3alarmer 

.
...it seems to be a series of articles in the Health section. As in, they might be bad for health in some cases.

‘A Dangerous Combination’: Teenagers’ Accidents Expose E-Bike Risks

What Is an E-Bike, and How Safe Are They?

I thought I'd drop it in here, as related to safety concerns, rather than the e-bike forum, where it will probably be poorly received. But if someone wants to move it, I'm OK with that.

Gresp15C

I subscribe to the NYTimes, so I read both articles. I don't ride an e-bike.

I think a problem with writing about cycling in a national newspaper is that regional variations tend to be overlooked. Also, they may be over-hyping the top speed. At least in my locale, I haven't seen anybody going over about 30 mph.

The articles don't suggest that people shouldn't ride bikes. That's good. The crashes that they describe all seemed to be "typical" in the sense of a cyclist being struck by a car. That's not unique to e-bikes. My hunch is that the speed and power of an e-bike doesn't change the basic safety equation, which is that the best thing you can do for your safety is to avoid cars -- choose routes with less, or slower, car traffic.

What I've seen in my locale is a combination of "beginner cyclist" behavior, and a tendency to follow car-driving habits, notably using acceleration as a maneuvering tactic. And of course nobody wants to impose bike safety training. The commuters who ride at top speed and effort seem to be in reasonable control.

I'm not particularly worried. If the dead bodies start piling up, there will be regulations or lawsuits. Also, people will figure out that battery life and speed are interrelated.

Iride01 

Is there anything that is safe when used by teenagers? I still amazed I made it out of my teens with nothing more than a sprained ankle after all the many dumb things we did. Many of them over and over and over.

As for what is an e-bike. Well that depends on the laws and whom you ask. But things are always "modified" by enterprising DIY'ers all through history. So why should it be any different for a e-bike? Just because something is illegal, doesn't stop everyone. Can any of us say we've never driven over the speed limit or run a yellow light when we could have safely come to a stop.

3alarmer 

...as you mention, locality probably has a lot to do with the associated issues. The beginner behaviors you point out, along with the relatively fast speeds achieved by these beginners, do constitute what I perceive as a hazard (to me), on my local MUP and occasionally in the local bike lanes, which are narrow (and probably inadequate) from a design stand point.

I don't claim any particular expertise about what's out there and available for sale. But I do see more and more of these that resemble lightweight motorcycles, in terms of wheels and tires. I presume they are powered with relatively powerful motors.

I'm not really enough of a humanitarian to worry about the well being of the people riding them. I figure we all learn stuff the hard way.

Gresp15C

I think the wheels and tires may be a consequence of engineering the bike for its use. For instance, this bike has small, wide tires but is certainly not styled like a motorcycle:

https://www.crazylennysebikes.com/pr...lding-fat-tire

Among other things, the smaller tires provide space in the wheelbase for the mid-drive mechanism and the battery. It's probably easier to cram into a garage or living space for charging. It's a nice package.

I've seen cyclists on motorcycle-themed e-bikes as well, almost always with matching attire: Black hoodie, black pants, black shoes. Cycling will always be a partly aesthetic activity.

3alarmer 

.
...yeah, no. I'm talking about the real electric motorcycle styling. There are some moped styles, like the Rad Power bikes.
These are different. Not sure why engineering to use would account for that, unless the intended use is going pretty fast.

These have wheels and tires at least the equivalent of a fat bike. I wonder what ever happened to regular, pedal powered fat bikes ?

Gresp15C

In terms of motorcycle styling, I was thinking more along these lines:

https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256805404319954.html

I've seen one like that so far, in a town where people have been snapping up e-bikes for a few years now. My own reaction, since I was in middle school once, was that riding a motorcycle-styled bike fell into the "trying to look cool" category, which we know is the opposite of cool. The cool kids, and their followers (the rest of us) tried to make their bikes look like they were whatever they found in the garage, minus all of the unnecessary parts such as fenders, kickstand, etc.

I still see conventional fat-tire bikes. I don't think people are giving them up in greater numbers than any other kind of bike. They never really caught on for widespread use.

