How luck are we in the UK?

Usual ******** - Councilman James Oddo (R-Mid-Island) said a few years ago motorized scooters were "all the rage" on Staten Island. They're especially dangerous, he said, because the scooters are hard for drivers to see.

- if the drivers can't see them then they probably shouldn't be driving, perhaps we should all drive around in trucks instead. The problem seems to be underpaid fastfood delivery drivers on piecework riding up pavements and the wrong way on one way streets etc. E-bikes/scooters are a fundamentally sensible form of transportation in cities like New York, take away their ebike and they will just start using pogo-sticks or something.

Yes, I've previously highlighted this long existing ban on e-bikes in New York. The determination to enforce the ban will have an ill effect on Nycewheels, who are one of Americas oldest and largest e-bike dealers, since they are in New York!

Mention is made of the much higher speed than normal bikes being a city ban reason, and that comes about due to their higher national limits of 700 watts and 20 mph and even higher limits like 1000 watts and 30 mph in some states. Cause for reflection from those here who want our 250 watt and 15 mph limits raised, it could be a poisoned chalice.

And not just New York of course. Illinois with that other huge urban conurbation, Chicago, also has a total ban on e-bikes and there they've always strongly enforced it.

And there are some Chinese cities with total bans and a number of others there with roads and/or districts banned to e-bikes.

In all of these cases the e-bike speed and power conditions have been much higher than ours, so as I stressed above, we are likely to be more immune from bans and unwelcome regulations if we keep with our moderate speed and power limitations, irksome though they may be.

There are American towns that have banned cycles full stop:-

Black Hawk Bike Ban - Bicycle Colorado

Banning electric bikes is easy because their users are a minority and it's just part of the anti-cycling, "roads are for cars" mentality that many people have. It's nothing to do with high power or speed. Once the ebike ban has taken hold and people have moved onto regular cycles they'll ban them too.

Edited May 4, 201312 yr by amigafan2003

There are American towns that have banned cycles full stop:-

 

Black Hawk Bike Ban - Bicycle Colorado

 

Banning electric bikes is easy because their users are a minority and it's just part of the anti-cycling, "roads are for cars" mentality that many people have. It's nothing to do with high power or speed. Once the ebike ban has taken hold and people have moved onto regular cycles they'll ban them too.

Totally agree with your thoughts.

Incredible! they are worried about the dangers of the odd cycle.

Get some perspective. A good percentage of their population are eating themselves to death.

No, nothing to do with speed or power as you say, but having higher speeds and powers makes a convenient stick to beat e-bikers with, as happened in the case of New York. It's not possible to make that case when the power is equal to a cyclist's output and the speeds fairly universal cycling ones.

US towns can and do make eccentric decisions, but the states and cities are less likely to do anything like as extreme as banning all cycling. The Illinois problem is that they see e-bikes as motor vehicles, but which fall far short of motor vehicle standards. They have therefore also banned any attempt to register them as motor vehicles, catch 22.

The stated New York reason of safety is a nonsense of course, their reason is clearly that e-bikes inconvenience motor traffic. This position is identical to the Chinese places that have bans in place, but they've been honest enough to say that's the true reason.

Why beat with a stick.

They have two options, ban all e-bikes or work with manufacturers, organisations and the public and come up with an e-bike policy that works for the people.

Of course the easist route is to ban all.

Lots of delivery riders uses ebikes in NYC. Those that used them responsibly never appeared on the radar. The irresponsible made themselves a target.

I've always had my reservations about people using fast bikes in big cities (whether electric or not) - the very place they are in large concentrations and being promoted... and brakeless fixed gear bikes have no place on city streets.

It's people without a huge infrastructure of public transport choice who really need them - as they have no alternatives except cars. If anyone should feel there is a group who are genuinely compromising the development of appropriate legislation it is cyclists and eBikers in places like London, Manchester, Birmingham tyring to beat everyone else to their finishing line.... so I have no problem with control measures in those conurbations where conditions are dangerous and risks are high. It's rolling that out to the whole nation including quiet rural areas that makes absolutely no sense.

