NYT gift article expires in 30 days.
I swear these technology subs really are anti-technology, it’s all old-man-yells-at-cloud whining and complaining. What a joke.
Who’s complaining in here?
Parents!
They’re the worst.
Please kindly point to the whining and complaining.
It’s worth noting that the top picture in the article is of a kid on a $4400 Sur-ron X, which is strictly not road legal and is capable of up to 45mph and can accelerate to 30mph in 3.5 seconds.
And thats without cutting the wire that unlocks it to 45+ mph and without modding it
I think you and the article have this wrong. 45mph is with the speed governor removed. The article doesn’t make it clear whether the parent misspoke and the reporter didn’t fact check or that the reporter just mistyped, but you can’t get anywhere close to 70 mph with a 6kW peak motor. There are people who have modded the hell out of these and poured thousands more dollars into them to get those kinds of speeds, but that’s not possible with a stock bike.
Thx! Sorry I meant 70 kph.
I looked it up… it’s 70kph, not mph. Comes out to be about 45mph.
Thx!
Anything over a class 2 should be licensed and require insurance. In the US if you are traveling faster than 12mph you are required to follow traffic laws. Some states even require vehicle insurance if there is an incident above 12mph.
You think teenagers care about insurance? Even if they did, they certainly can’t buy any.
I’m pretty sure the teens my neighbourhood that go as fast as they can at night on the wrong side of the road around blind corners with their lights turned off are uninsured. I love my eBike. Not a fan of how I see other people riding them every day though (and not just kids).
People on bikes and scooters here just blow through red lights without even looking. Sometimes I won’t even hear the scooters running the reds when I’m on foot because they are so quiet.
People I know have unfortunately died or become vegetables from non-traffic related crashes on bikes and escooters without helmets. :/
I love mountain biking, but I’m super anal retentive about always wearing protective gear, and I never ride with traffic because it’s so dangerous. I feel similarly uneasy about heavy and fast ebikes and emtbs.
99% of the danger on roads is caused by motor vehicles. Once we’ve solved that problem we can have a conversation about whether licensing improves e-bike safety. But until that day, creating barriers to car alternatives directly makes people less safe. If you prevent teenage hooligans from biking, they will drive instead and will be an actual danger to people instead of this imagined one.
States have no licensing/registration infrastructure for bicycles. And any changes must happen state by state (c.f. the chaos that is motorcycle registration).
Freedom is inherently dangerous, so, yes. We accept the risk of course because not being free is fucking terrible.
Freedom is inherently dangerous
Only to a degree. Letting your child run free on a playground is significantly less dangerous than letting them run free in a hazardous waste landfill. We can absolutely design safe and free places. We just need to stop designing our cities for the sole use of hazardous waste (cars).
It’s all relative, yeah.
Why do perfectly healthy teenagers need electric bikes? I understand the case for less physically able to use ebikes, but why can’t these kids just use regular bikes? Has everyone forgotten how to use their bodies?
Edit: carbrains have arrived
I am long since past my teen years, but as an avid traditional cyclist who is now an ebike enthusiast, here are a few points off the top of my head:
- ebikes are consistently faster. It is easier to plan your day around ebike trips, since they take about the same amount of time every day. With a regular bike, your trip could be twice as long today because yesterday’s tail wind has been replaced by a stiff head wind.
- Issues involving extreme heat and poor air quality (in my experience, these often go hand-in-hand) have less impact on ebiking.
- Terrain not being an impediment gives you more options. There may be some path you’d never have contemplated before since it is hilly or goes down into a deep ravine you will eventually have to slog your way out of, and so you’d wind up taking busy city streets instead with the danger that entails.
- ebikes do give you exercise. You can usually control the amount of pedal assist or even turn it off for a real workout. When off, you will get more exercise than with a traditional bike since ebikes are heavier. But you can do this exercise wherever it is safest to do so and go electric when you need to move with traffic.
- If your city has a main corridor for cycling in terms of say an off-road paved trail to downtown, but you’d have to go out of your way to an extent to reach it, you will be more likely to do so on an ebike. It is just not as much of bother to seek out the better and safer routes.
