Oh no… Can’t have people travelling around without flock cameras being able to establish travel patterns…
As more people turn to e bikes for commutes or errands, government needs to be able to track and Id you.
/s but still its probably true
I would support something that gets other cyclists to stop breaking the law. Running stop signs and red lights is dangerous for no fucking reason. I’m not sure if this is the right way though.
Maybe we should give them license plates and ban the flock cameras. Two birds, one stone.
Studies show that treating stop signs as yield signs and lights as stop signs saves cyclist lives. See the Idaho stop.
What makes cars safe to be around is not necessary for cyclist safety to themselves or others.
The cyclists around where I am ignore stop signs and lights. I’ve seen some that will get to a red light, take a right without stopping. Immediately take a u turn less that 30 feet from the intersection. Then take another right without stopping.
I’m not convinced that criminalizing them is the correct answer. Ideally we would just build real bike infrastructure and public transit. Less cars on the road is also probably a lot safer for cyclists and pedestrians.
Stop signs and stop lights only exist to prevent cars from killing people, they aren’t necessary for bicycles going under 25mph.
ive seen cyclist almost run over people, by going extremely fast, and they warn pedestrians at all, or they make a obnoxious loud noise that is equally dangerous when it also involves cars.
I’m gonna play devil’s advocate here a little bit. If you can drive a “bicycle” the same as a scooter (30 mph motorized vehicle) why would you not regulate the same? Scooters have to be registered and I think these 30mph ebikes with a throttle are pretty much the same thing. Should have reg and insurance if your doing 30 and operating on the roadways as a motorized vehicle. Otherwise why did I register any of my motorcycles? Why register a car? Read about ebike injuries. Their more akin to motorcycle crashes than bicycle accidents. Also can cause damage to other motor vehicles and injure pedestrians just as much as a scooter would.
The convenient surveillance doesn’t exactly discourage the government from supporting/driving car-centric communities.
I’ve put 4000 miles on my e-bike in the past 2 years. Even though I follow traffic laws, I’ve seen far too much fuckery by other e-bike riders. I’m seeing children riding e-bikes and scooters, without helmets, doing crazy shit in the middle of the road almost cause accidents. I have narrowly avoided hitting such children on 3 separate occasions. I see plenty of adults on these things also not following traffic laws and riding these things on busy sidewalks.
I really do not want e-bikes to be regulated like cars. Being forced to register and carry insurance makes an inexpensive thing expensive. That being said, there are tons of dumb assholes out there that will ruin it for the rest of us.
Registering is fine, a lot of people voluntarily register their expensive bikes with local police that have those programs anyway.
Insurance is weirder. Cars require as much insurance as they do because they weigh multiple tons and can kill people and destroy infrastructure. A powered bike can do a lot of damage, especially if it rams someone, but it has an order of magnitude less destructive potential than a car. Especially for a limited powered bike insurance “should” be significantly cheaper.
The difference is honestly closer to two orders of magnitude.
E = 1/2mv^2
1/2 * 1000kg * 50 km/h * 50 km/h * 0.2778 mh/skm * 0.2778 mh/skm = 96 kJ
1/2 * 100kg * 25 km/h * 25 km/h * 0.2778 mh/skm * 0.2778 mh/skm = 2 kJ
The number of children I see zooming around the neighborhood without helmets and not even stopping at stop signs (I legit almost hit one kid one time who blew through a stop sign in front of me), is pretty horrifying. Their parents have basically given them all small motorcycles and let them go free with no supervision. It just seems so unsafe.
Some vehicles that people call “ebikes” should absolutely be registered and plated. You should not be able to take a motorized vehicle on a bike path and zoom through at 50+ MPH. The surron kiddies are going to ruin alternative transportation for everyone. Sure, surrons aren’t ebikes (and something like a super 76 which has pedals really should be regulated as part of its own category like emoped or something), but regulators are going to want to put everything in nice neat categories and ban everything else.
The issue here is that we have no way to verify from your text whether you almost hit them because of their lack of responsibility, or if you weren’t paying enough attention.
As someone with extensive experience with bike commuting on a regular bike, I have had multiple near death experiences while obeying all traffic laws properly and using multiple light sources. Even with my new 10 minute walking commute, the simple act of crossing the street safely when the street lights tell me to cross, has proved to be asking too much with multiple near hits in only a few months.