UniChris

The fad of selling fat tire BSO's in big-box stores died out because they're too much work for typical 3-season neighborhood or rail trail rides, but only make sense in serious snow, mud, or sand.

JW Fas

Archived versions of the NYT articles to bypass the paywall:

https://archive.is/izF8q

https://archive.is/JSY3J

3alarmer 

.
...thanks. I don't know how to do that.

JW Fas

Go to archive.is and paste the article URL into the search field.

Troul 

In my local area regarding e bicycles, they are either inexperienced & ride "moped" speeds or inexperienced & ride slow in the middle of the pathway.
inexperienced is the biggest problem imo.

I would hope e bikes are soon to be heavily regulated, but I think it will somehow rope traditional non e bicycles in with it.

Roughstuff

well the standard of what passes for “journalism” at the NYT has fallen to the 8th grade level for several decades. There isn’t a single issue discussed in the article that couldn’t be said about teenagers, and 2 wheeled vehicles, in general. Let’s hope safer practices become more widespread, since I notice E-bikes being used by folks for short trips to the store etc., which reduces use by of cars for this purpose.

UniChris

What motorizing two wheeled platforms does is expose the raw realities of the lies society tells itself.

If we really want to replace cars, then we need to start treating bikes as practical road transport - not as a boutique novelty to be fetishized on a pedestal of impracticality, which is how planners tend to handle bike routing.

Things like routing bikes on wide sidewalks, hiding us behind parked cars, etc - these address an instinctive but statistically irrelevant fear, while making continued movement at more than walking speed extremely hazardous due to the overwhelming reality that intersection conflicts are where cyclists get hurt.

If we actually want to replace cars with lighter vehicles (be they electric or pedaled) we're going to have to resume viewing bikes traffic as traffic, and practically routing us as such, in accordance with decades of knowledge of basic facts such as that through traffic belongs only on the through side of turning traffic and not trapped inside it in an inevitable hook.

The ordinary multi-purpose lanes of ordinary roads are the only transport network which will ever effectively reach the majority of American housing, schools, shopping, and recreation, and the fact is that we prohibit young teens from operating vehicles not just because of the damage they could do to others when piloting a large metal object, but also because of the risks to self inherent in participating in an adult interaction with still undeveloped judgement and understanding.

Right now we face an extreme, and unsustainable contradiction - the very same advocates want to route bikes in ways that are absurdly deadly at more than a walking speed, but also subsidize motors to get people out of cars. That's simply not going to work.

Getting people out of cars requires treating the car replacement platforms as ordinary traffic to be routinely expected, admired, and safely accommodated on the main roadway, not rare exceptions to it routed in deadly-impractical and outrageously mistaken ways.

blacknbluebikes 

Please let Darwin do his work.
"Failed to breed."

Calsun

It always bugs me when someone quotes an article from some publication and thinks that this gives more credence to the information. Most of the people writing for newspapers today are barely out of college and have a liberal arts degree and not by any means to be considered professional journalists.

Hysteria and hyperbole sells newspapers and television advertising. The simple facts are not important. Fox commentators use the phrase "some would say" to put out some bit of propaganda and distance themselves as being the source for the gossip.

There is a great deal of posts on social media that are made by people paid by the energy industry in an attempt to discredit anything that does support the contiued use of fossil fuels. They are anti wind and solar and anti bicycles of any kind. The advent of e-bikes has resulted in fewer miles driven in cars and this makest the likes of the Koch family quite uncomfortable. There is an incredible level of meanness when billionaires begrudge a safe environment for workers and their families. It is like they say that if there is not enough bread for the workers and their children then let them eat cake. Some things never change.

3alarmer 

.
...the news articles would have been much more credible, as journalism, had they referenced some statistics on accidents and fatalities attributable to e-bikes. Unfortunately, statistical data bases on something that is relatively new, like e-bikes, are either non existent or not authoritative...most reports are based on anecdotal evidence from ER personnel.