With my e-bike I’m as fast as cars in city traffic, which means they don’t attempt to do horribly dangerous overtakes, keeping me alive for longer.
Whatever it takes to get fewer people on cars
I think you’re being needlessly judgy, ebikes are great and it’s never been about whether you “need” one or not.
They’re faster than regular bikes, allowing you to cover a larger distance in the same amount of time, especially if you’re fit. They’re very fun to ride in general, and they can take some of the misery out of climbing hills or otherwise challenging/tedious parts of your commute. Cargo ebikes can carry a decent amount of stuff and even one or two small passengers in some cases, and in other cases they can replace your need for a car (like quickly getting to a store for something small). And they give you the ability to balance exercise vs convenience as the situation or your personalty demands (you get to decide how much work your body does and how much the motor does).
Finally, ebikes open the door for people to get into using active transportation instead of cars for people who normally wouldn’t want to, whether they need help because of fitness, want help because of living in a hilly environment, or because they just want to get from point A to B in a reasonable amount of time. Riding my ebike in an urban environment, I find that I can actually get around just as fast as in a car, if not faster due to traffic.
Because I’m not super fit and live in a very unforgiving and hilly American neighborhood (where I also have to ride on curvy roads where people drive too damn fast) I would have never ever considered getting a regular bike. I’m now riding a bike somewhat regularly, getting a bit of exercise (or not, depending on the circumstances), and having a great time riding on roads, bike lanes, sidewalks, through parks (at a reasonable speed for pedestrians), etc.
Yes, they’re more expensive than a regular bike.
Yes, they’re heavier than a regular bike.
Yes, having to worry about battery charge is inconvenient.
Yes, it can be dangerous to ride any bike at >20mph.But as the old saying goes “don’t knock it until you try it”. Even if you think you’re a cycling purist, I recommend at least giving ebikes a try before judging others for using them. I think if you did you’d find that ebikes are an ally of and complement to normal bikes, and just like an electric guitar amplifies your strings, ebikes are amplifying your legs and not rendering them obsolete.
Why do perfectly healthy adults need cars? Or regular bikes? Has everyone forgotten how to use their legs?
People need to start pulling themselves across the ground like slugs, as god intended.
Hills exist, sometimes you need to go 20 miles, we have record setting temperatures every day, public transit sucks most places, and a lot of areas don’t have bike lanes so you keep up with traffic or get ran over. E-bikes are good for everybody.
Hills are the main reason I’d love an ebike. I bike pretty regularly, but I’m simply not capable of going 20+ up a big hill. I live in a ridiculously hilly area, trying to ride on the roads as is would be borderline suicidal
Used to bike 12 miles most days for my commute several years ago. All hills. On the real steep ones I’d be going 2-3 mph up them and 35mph down them. Pedal assist would have been real nice back then. I would drive in on meeting heavy days just so I wouldn’t be sweaty in front of clients in the morning.
Crikey, that’s horrible.
In addition to RiderExMachina’s point, an e-bike will get you to your destination quicker, and with less effort. With how hot things are getting, it’s much more preferable to not arrive sweaty as hell due to how much work it can take, plus it’s better to spend less time in the heat.
No they don’t
No they don’t what?
It’s safe if there’s safe places to ride bikes? More bike lanes are needed everywhere, especially as cars get more and more out of reach for people.
Overall they are a very good thing.
(Maybe just … do some public safety campaigns for sidewalk sharing etiquette haha)
Denmark already have regulations that stipulate that ebikes and escooters can’t go faster than 20kmt and i feel that’s reasonable. For scooters you’re also required by law to wear a helmet.
It’s 25km/h. There is also a 45km/h category with stricter regulation.
We have the same/similar regulations in norway as well. I don’t have an e bike, but I guess the speed limit must be annoyingly low. I often pass them on my regular bike in like 30 km/h.
I could be wrong and the speed limit is only for scooters but honestly I don’t care to look into it. I prefer my regular bike and until I’m old and incapable of using that I won’t change.