Humans are not remotely responsible enough to drive.
Lol I was paying perfect attention. Only reason the kid was ok was that I was far enough back to slam on my breaks (and was going the speed limit). I doubt he even realized how risky the move he pulled was.
In all fairness, I’ve also nearly been hit by asshole pickup trucks blowing the same stop sign. Guess it might just be that intersection that makes people think it’s optional.
Not just children, but adults too! They’re more likely to have a helmet on, but stop a stop sign? Nah, they don’t have to stop, they are immune to traffic laws!
Stop signs and traffic lights only exist to stop cars from killing people, bicycles do not need stop signs.
It is safer for bicyclists to run stop signs than it is to come to a complete stop. Also who the fuck in 2026 actually stops at a stop sign? Nobody does.
Hell, I’ve had kids riding down the opposite lane of traffic riding wheelies and swerving around. Absolutely no accountability.
Kids having independence is a good thing. They are probably the first in their family to be independent from cars and so their parents don’t teach them cycling etiquette.
Yes independence is a good thing. If they were riding normal bikes, I’d have few issues with them. However, the way things currently are, I see a decent number of dead or disabled children in the future.
Not seems, is.
People are fucking stupid.
Genuinely nobody follows stop signs. I think it’s like 20% actually come to a stop?
With bicycles, it’s safer to treat stop signs as a yield signs since coming to a full stop means you’ll cross the intersection much more slowly than if you keep some speed.
Helmets are bad for safety because (1) car drivers act more dangerous around cyclists wearing helmets and (2) they discourage people from riding bikes whereas the primary safety factor of cycling, by far, is the number of people cycling.
huh? I never wear a helmet outside of escooters but I’m not going to argue that no helmet is safer than helmet
I should have been clearer sorry. Wearing a helmet is obviously better in a crash; but, both personally and societally, not wearing one decreases the chances of getting in a crash in the first place.
Helmets are pretty important for safety. I don’t really have strong opinions on whether helmets should be required or not, just because if you go flying without a helmet and die it only kills you, but… yeah, we’ve gotten hit by cars (on our dinky 15mph escooter) and the helmet probably saved our life.
That also applies even if you don’t get hit by a car and just, say, get your wheel stuck in a train track rail or something and go down. (We’ve had that happen, too, on a bike.)
– Frost
Just license them in accordance with their capabilities. All the bad press about ebikes lately is running cover for government negligence over lack of normalizing them into existing licensing frameworks, on behalf of the automotive lobby that knows if these vehicles aren’t given an appropriate legal niche they will instead end up being seen by society as dangerous scofflaws and ultimately banned or legistalted out of practicality.
Use your brains. Ask why the discussion doesn’t revolve around appropriate licensure and infrastructure, and instead revolves around how to get rid of them.
IL has a L license for motorcycles under 150cc, no reason not to have a kwH rating for it.
A 110cc motorbike can do 60 mph, theres a fundamental difference between that and a souped up ebike doing 30.
Souped up e-bikes are approaching 60+ now too.
This kid who killed a pedestrian was caught going 56mph in the weeks preceding the accident.
Yes but the souped up e-bikes doing 30 need regulation as well. Maybe not by placing them into an existing category where they don’t fit but some of these rigs out here are freaking ridiculous and ruining it for everyone.
Do states not? PA is 750W, but bikes might be governed to 20 or 28mph.
State laws around low power two wheel vehicles are all over the place, and mostly leftover from the two stroke moped era of the 70s and early 80s. So none of it really makes sense anymore.
The laws are varied, but from what I can tell only three states don’t have definitions for e-bikes: AL, AK, GA. Most adhere to federal guidelines of 750W and Class 1+2 while others also permit Class 3. Several allow up to 1000W. The tl;dr is a <=750W Class 1 is allowed pretty much anywhere whereas a Class 3 may have additional requirements or be unpermitted.
That’s what I thought as well yet I see what are essentially electrically powered off-road motorcycles everywhere. There’s no enforcing the sales end of it, which I guess means it’s up to local law enforcement?