But then again (and I may be in the minority on this) I don't ride on pavements either and don't think bikes should be there. Just wait at the traffic lights like everyone else, or walk -if you don't want to ride on cycle paths.

Edited May 4, 201312 yr by 103Alex1

is why NYC have cracked down on ebikes (and soon all cycles).

 

A fine display of knobbery, there. One other thing - they say the bikes were fixies, yet I'm sure I saw the front rider freewheel on numerous occasions - and lock the rear up a couple of times - which makes me think it has one of those back-pedal brakes. So much for accuracy, eh?

It's people without a huge infrastructure of public transport choice who really need them - as they have no alternatives except cars.

If anyone should feel there is a group who are genuinely compromising the development of appropriate legislation it is cyclists and eBikers in places like London, Manchester, Birmingham tyring to beat everyone else to their finishing line....

What about the cyclists and eBikers in places like London, Manchester, Birmingham NOT tyring to beat everyone else to their finishing line. What about the car drivers and motor cyclist in places like London, Manchester, Birmingham tyring to beat everyone else to their finishing line... What if the public transport doesn't run early enough to get me to or from work? What if the public transport turns a 14 hour day into a 16 hour day?

...or petrol bikes which can be cheap to buy and run.

Not everyone is allowed to ride them though, are they ?

What about the cyclists and eBikers in places like London, Manchester, Birmingham NOT tyring to beat everyone else to their finishing line. What about the car drivers and motor cyclist in places like London, Manchester, Birmingham tyring to beat everyone else to their finishing line... What if the public transport doesn't run early enough to get me to or from work? What if the public transport turns a 14 hour day into a 16 hour day?

At least there IS public transport - and a wider choice of jobs if people can't get to one or the hours don't make it viable. Most rural areas have lost not only their trains but their buses too as more and more resources are poured into cities year on year on year. Point is we're talking bikes not cars or motorbikes and the city rat race attitude leads to rules being spread well beyond the confines of the awful scrabble they are appropriate in to regulate. A few concentrated areas of people climbing all over each other to get where they have undertaken to be in timeframes the conditions don't really allow. The outcome is predictable - and evidenced by peoples' behaviour. But these are choices and big city problems are not ones that should shape the rules for the rest of the British Isles.

London introduced congestion charging - that was a London response to a London problem. Same can just as easily go for other transport issues. In fact why not just nail the delivery riders, couriers and city racers for their bad riding and spare everyone a load of hasstle. Heaven knows there are enough transport police marauding around London interrogating conspicuously careful drivers for not driving like their life depended on it ... pull up a few more reckless cyclists rather than let them all think it's the norm and "everyone does it", and maybe the margins in their extra package deliveries won't be enough to make it worth their while getting landed with some on-the-spot fines.

I'd think it was a good idea if it were not for the fact I reckon the police would pick off soft targets who are easier to catch whilst letting the real problem cases away with it.... because they tend to be like that

Edited May 5, 201312 yr by 103Alex1

Not everyone is allowed to ride them though, are they ?

So because cars cause congestion on some of the roads that I may not use, at times when I may not be travelling, I should get a new job rather than ride my bike? Just because I live and work in a 'city'?

Not everyone is allowed to ride ebikes either.

Anyone is allowed to ride an eBike if they are old enough. No-one is officially allowed to ride a 'fast' one. Point is the 'fast ones' are most dangerous in busy urban areas with congestion and excess numbers of road users and pedestrians. So it follows their use in those areas can be regulated locally. As can cycling speeds. If it's 20mph limit for cars, why should bikes be used to travel faster ?

So because cars cause congestion on some of the roads that I may not use, at times when I may not be travelling, I should get a new job rather than ride my bike? Just because I live and work in a 'city'?

Congestion charging is simply an illustration of a particular system of regulation being applied at a local level to address local problems.