And the other small electric driven transport devices, like scooters and skateboards, often get mixed in with the accounts.


E-bikes show distinct pattern of severe injuries...link to referenced study.
Injuries Using E-Scooters, E-Bikes and Hoverboards Jump 70% During the Past Four Years

This is new tech, and if regulation of it waits until all the studies are in, a lot of those statistics will be preventable deaths.
I thought one of the articles in the times did a reasonable job of explaining this point.

I don't really understand how enforcing limits on the top speed and motor power of e-bikes will make them less available for use as alternative transportation ? Maybe someone can explain that to me ?

UniChris

It will make them less practical and less attractive as car replacement.

Fact is, it makes no sense to shell out a few thousand dollars to go 12 mph for utility purposes.

If someone is going to shell out to buy a motor (or even simply get their body on a pedal bike with the idea of going somewhere) they need routes that are actually practical as traffic, not merely as a theoretical but boutique novelty to be fetishized as token inclusivity in a powerpoint presentation on an impractical pedestal that looks good to the unaware but is in reality is deadly-in-practice to anyone actually attempting to do things by bike.

It's ironic, but we were probably better off in the days when planners ignored us, than in the trend of claiming to serve us, but in the absurdly ill-informed, fetishizing, patronizing, impractical-for-your-own-safety norm that currently prevails.

Designers and "Landscape Architects" If you don't actually get around by bike, don't presume to know how biking works - because all you do is impose your own patronizing and deadly ignorance upon those of us who are actually trying to survive while doing so.

3alarmer 

?...nobody is proposing that as a limitation for e-bikes, except maybe you.

...so I'm OK on the current bike infrastructure in my city, because I don't have an e-bike ? What in the world does this rant have to do with e-bikes ? Are you saying that I'm gonna die anyway, in my rides around town without battery power ?

...I've been riding bikes in urban and small town environments since the 1970's. No, my impression is not that "we were probably better off in the days when planners ignored us." But thanks for this. It gives me a benchmark from which to measure your argument.

...as stated, I have been cycling for urban transportation since the early '70's, in Washington D.C. and the Maryland suburbs there. I like to think I have some experience, based on my riding there and in the other places I've lived and commuted by bike. I also did a year (year and a half ?) out at UC Davis, in the landscape arch program. I agree that there is a lot of bicycle infrastructure that is poorly designed. The bike lanes here in Sacramento range from OK to laughably inadequate, to downright dangerous.

But a lot of that is a function of when they were designed and built, and the funding available for it. They do seem to be doing better, with some of the newest projects. I do not know if the people who design them are cyclists or not.I suspect you don't either.

Your replies strike me as fairly militant in tone, like you are looking for people to blame for this cycling infrastructure problem. We all share the blame, insofar as America, for the most part, embraced cars and built out the cities accordingly. All we can do at this point is to try to remedy that massive wrong turn, with whatever resources that can be commanded for the change.

But I have lost interest in your argument about addressing this thread topic. I don't feel like you're interested in addressing it, only in redirecting the discussion toward some larger issue you perceive. Good luck in all your endeavors. The random bolding makes your replies harder to read, FWIW.

Chistophe516

For me, an E-bike, would be an EEEEEK!-bike. I don't trust them.

LeeG

When cheap 49cc Chinese scooters showed up a couple decades ago there were some hairy moments in town as kids were driving in all directions like cockroaches. Likewise at the height of the sea kayaking boom grownups were playing in the middle of boat traffic causing problems. So cheap ebikes allowing kids to play in the middle of the street more than usual sounds plausible. It’ll self correct.

UniChris

You say that only because (like many injured users) you are ignoring the survival speed limit imposed by the geometric facts of these designs.

The reality is that the planners have a fetish for intersection designs which are deadly at anything more than walking speed - and that goes not only for the acknowledged intersections with roads, but also the factually implicit ones with commercial and private driveways.

When one is properly positioned in an ordinary road lane, riding without slowing through the intersection with a minor road or driveway while on the major road is very much a thing.