It’s similar in the U.K…I think you can have up to 125cc for so long, then you can have up to a 250 for so long, and so on…
Too many people in here are perfectly fine with all movement outside of their home being ID’d, documented and monitored. A plate on a bike does absolutely nothing to make the road safer. It just normalizes the “safety” of constant surveillance by your benevolent overlords.
Put normal regulations on e bike performance and build bike safe infrastructure. “It would be too dangerous to chase them”… get on your own bike you fat lazy pig.
I think it makes sense for those bikes that can do 30mph+ and aren’t even meant to be ridden as bicycles despite having pedals. They usually look like a motorcycle and can accommodate two riders. Having bicycle pedals shouldn’t be a loophole for bypassing drivers licensing requirements and traffic laws. These things are usually ridden by 10-15 year olds who don’t yet have formal training. I saw a kid cause an accident buzzing through a 4-way stop. I’ve also heard of them colliding with pedestrians at high speeds on sidewalks. E-bikes are a good thing overall, but it’s the Wild West right now and some e-bikes can go way too fast for something that isn’t regulated.
I agree with all of your points. However, in California, ebikes are already regulated:
https://riding5.com/blogs/news/california-ebike-laws-class-1-2-3
The only “wild west” thing happening is that some people are riding illegal, (they’re already illegal. We don’t need new laws) unregistered electric motorcycles. The 30+ mph “ebikes” you refer to: those are motorcycles.
What makes it the Wild West is there is no good way to enforce anything at the moment, so any existing regulations are ineffective to the point where the current environment is de facto unregulated
Assemblymember Rebecca Bauer-Kahan, the East Bay legislator behind the license plate bill, says law enforcement in her district has been raising concerns for some time. Officers told her they are seeing dangerous speeds from electric bikes but have no practical way to issue citations without putting themselves or others at risk. A license plate changes that equation.
She also pointed out that the rise of e-bikes among younger riders has made it harder to know at a glance whether a child is legally riding an age-appropriate e-bike, operating an illegally modified one, or cruising around on an electric moped that is not supposed to be on public roads at all.
How do you know which one is illegal? It’s the one that’s going too fast.
Ebikes are an excellent, relatively inexpensive solution to several problems. They’re going to try to regulate them until they become impractical.
I’ve got a skateboard and unicycle myself, I think all these things are great, but you’ve highlighted the big problems that exist today. It’s the kids that have no sense, whip by people walking, being ignorant to traffic rules, etc.
I watched 2 kids on a gravel path whip by on escooters past a 5 year old swaying back and forth on a pedal bike as he was obviously trying to learn. That could have gotten bad.
It’s really a shame. Ebikes are amazing and have the potential to really bring bicycling to the masses. But these jackasses riding motocross rock hoppers down the sidewalk are going to ruin it for everybody.
Now limit car speed next? They seem to be the biggest menace on the roads in California. E-motos are not e-bikes and e-bikes shouldn’t be lumped into legislation.
Yes.
But even if they didn’t limit cars. That’s no excuse for not limiting e-bikes.
You don’t need to prove that you know the traffic laws to ride an ebike. You do to ride a car.
You do not need a license that can be revoked to ride an ebike. So if you speed in a car you could just get your license removed, not the case for ebikes.
The thing is, cops can still cite bikers for breaking traffic laws they don’t know. So why aren’t the cops enforcing existing traffic laws on e-bikes? In my town I see kids without helmets drive past cop cars and the cops don’t even take a second look.
I really wish California revoked licenses for stuff like that. On paper they do but really speeding is rampant and not enforced. We should be stepping up patrols to enforce laws we have on the books before making more.
Aren’t car speeds already limited everywhere?
e-bikes and e-scooters where I come from are limited to 25 km/h because you don’t really need a license for those. Vehicles that require a license (and thus plenty of training) are allowed to go faster. If your e-bike is limited to 25, you’re still allowed to cycle faster than that on your own. In fact, cycling speed isn’t limited at all, other than near pedestrians or in designated walkable areas. E-motos have the same speed limits as cars and motorcycles, because they require a motorcycle license and are generally classified as motorcycles.
The idea is that kids with no formal traffic training and potentially not much experience shouldn’t be able to shoot up to 50 km/h in 2 seconds using an electric motor. Achieving speed with your own muscles takes more time and effort, requires a straight enough road, etc.
