ ” said Rideout, adding he was wearing a bicycle helmet, which the police had also advised him to do.
“At that point, thinking that it was a joke, I kind of lifted the top of the cooler and said, ’Officer, go ahead.’ All he found was a combination lock and a half bottle of Orange Crush.”
Desiree Vassallo, a spokeswoman for the Cape Breton Regional Police Service, confirmed Rideout was facing a fine for driving the machine on the sidewalk.
She said the only motorized vehicle permitted on a sidewalk under the act is a wheelchair, though Rideout disputes that fact.
Rideout said there’s no provision in the act for electric scooters or motorized kids’ toys and he believes he’s being discriminated against.
The website of the company behind the motorized machines, XtremeCoolers, shows photos of grinning, wheelie-popping riders and the slogan “Ride ’em hard, drink ’em cold.”
Rideout was at a tradeshow in Pennsylvania when the cooler caught his eye. He shelled out US$650 for his “perfect urban vehicle.”
Once home in Cape Breton, Rideout spent hundreds more dollars to upgrade the cooler’s one-horsepower motor, reinforced the suspension, added an MP3 plug in and a headphone jack.
He said the cooler, which costs about $3 to fill up with gas, is more economical and environmentally friendly than driving his considerably larger Chevrolet Impala to the local Tim Hortons.
The cooler can now clock up to 50 km/h though Rideout said he prefers to drive between five and 10 km/h.