The New York Times published a pair of articles this weekend highlighting the rising number of deaths of cyclists riding electric bikes. However, in one of the most impressive feats of victim-blaming I’ve seen from the publication in some time, the NYT lays the onus on e-bikes instead of on the things killing their law abiding riders: cars.
Just another perspective here.
Yes, it’s cars, and yes, it’s infrastructure. However…
E-bikes have been causing a spike in cyclist crashes, even in places that is considered the safest place to cycle: The Netherlands.
The problem with e-bikes is that they are more like motorcycles and less like bikes, so you get a huge number of people under 25 and people over 55 crashing these things left and right.
This article from The Verge is worth the read to get a better idea of what’s going on.
I’d say two bikes crashing would be a hell of a lot better than a car crashing with a bike. No need to demonize the better option.
80 yo or 14 yo on ebikes are menaces. One because they don’t have the reaction time and coordination to handle the speed. One because they don’t have a shred of situational awareness or respect for the rules of the road.
It’s honestly scary to share a bike path with both.
The problem isn’t 14 or 80 year olds. The problem is pretending motorbikes are bicycles because they have accessory pedals.
A bicycle as a class of vehicle moves at about 25km/h on average, doesn’t accelerate very fast and is a bit slower after hills or corners. An ebike is a bicycle that you pedal a bit less, not a vehicle that moves at at least 32km/h any time it is moving.
250W 25km/h limits are about the highest you want for the default vehicle type. And a real 250W max, not the corrupted testing process currently used for euro standards designed to test a lower bound.
Why 32km/h at least? E-Bikes are limited to 25km/h in europe. E-Bikes above 25km/h are only allowed on the streets and not on bike-paths, in villages and cities. In the netherlands, they are allowed on bike-paths outside of villages and cities, but those bike-paths are wide and allow those faster e-bikes.
Additionally, the aforementioned 14 and 80 year olds are usually not on those e-bikes faster than 25km/h. You need a registration and a drivers license which you only get at the minimum age of 16 for S-Pedelecs (E-Bikes faster than 25km/h are called S-Pedelecs here), 80 y/os dont buy S-Pedelecs but buy normal e-bikes which are limited to 25km/h.
E-bikes in the US (the subject) do 32 (or more on downhill stretches where the motor finally tops out and the rider is fresh). S-pedelecs are the ones with much higher fatalities for the elderly in the metherlands and do 45. Nornal pedelecs in europe also produce much more than 250W
Downhill is the situation in which ebikes are least likely to exceed the speed of regular bikes. Since the motor is designed to cut out at 20 mph anyway then it won’t help you go faster downhill, but it will continue to have increased rolling resistance. And if it’s no worse than a regular bike, it isn’t a problem.
I see you’ve never encountered an ebike on a hill.
Acoustic bike riders rest on the downhill.
Ebike riders who have motors that exceed their power output by a factor of 3 rest on the uphill.
The rolling resistance difference is single digit watts. Any influence from extra weight will increase coasting speed.
Actually, I was thinking of personal experience riding with my wife, with me on an ebike and her on an acoustic bike. I was surprised at how I actually needed to put in a little effort to keep up with her downhill.
^ precisely my point though. A little effort exceeds the motor speed limiter. Effort that is much more readily available because you didn’t spend it going up the hill.
I dont get what you want to achieve with a general 250W limit. There are 3 different motors which provide a completely different amount of power with 250W. You would need different limits per kind of motor
Edit: also the root-comment is about the netherlands, so thats why I assumed this discussion is about the netherlands. My bad
250W is an output limit not an input. And power is power.