They are not limiting car speed on the car itself. Which is what they are proposing, a governor on the e-bike that prevents you from going faster.
Yes, on vehicles that require no training or license and have no license plate and usually go pretty fast on pedestrian walkways. The faster ones will get license plates (but no training or license requirement).
[Analog] cyclist here. I’m of the opinion if it has a throttle, it needs some sort of registration and maybe even minimal insurance.
Class I (in the US), you don’t need anyone’s permission to ride. Just like a regular bicycle.
Class III, you need some sort of registration/license. Might as well be a motorcycle.Class II is where we can have some discussion and disagreement.
Unclassified: the 40mph+ e-bikes and no-pedal scooters ruining it for everyone else.
I’m of the opinion it doesn’t matter because enforcement will be spotty and the reckless assholes will still be reckless assholes while the responsible <25mph riders will be regulated. There are e-bikes with weight and speed exceeding the lowest of registration-required motorcycles (Aniioki A9 vs Honda Cub/monkey/grom, yes I watch Fortnine)
Maybe I am mistaken on e bike ratings but can’t you have a class 3 without a throttle? And isn’t the definition of a class 2 that it does have a throttle?
I think you’ll find the definitions of what constitutes each class is fairly moot when there’s no-one enforcing the differences. You’re right, not all class IIIs have throttles, but the ones that are causing the most problems definitely do.
You don’t have that correct. Not your fault, the system is very confusing.
Class III can’t have throttles by definition. They have a max speed of 28mph.
Class II have throttles but a top speed of 20mph.
Class I have no throttles and a top speed of 20mph.
You are thinking of unclassified bikes (electric dirtbikes, mopeds, and motorcycles).
Fair enough, thanks for the correction. At least from my revisiting of the classifications, class III seem to allow (but not require) throttles in most places, but– to your point– not allowed in California.
My incorrectness proves a larger point, I think, that the unclassified bikes are often grouped into “e-bikes” and those at least need to be regulated. That we don’t allow class III e-bikes on multi-use trails muddy the water between III and unclassified, at least to me.
Let’s work on gun registration, then I’ll be open to it.
Not sure where you are in the world, but where I am guns are most certainly registered.
Give you ONE guess 🤣🤣🤣
Your country already seems sensible, so I’d probably be ok with registration.
Somewhere in the American South? If so, I can see how you have such a pessimistic view of the US. My view from California is also pessimistic, but maybe not quite as much as if I were from, say, Florida or Texas.
Getting back to the original point, I’m not thrilled with the idea of any bike registration. But do have to agree with the idea of something being done about the dangerous class IIIs.
I live in the northeast and my state does not require firearms to be registered, and you only need to be 16 to purchase a firearm. My state is in the top 3 for least school shootings and among the lowest per capita gun deaths. Culture makes a big difference!
East, but not south. I’m fully against any sort of internet ID until we can at least talk about gun registration. I’m all for guns, I’ve owned a few, pistol, rifles, etc, currently only own 2, but if we can’t talk about limiting who can get a firearm, then they can fuck off about ID bullshit.
Figured you’d be in a more developed country by the way your comment read.
It’s certainly not Norway or Finland, but I like to think California is at least on the right side of “developed.” However, CAs push for age verification is most certainly misguided (at best) or downright wrong.
Reading what the law actually says, these seem to be sensible changes, bringing the rules in line with European standards.
Yeah, works pretty well over here.
It’s about expected speed and who you’re sharing a path with.
If I’m a cyclist, I don’t want to share a cycle lane with some idiot doing 40mph on a Temu deathtrap. By all means have those as an alternative to cars and petrol motorbikes (because cheap transport is still transport), but you’ll need regulations, registration plates, and mandatory safety equipment, and they need to share the road with other vehicles.
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Then I would say it doesn’t matter because they’re not riding like a bell-end. The system will have done it’s job.
It’s more about liability, if someone is riding around on an unregistered ebike and cause some sort of incident then they (or they’re parents, since IMO it’s a lot of kids who are ripping around on these) are the liable party
Does it matter if the coo knows or not? If they do something stupid and get stopped, the cop will realize and fine them for not being registered.
You can also drive around in a car without a license and a cop would never know unless you drove stupidly and they pulled you over.