You can put restrictions in that only apply at certain times of day - such as when the majority of people are riding recklessly - if someone bothers to do a study to understand whether it is commuters or delivery drivers who are the problem (or both). However, to stick with the conceptual analogy, congestion charging doesn't apply at weekends - and neither do parking charges in many London areas after Saturday lunchtime. There is flexibility on the part of many employers and public transport providers. They just don't have enough reason to exercise it.

To turn on its head, when I sold my car one of my jobs went with it. No other reasonable way to perform it. So yes your job choice is impacted on by your options or choices for transport.

Edited May 5, 201312 yr by 103Alex1

If it's 20mph limit for cars, why should bikes be used to travel faster ?

Bike are not fitted with a verified speedometer, so how does a cyclist know if they are travelling above the posted speed limit?

Only in America...the land of the free....?

As one of life cynics, my explanation is that America is being run by various large oil companies, with Obama as a temporary agent, as all Presidents are. Money has always had a bigger voice than the whole of the american democratic system, so when a new or alternative technologies that threatens USA oil comsumption(profits) come along it will bought out and buried or RESTRICTED and in some cases banned. Some people will think this a oversimplifiction of the case, but greed has very few smooth edges.

There are American towns that have banned cycles full stop:-

 

Black Hawk Bike Ban - Bicycle Colorado

 

Banning electric bikes is easy because their users are a minority and it's just part of the anti-cycling, "roads are for cars" mentality that many people have. It's nothing to do with high power or speed. Once the ebike ban has taken hold and people have moved onto regular cycles they'll ban them too.

There are two ways of solving a problem in USA. The first, adopted in this case, is to employ vast numbers of lawyers to argue at great expense, until either the money runs out, everyone forgets what the problem was in the first place, or the world ends.

The second way, which the cyclists should have adpted here, is to cite their constitutional rights to bear arms and shot the town manager. End of problem.

Bike are not fitted with a verified speedometer, so how does a cyclist know if they are travelling above the posted speed limit?

Any technical reason why they can't be ? If not then just say if you want to ride them in restricted hours they must be, else you get done for not having one. Simples.

If the French can make it an offence not to carry an alcohol breath testing kit in your glove compartment then I'm pretty sure insisting on speedos (that's the measuring variety - not the budgie smugglers ...) is feasible. Provided there is any sort of will. Which I doubt there really is.

Yes, I've previously highlighted this long existing ban on e-bikes in New York. The determination to enforce the ban will have an ill effect on Nycewheels, who are one of Americas oldest and largest e-bike dealers, since they are in New York!

 

Mention is made of the much higher speed than normal bikes being a city ban reason, and that comes about due to their higher national limits of 700 watts and 20 mph and even higher limits like 1000 watts and 30 mph in some states. Cause for reflection from those here who want our 250 watt and 15 mph limits raised, it could be a poisoned chalice.

Well then we will need to pass the chalice on the left hand side because it has to burn. But I do agree with you on a serious note.

Mountainsport.

Just for info: the new French government has rescinded the requirement to carry a testing kit. I didn’t quite understand the reason; probably because it was instituted by the previous government.

Lol. Governments are the same the world over it seems. The sheer inconsistency of them and the shifting sands are half the reason it's hard to take laws seriously sometimes.

The first thing power mongers seem to want to do is undo what the person before did. Just in case we don't notice there have been any changes. The civil service runs the country in Britain - I think the politicians just get to join in with messing a few things up for good measure.

Edited May 5, 201312 yr by hech

is why NYC have cracked down on ebikes (and soon all cycles).

 

Lots of delivery riders uses ebikes in NYC. Those that used them responsibly never appeared on the radar. The irresponsible made themselves a target.

I loved this video, these guys have more talent than anything we saw in last years Olympics (not that I watched any of it). I dunno if its supposed to be an artform in itself or just two dingbats out stealing wing mirrors but either way there is already a law against it. The authorities are just getting frustrated because of their difficulty apprehending them(dingbats). But that is their (the authorities) problem and we should not allow them(politicians) to dictate new restrictions on our (good people's) freedom, but instead spend a little more on more imaginative policing or rely on the commuters sense of natural justice next time the boys(d'bats) actually hit someone.