Edit: Learned a lot about this today. Cheers fellas for the replies!
IIRC motor power has to be limited to 250w, and the speed gouvenor is set to 24km/h.
I have one of those E bikes that only run the motor when the user pedals, and it wasn’t hard to remove the speed limit. The bike paths here in Oslo are a bit sketchy sometimes, so I usually dont go above 30km/h, though my bike can reach 40 at full battery.
I was going to say, when I was a kid, growing up in the 70s, I had a dirt bike with a spedometer and I regularly pushed that thing to 25mph just with the pedals.
My first thought was “faster than 20? No big deal…”
But then I hit this:
“in fact, the Talaria can hit 70 miles per hour. His mother gave him her blessing, she said, and even helped him clip a wire that removes the speed “governor” that ordinarily limits the vehicle to 20 miles per hour.”
Having an eBike that can go that fast with relatively no modification at all does not seem wise to me, and it’s irresponsible of the parent to assist in that.
1 year after graduation, one of my high school friends got into an argument with his girlfriend, was riding his motorcycle too fast without a helmet, and crashed straight into the back of a garbage truck, killing him instantly.
A bike helmet wouldn’t have helped, maybe a DOT approved motorcycle helmet would have.
Edit I looked up the mod, it brings the bike to 70Kph, not mph. So about 45. Still faster than I’d want my kid going.
FWIW, I used to have an ebike that went up to 70, as an adult, that I used to commute to work and do shopping. New regulations came in restricting all new ebikes to 25 km/h, and now a shopping run takes an hour one-way.
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I never actually timed it but I can work it out. Back of the hand maths says 25 is a third of 70, roughly, so the journey used to take a third of the time, twenty minutes.
I was going to say, when I was a kid, growing up in the 70s, I had a dirt bike with a spedometer and I regularly pushed that thing to 25mph just with the pedals.
My first thought was “faster than 20? No big deal…”
But then I hit this:
“in fact, the Talaria can hit 70 miles per hour. His mother gave him her blessing, she said, and even helped him clip a wire that removes the speed “governor” that ordinarily limits the vehicle to 20 miles per hour.”
Having an eBike that can go that fast with relatively no modification at all does not seem wise to me, and it’s irresponsible of the parent to assist in that.
1 year after graduation, one of my high school friends got into an argument with his girlfriend, was riding his motorcycle too fast without a helmet, and crashed straight into the back of a garbage truck, killing him instantly.
A bike helmet wouldn’t have helped, maybe a DOT approved motorcycle helmet would have.
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I think the pros outweigh the cons? Anything that steers us away from car culture is desperately needed at this point, and this is one of the only practical alternatives in suburbia.
I would be for bike safety being taught at schools, though I feel licensing for minors would be a quagmire? Let’s not go there. I would be for speed limiters that are harder to bypass. For example, I can disable mine by phone app. If I had any trouble I could ask, well, a teenager? lol
But perhaps most importantly, cycling infrastructure, at least in North America, is a joke and there is so much that can be done on the safety front it’s not funny. I wish the decision makers were all bike commuters. Then they would understand the level of impracticality in their well-meaning but futile attempts to improve the situation.
This basically sounds like the regulation in Germany. Bike safety is being taught at schools, and there is a discrete distinction between e-bikes and Pedelecs. Pedelecs, which only support while pedalling, are legally bicycles with a speed limit of 25 km/h (15 mp/h). Everything above this limit or with the capability to drive without pedalling are called E-Bikes and need insurance and some sort of license.
There is a lot NA could learn from Germany and, well, Europe in general. I’m in Canada and read an article recently about how some Scandinavian communities keep their bike trails serviceable all winter long. I wish! They pack down the snow kind of like a cross-country ski trail here but over a broader width.
“As teens take to cars, parents ask: Is this freedom or danger?”
Danger, clearly. We shouldn’t have encouraged them off the ebikes.
As teens take to sidewalks…
As teens take to malls…
As teens take to wilderness trails…
I guess I shouldn’t be surprised, we live in a society that threatens to take kids away from their parents for letting them walk to the post office.