Some of these comments read like FBI boot licker plants
Either the general Lemmy IQ has dropped quite a bit or we are infested with bots. Neither is good.
Too many.
“I want the government to limit my property for the state’s benefit” is such a lib take. Oh and before anyone says its for “public safety” you’re chugging state propaganda. If it was for public safety then they would get rid of right hand turns on red but we’re not here to talk about that.
get rid of right hand turns on red
I’ve been driving in California for 30 years, and have never once considered right on reds a safety issue. At intersections where visibility is limited, they do prevent the turn on red.
I, like you, am uncomfortable with the license plate as a solution to the “something faster than an e-bike” problem. I don’t think that’s the solution. But it is a problem, and we should explore all possible solutions.
Miss me with your 30 years of driving bullshit https://apnews.com/article/red-light-turn-pedestrian-bicyclist-deaths-7f5bdee9c7b3f4cbf005f1844f486123
Miss me
What are you, twelve? You can find some isolated stories about tragic accidents (never mind the fact that the offender here did not stop at the red light, which is the crux of the issue.)
Yes, in my 30 years and hundreds of thousands of miles of driving in a state in which it is legal everywhere, I can conclusively say it’s no less safe than the rest of cars vs pedestrians- which is to say not as safe as it should be, but the solution isn’t in banning right-on-reds. Updates to the traffic code in Illinois (the state in which you cite the accident) go on not to ban right-on-reds, but to enforce a full and complete stop before the intersection and yielding to any pedestrians. Safety precautions that, frankly, should’ve been in place before and, from my seat, how it’s enforced in California.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turn_on_red
"A 1981 US Department of Transportation study determined that the frequency of motor vehicle collisions with bicyclists and pedestrians when the vehicle was turning right increased significantly after the adoption of “Western RTOR”. According to that study “Estimates of the magnitude of the increases ranged from 43% to 107% for pedestrian accidents and 72% to 123% for bicyclist accidents.” These RTOR accidents were between 1% and 3% of all pedestrian and bicycle accidents in the locations that were studied.[94]
A 1984 study found that where RTOR was allowed “all right-turning crashes increase by about 23%, pedestrian crashes by about 60%, and bicyclist crashes by about 100%.”[95] A 1993 study also concluded that RTOR increased crashes for pedestrians and cyclists, by 44% and 59% respectively.[96]
For the 1982–1992 period, a National Highway Safety Commission report estimated that total fatal crashes in the U.S. involving vehicles making a right turn on red, were between 0 and 84, and probably toward the lower end of the range.[97]
A February 2002 study published in the ITE Journal concluded that “Prohibiting right turn on red would require drivers to turn on green. This would most likely increase the number of collisions by right turning vehicles.”[2][98]
A 2009 study by The New York City Department of Transportation of injuries before and after right turn on red was allowed at specific intersections concluded that the change had not affected accident rates.[99]"
“Please regulate our ebikes while we don’t have free healthcare” That’s you, that’s what you sound like.
I am 12 and your anecdotal evidence is childish now fuck off dumb ass lib.
Nothing like being called childish from someone not in control of their emotions.
Oh, and I don’t want e-bikes regulated. I want e-motos defined correctly.
A February 2002 study published in the ITE Journal concluded that “Prohibiting right turn on red would require drivers to turn on green. This would most likely increase the number of collisions by right turning vehicles.”[2][98]
A 2009 study by The New York City Department of Transportation of injuries before and after right turn on red was allowed at specific intersections concluded that the change had not affected accident rates.[99]"
I’m not sure the last two agree with your point there.
“Please regulate our ebikes while we don’t have free healthcare” That’s you, that’s what you sound like.
But then why not also deregulate cars and motorcycles? Why do electric motorcycles deserve to be unregulated while regular motorcycles are regulated?
We could use RTOR where I live. It would likely improve pedestrian safety because pedestrians don’t cross with red. Pedestrian red and car red are synced. Lack of RTOR means cars have to make right turns when pedestrians are crossing.
I don’t agree with any of idea of registering a bike but what did people expect? Slap a motor on a bike and the cops are going to target you. Hell, no motor and they still will.
Edit: you can be mad about it if you want but I’m just letting you know thats exactly what they’ve always done to moped riders and now they’re coming for electric motors. Same shit different year.
