Tuesday, December 26, 2017

Banning e-bikes is not the right solution

New York City has not only banned electric bikes, but made it illegal for businesses to employ delivery staff who use e-bikes. This will affect a whole sub-section of poor, largely immigrant New Yorkers.
Electric bikes, and converted standard bikes, can reach speeds of over 30kph, and are admittedly often ridden recklessly, both on roads and on sidewalks. Part of the reason for New York's ban is supposedly the threat that electric bicycles represent to pedestrians and motorists, although there does not seem to be any reliable publicly-available data (other than anecdotal claims) that e-bikes are actually particularly dangerous, at least no more than other vehicles.
Banning them seems like overkill to me. Regulate and license them by all means, as is currently done with electric scooters. Police their use, enforce the rules of the road, and fine aggressive and reckless drivers, as with any road vehicles. But banning them does not seem like a good solution.

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