“As teens wear shoes and leave the house, parents ask: is this freedom or danger?”
“As teens start doing homework, parents ask: is this freedom or danger?”
Freedom. I fucking hate this shit where parents own their children. Fuck off with this. Genuinely one of the most awful aspecta of American life is having to live with and get to know your shitty boomer parents instead of getting drunk and having sex and dancing, like I assume european teens get to do, considering their age of consent and drinking ages are lower than ours.
instead of getting drunk and having sex and dancing, like I assume european teens get to do
Uh, yeah but actually no. You also need to hide it from your parents wtf. Also we do live with and get to know our parents until we get out of their home which with current prices the age is around 28-30ish right now?
E-bikes are great. I’ve got one I built from a kit. That said, you don’t want kids riding more powerful e-bikes than they can handle. If you wouldn’t let your kid loose with a gas-powered dirt bike that can go 30+ mph, you shouldn’t let them loose with an equivalent e-bike.
I’m against licensing e-bikes or requiring insurance. While they can potentially be dangerous to the rider if misused, danger to other people or property is pretty minimal. The risk isn’t enough to justify requiring liability insurance, like with cars. Licensing will only discourage ridership.
That said, there should be an age requirement for certain classes. In lieu of that, parents are just going to have to exercise common sense. The kids will do what they want, rules be damned.
I love e-bikes but also think that many of those are motorbikes in disguise. a 250w motor is enough for most people (excluding cargo bikes, of course). I totally agree with you with the rest of points. In general measures that harms adoption of bicycling are a bad idea
I’ve got a 1000w motor on mine. Is it a motor bike in disguise? Yeah, maybe, since it has a throttle control. Where I live, though, there’s no regulations specific to ebikes. I obey traffic laws and stay off of sidewalks and have a drivers license, so as far as I’m concerned it’s fine. It does go about 25-30 mph, but in my mind it’s a commuter vehicle. I’m not riding on bike trails that share pedestrians and have low speed limits.
If necessary, I could modify it to make it a class three e-bike. The governor, currently off, cuts it to 750w and I could change it from a throttle control to a pedal assist with parts that were part of the kit but are still sitting in the box.
It’s in a legal gray area, as my state’s definition of what constitutes a “motorized bicycle” was written with gasoline engines in mind. There’s lots of unlicensed, uninsured 49cc scooters running around that fall into the same gray area, so it fits right in.
This article is obviously from an American perspective, in which case e-bikes are probably a necessary evil to give kids more freedom. But from the Dutch perspective I’m certainly a bit scared about them. I see more and more kids racing through the streets on those things. These kids often used to go by bike anyway, but their speed was still limited by their physical ability. Now they have to put in less energy, meaning they’ll gain weight, and they’re also going way too fast with a heavier bike that they don’t fuly control. It’s led to plenty of dangerous situations already. People obviously aren’t forced to buy an e-bike, but the kids without one often have a bit of a problem when they have to cycle 10km every day with friends who do have one. So it becomes a domino effect where we end up in a worse situation than before.
Middle schoolers (age 11-14) just rip around on 2-stroke dirt bikes where I’m at. Even a 100cc dirt bike will hit 50mph at WOT.
At least e-bikes aren’t noisy like the awful buzz of a 2-stroke a half-mile away.
Here electric dirtbikes are a problem. They rip around with no lights in the dark, and you can’t hear them coming. Things like that make me understand why places like Paris have bike gates to restrict the handlebar width and tyre size of bikes that can pass through
The riders wear no helmets whatsoever, so I’m just currently waiting on that problem to sort itself out 👍
Still infinitely better than hearing a two stroke from half a mile away though
Especially in the Netherlands, better to have those escooters than to have actual scooters which make tons of noise and blow exhaust fumes to any biker that drives behind them.
Oh yeah for scooters it’s better. But for bikes it’s only better if it leads to someone using a bike where they otherwise could not. Otherwise it makes stuff more dangerous and expensive and less healthy.