As a cyclist, I’m all for e-bikes requiring a license.
Most e-bikes in my area are ridden by people who can’t get a driver’s license. This includes people underage, people with their license revoked, and people who have restrictions on their licenses.
And people regularly remove the regulators on those bikes, making them unsafe on the roads.
Meanwhile, they’re also tearing up the mountain bike trails I normally ride on my pedal bike. Many of the people riding these have zero traffic safety training, zero trail etiquette, and zero interest in cooperating with others.
Last week at dusk I had what looked like a 13 year old riding his bike behind me in city traffic, doing a wheelie. Eventually he swerved around me to cross oncoming traffic and hop up onto the sidewalk on the other side of the street so he could avoid an intersection.
Sure, there’s probably plenty of well behaved e-bike riders out there, but the volume of unsafe ones I’ve seen over the past month is insane.
Perhaps you live in a car dependent area and e bikes are the first viable non car mode of transport in your area and so you are seeing those growing pains of introducing a new mode of transportation for the first time in its history.
Ebikes should not need a license, the bikes themselves need regulation so they are safe without one.
Ebikes should not need a license, the bikes themselves need regulation so they are safe without one.
Agreed. What in my country are class I and II bikes should not need a license. The regulation you speak of should “regulate” class III bikes as something other than an “e-bike”, and require license/registration/insurance. We already do this with hypothetical class IV bikes; a motorcycles.
As a cyclist, I’m all for e-bikes requiring a license.
As a cyclist, I disagree. For traffic, we only need licensing on e-bikes that support people to go faster than ±20 km/h whithout pedalling to such speed by their own body strength. Basically: treat e-bike like the motorcycles they are. But ± 20km/h is a speed a normal healthy person on a normal non-electric bicycle can also easily achieve. It’s a generally safe speed in most situations. If it isn’t, it’s a mental health or sociopath behavior of the driver / very poor street infrastructure problem, but the light e-bike shouldn’t have to take the blame.
On mountainbike trails (and on hiking trails!!!) i’m more in favor of something getting close a complete ban for anything motorised.
I agree with you in principle, but those rental e-scooters reach 25 km/h far faster than the average commuter could with pedals. In cities, cyclists usually don’t hit that kind of speed very often (you have intersections and stuff after all) and those who do, clearly have had plenty of practice.
I do still support them being license free up to about that speed though. Just saying they’re actually slightly more dangerous than pedal operated bicycles.
I think I agree! Are we talking about the same? I was talking about e-bicycles (regular looking bicycle with battery and motor, which doesn’t help you anymore above that cut-off speedlimit), not e-scooters (the one with tiny wheels, stand-up while riding, no pedalling at all). The e-scooters can just all have licenses and license plates imo, it’s a normal motorised vehicle, has nothing at all in common with a bicycle)
Where I come from, e-scooters and e-bikes are both classed as “light motorized vehicles” so the same regulations apply. And e-bicycles on high assist require close to no input so IMO they’re not actually very different from e-scooters in terms of how dangerous they are to pedestrians (bicycle will have better stability, but the scooter will be able to swerve quicker so it evens out). Which I’m not saying the ones limited to 25 km/h should require a license and a license plate, but I’m saying that at that speed they start getting more dangerous than regular cyclists at the same speed (who have to work to hit that speed), so it makes sense that e-bikes that can go faster (even if they’re still “assisted”) require licensing.
One of the issues you’d run into there is enforcement by definitions. For something comparable, see the scene in Breaking Bad where Hank pins down the RV, but can’t go inside without a warrant because it’s a “domicile”, not a vehicle.
If an ebike user with pedals is pulled over, in some cases it can be hard to factually prove the electric motor is working, since they could still theoretically get up to speed with it (I’ve brought mine home on a 100% dead battery before. Slightly tougher, but still traffic safe)
You’re proposing more restrictions to what end? All licensing will do is hurt people that are unable to obtain a license like you listed in your post. That doesn’t automatically mean that roads will be safer or rider law enforcement will be better.
Sure the ones that aren’t following safe practices are egregious, but that’s the same with cars too. I literally saw someone in a van swerve around a line of cars to blindly cut across a highway through a red light. No amount of regulation or licensing is going to prevent that.
