A tragic accident last weekend has led to a renewed call to ban or restrict mopeds on the Vineyard. Meanwhile, two young women are recovering from injuries.

Two young New Hampshire women riding a rented moped sustained serious injuries after hitting a dump truck on Barnes Road early Saturday afternoon. Both are recovering.

According to Chapter 90 of Massachusetts General Laws on the operation of a low-speed vehicle in the state, a low-speed vehicle is a motor vehicle that cannot legally be operated at a speed greater than 25 miles per hour.

This week I witnessed a number of near accidents and arrived just after a fender bender in two different parking lots. It is the first time I have seen the signs reading, “Drive as if your children live here.” The delicate balance between everyone who shares the roads was upset this week by the tragic death of a 22-year-old man on a moped; three people in a pick-up were not at fault. My heart goes out to the family and friends of this young man and the loss they all must accept and learn to live with.

The driver of a moped was killed Wednesday afternoon in an accident on State Road involving a moped and a truck. The accident took place two days before the Fourth of July holiday as the Island was beginning to fill with people and traffic.

It was one of those sunlit, breezy exquisite Monday afternoons driving down State Road in light traffic from up-Island near Lambert’s Cove Road in West Tisbury. Through my windscreen I observed four rather burly young guys approaching me from Vineyard Haven on their obviously rented mopeds.

A New Jersey man was med-flighted to a Boston area hospital Friday after being injured when the moped he was operating collided with a Jeep on State Road in West Tisbury, police said.

According to a police report, Robert Czech, 47, of Clifton, N.J., sustained injuries after being ejected from his moped. His passenger, Emily McDonald, 25, of New York, N.Y., was also injured and taken to the Martha’s Vineyard Hospital, West Tisbury police Cpl. Garrison Vieira said Friday.

Convinced there's no way to make rental mopeds safe on the Vineyard, Oak Bluffs selectmen this week threw their support behind proposed state legislation that would require anyone renting a moped to have a motorcycle license.

Operators of rented mopeds suffered two serious accidents this week on the same stretch of Seaview avenue near Lola's Restaurant in Oak Bluffs. In both accidents, moped operators lost control, crossed the center line and crashed into oncoming auto traffic.

There's money to be made in moped rentals on Martha's Vineyard, but just a handful of people are counting the cash - seven shop owners and four landlords, to be exact.