But when one is instead on an ill-designed contemporary "bike route" that same requirement for an intersection with a minor road or private drive becomes a spot where (despite what the law might purport) the "bike route" user lacks any practical right of way and if they wish to survive the journey is instead forced to come to an all-but stop and check for traffic from all directions.

Those who wish to segregate bicycles on to such deadly and improper routes are actually building to perpetuate a car-dominated future where alternatives remain actively discouraged numerical minorities marginalized on the unsafe and inconvenient margins.

In contrast, if you actually believe that the future of transport is things less than cars, then the only way we're going to make that happen is to normalize the usage of bicycles and light electrified platforms as primary users of the roads themselves.

Surely you understand the fallacy of continuing to reserve the only safe and practical part of the transport network for the mode of usage which public policy needs to discourage and decrease?

Sadly, most who believe they are designing for a a bike-based future are instead cementing a car-based one where bikes remain toys for Sunday afternoon recreation.

TL;DR it's idiotic to both subsidize e-bikes and build "bike routes" that are only survivable at walking speed

3alarmer 

...I think I get it now. You presume that the portion of our roadways used primarily by cars are the safe and practical portion of it.
I cannot even begin to address the fallacious nature of that. Google up the auto injury and fatality statistics when you get a chance.

The part you seem to be missing is the direct correlation between increased speeds and the severity of injury. I can't help you there. I don't teach physics.

UniChris

That's indeed most often the case (after all it is literally how roads are designed to work) - at an intersection, an ordinary travel lane compatible with one's intended movement is overwhelmingly the only remotely safe place to be.

The idea that cars behind you are the primary threat is a instinctual fear inconsistent with informed reality - instead, it's the turning or entering driver who does not see you who is the primary cause of concern.

You're imagining the stats support your view, when in reality if you pay attention to what specifically you are looking at, they contradict it. Intersections are overwhelmingly where danger is found.

Only if you look at fatalities specifically rather than injuries, and only on the highest speed roads, do crashes from the rear show up statistically relative to intersection crashes.

Roads with highest speed motor traffic can present some unique design challenges - but the most likely conflicts still remain at the intersections, which need to be designed from awareness rather than the all-too-common ignorance.

You're stuck in this fantasy of imagining that we can somehow "graft on" bike friendliness to a system which remains fundamentally reserved for cars. That's just not going to work.

The only way we actually see car trips replaced with bike and light electric vehicle trips to an impactful degree is if we welcome such alternative transport as to start to become the primary and defining use of the roads themselves.

Build for bikes on the margins and you marginalize bikes.

Normalize bikes and light EVs as the mainstream, and things start to look like a bike and light EV world, rather than a car world.

In fact you've probably already seen this - bet you know a vacation area or local street where it's bikes and pedestrians which set the character, with car drivers as occasional "guests" well aware they are in others' domain.

A driver "stuck" behind a bike on a narrow road has to come to recognize that it's the fact that they are in a car, and not the fact that the bike is going 12, 16 or 20 mph which is the fundamental problem that will require a patient maneuver on their part.

3alarmer 

...this gets more and more strange. I had meant to simply ignore you, but I am compelled to ask, what the hell are you talking about ? Clearly you have used this thread as a launching pad for some massive overhaul of the US transportation grid that is unlikely to happen, due to costs and numbers. Yes, intersections are dangerous. They are dangerous no matter what your mode of transit. Even pedestrians are in trouble at intersections, if you believe the numbers. Thanks for pointing it out. What in hell does it have to do with the topic ?

...

...yes. I'm off in fantasyland. We have no intersections in fantasyland. Everyone just goes with the flow.

...if you want to build this out as e-motorcycles and e-mopeds, then they need to undergo at least the same regulatory oversight as IC propelled motorcycles. Why do I even need to state this ?



...we have now come full circle. First you complained that nobody is going to spend several thousand dollars on an e-bike that won't go substantially faster than a conventional bicycle. Now you are complaining because drivers won't acknowledge and adapt to the lower speeds bicycles can attain. I should know better than to post topics in A+S. My bad.

Random bolding should have been my first clue.