The best method to fixing traffic issues is planning better infrastructure first and then adding enforcement in problematic sections.
Meanwhile, they’re also tearing up the mountain bike trails I normally ride on my pedal bike. Many of the people riding these have zero traffic safety training, zero trail etiquette, and zero interest in cooperating with others.
More money than brains.
While my knee-jerk reaction was that they’re going to over regulate, all those changes are already in effect in the EU and it didn’t destroy the e-bike market there. So I guess California will manage.
Class 2 and 3 requiring license plates makes sense to me.
And class 1 would be pedelecs in the EU, where they are capped at 250 Watt and 25 kmh. Class 1 being capped at 750 Watt and 16mph (25kmh) seems okay, might be inconvenient with how much further apart everything is over there, but reaction times are the same all over the globe.
I personally don’t even drive the full 25kmh, in the city I’m capped by the manual cyclists in front, which I don’t need to overtake. And outside I’m too worried about my battery to go full power. I will say, cargo bikes in particular could use a higher powered motor than the 250 Watts we have here, but I have no idea what a good cap would be.
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Then get a more powerful electric bike and a motorcycle license? Or perhaps don’t go out of your way to annoy other road users, have you considered that as an alternative?
The idea is that someone without proven traffic knowledge and experience shouldn’t be able to zoom to 50 km/h in 2 seconds. Plus with that kind of speed available on tap, you become a danger to pedestrians so it makes sense to require a license plate so it’d actually be possible to find you if you fuck someone up and decide to escape.
Or perhaps don’t go out of your way to annoy other road users
There are basically two ways that bicyclists annoy motor vehicle drivers and wind up being threatened with deadly force on the regular:
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By following the rules
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By not following the rules
I hope this clears things up.
I mean if you read that particular user’s other comments, I’m pretty sure they try to swerve into cars and pedestrians on purpose. There was a comment saying it’s basically ok to take your 40 km/h+ e-bike into pedestrians in San Francisco because they’re tourists and therefore must’ve taken a plane there, making them as bad as car drivers.
FWIW I’m a driver and never have I felt like running a cyclist off the road. I also used to cycle and never did anyone try to run me off the road. This whole issue is pretty USA-specific IMO.
He doesn’t seem like such a nice fellow online here. I don’t think that means he tries to hurt people in real life.
I’m glad you haven’t experienced the rage that drivers often express towards cyclists. I don’t think its exclusively a US problem.
I’ve been riding bikes and driving cars for 30 years. It seems to me that any circumstance that requires drivers to slow down and consider how to respond to other people’s needs is a guaranteed rage trigger – for some fraction of the driving public. That seems to be carrying over into electric bikes as well.
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I never said that. I just said that if you want a vehicle that’s fast enough to use as a getaway vehicle when you smash someone’s window in or something, you should be prepared to live with the consequences and have a visible license plate on it. If you want zero consequences for your actions, like the ability to literally kick someone’s shit in and then just leg it without anyone catching you since there’s no license plate… Be prepared to be limited to a lower speed.
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No, it’s not. If you want a fast getaway vehicle for whatever crime you’re planning, it’s illegal to not have a license plate. Boo fucking hoo.
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Accelerating out of danger is both a last resort, and mostly ineffective. By the time you realize you need to accelerate, it’s too late in almost every case. Also, in any situation where accelerating might help, braking would probably help as well. The entire argument that vehicles of any type need more power to be able to accelerate out of danger is mostly BS, as anyone who drives, or rides responsibly can see.
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Considering your comments on this thread (this isn’t FuckCars btw) i don’t blame them.
Yeah judging by your comments, you probably go key people’s cars or even punch off their mirrors and then get surprised when they try to chase you down lmao
You’re thinking on the right questions…
It took years, but finally I realized the appropriate threshold is simply to have people go on an exercize-bike/meter, for a 90-minute-session, & have them sustain what they can, for that duration, then multiply their RMS-output ( root-mean-square rounds-down ) by 3x, & make that THEIR motor-limit:
This means that you don’t get flimsy 50-lbs children with 750-w of bike-motor, & you also don’t hobble linebackers ( I think that’s what they’re called: NFL tackles? ) with the same limit you’re putting on small/flimsy ones.
Proportionate to the strength you wield when managing your own body, see?
So, for many reasonably-strong riders, it’d be … around 300-w, tbh…
Alot of people would hate me for making the limit sooo close to their own physical-strength, but … live longer.
& simply make another limit, higher, & require license-plate for that category.
I’d make it so that within the 25-kph & 3x-sustained-90-minutes-wattage, no license-plate is required: you get a photo-ID card which says you don’t need a plate.
More power, more speed? then you need a plate.
Some cities need 40-kph to do the parkways, & that’d have to be one of the limits.
60-kph would be needed for other parkways, but that’d be absolute-limit, & some body-armor would be reasonable at that speed ( since crash-energy goes up with the square of the speed ).
Having been a courier, I’d put an either-speed-XOR-weight limit on them, so the fast-light people can get that, but the heavy-cargo couriers get a slower-speed, … I"m not the only courier who discovered that it’s … an experience that many couriers have had … to discover that one has been biking, in traffic, while unconscious. Sleep-biking. And I want that NOT happening at high-speed.
So, this is all like graduated-licensing, but done vertically, instead of temporally.
_ /\ _
Um, no.
Hi, we’re disabled.
Don’t try to restrict us from using stuff that helps bypass the disability, thanks.
– Frost
E-bikes are already capped at 25km/h here. Aren’t they elsewhere?
That’s nothing a cheap EEPROM reader from China cannot solve…
In the US e-bikes that can reach 60 mph — which is 96.5 km/h — without peddling are starting to become common, especially with children. They are motorcycles.
Those aren’t e-bikes by any legal definition, they just look like e-bikes because they have some technically functional pedals.
E-bikes are categorized into three primary groups based on factors such as motor power, availability of pedal and/or throttle assist and maximum speeds. Familiarizing yourself with the e-bike class allows you to anticipate its performance characteristics. Depending on the class, certain areas may permit riding a Class 1 e-bike while prohibiting the use of a Class 3 e-bike for instance. These regulations vary across states with many states having their own e-bike classifications or lack thereof. California, for example, has legislation specifying three e-bike classes. There are generally accepted definitions for e-bike classes, and we provide an overview of these standard classifications below.
Class 1
A Class 1 e-bike, also known as a pedelec, relies on pedaling to propel forward. It features pedal assist but lacks throttle assist, limiting its speed to a maximum of 20 miles per hour. In most cases, Class 1 e-bikes are permitted in the same areas as traditional bicycles such as bike paths and bike lanes. However, the specific regulations governing their usage depend on local government ordinances.
Class 2
Class 2 e-bikes offer both pedal assist and throttle assist, allowing them to move forward even without pedaling. Generally, Class 2 e-bikes are not designed to exceed 20 mph. Many jurisdictions allow the use of Class 2 e-bikes on conventional bike paths and lanes.
Class 3
Class 3 e-bikes are slightly faster, reaching speeds of up to 28 mph. They often come equipped with a speedometer, which may be required in certain states like California. Class 3 e-bikes are typically permitted on roads and designated bike-only shoulder lanes. However, due to their higher power output, they are generally not allowed on standard bike lanes, paths or trails.
https://ww3.arb.ca.gov/carbapps/ebikeincentives/e-bike-basics/index.html
25 mph here
You’re not really a “cyclist” if a motor is doing a bunch of the work. That’s the equivalent of those mopeds we had in the ‘70s that you could pedal, too. Probably went 35-40 mph. Nobody in their right mind would call them bicycles or call the riders cyclists. It’s a motorized bike.
Depends, if it’s pedal assist it’s most definitely cyclists. If it’s just a throttle then I agree
have you tried “cycling” on stronger electric bikes with the support mode set to “sport” or “highest”? Moving the pedals is pretty damn symbolic on these vehicles, less than 10% of the actual energy needed to move is provided by the legs, it’s almost all motor. It’s like they moved the throttle control to the pedals.
I’m in eu so I don’t think so. It’s not allowed
It’s a motorized bike.
But not to be confused with a motorcycle, which is something different.
Semantics.
Just common usage has made a “motorized bicycle” of yesteryear into its own vehicle class today. It’s exactly the same thing with e-bikes hitting 30+ mph speeds, just electric motors instead of an ICE.
