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Comment by michaelwww | Hacker News Reader

The true revolution has hit public consciousness yet and that is the rise of electric bicycles. I own one and nearly every time I ride it cross town I think again that it's nearly the perfect form of human transportation. It is said that pedal bicycles are the most efficient form of human transportation. With a motor and a lithium ion battery that charges up at a rate of 150W for 3 hours and then delivers 12-15 miles of transport at 20 mph, depending on much pedaling is done to assist uphill, and I imagine that you only increase that efficiency. Electric bikes are allowed to use the bike lanes in California, while fossil fuel powered motors are not, so bikes can take routes that beat all the car and truck traffic. I don't break a sweat riding an electric bike so I don't need to take a shower when arriving at work. Take the optimistic tone of this article and add electricity and you really have a revolution.

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Are electric bicycles desirable mainly because of lower physical effort, or higher top speed? I am an avid cyclist in NYC and I don't think I would be comfortable going any faster than my current top speed. And I really enjoy the exercise. So why would I choose an electric bicycle over my traditional one?

I live in SF and feel a similar way; cycling is dangerous enough at my relatively slow speed and offers exercise built into my every day routine.

The one nice use case is for people discouraged by the distance of their commute (due to their fitness) or people discouraged by the one or two hills on their likely commute route.

The electric assistance can push these folks over the hump.

Anecdotally, I hear hills cited pretty often as a reason not to bike-commute. I live in Pittsburgh and the city is taking biking more and more seriously, but there's only so much one can do about topography. An electric boost could make a big difference for some. (Then again, if you live on the hill and work in the valley, the morning commute is pretty fun!)

To extend your range?

But the ultimate answer is maybe you wouldn't choose an electric bicycle. That's ok.

In my experience (as someone who cycles 50-75 miles a week) people go for the electric bikes for less exertion. Probably 3-4 times a week people on e-bikes pass me on hills, zooming along.

They always seem to be heavier-set than your typical bike commuter, so if the motor's getting them out on the road and getting some exercise and fitness in, I think that is just fantastic. Anything to get people out of their cars! Maybe they'll even upgrade to a real bike some day :)

Not everyone is able bodied and has nice showers at work to change in.

Happily, most people are able-bodied, and for those for whom a regular bike will never be an option, there remain cars, buses, light rail, electric bikes, and so on and so on.

As for showering, I think that will probably start to matter less as time goes on. In the last few years, in the Pacific NW, I've noticed it's become somewhat acceptable to show up to meetings a bit sweaty, if you've just gotten off your bike. At least, among the business meetings I attend, of course.

The Pacific Northwest is badly non-representative of most of America, especially the east coast.

Well, let me ask you--what is more likely to change in the next 10-15 years? Think we'll go back to higher standards of cleanliness in the Pacific Northwest, or think standards will relax on the east coast? Cause I assure you, things won't just stay the way they are.

It's an honest question, really, I don't know! (though I know what I'd prefer!) What do you think?

I lived there too and would see people show up and start work fully kitted out in what I call their "TRON gear" (though they would take the helmet off indoors).

Denholm Reynholm in the stress episode of The IT Crowd may have been hilarious in London, but he wasn't too far off the mark in Portland.

> Denholm Reynholm in the stress episode of The IT Crowd may have been hilarious in London, but he wasn't too far off the mark in Portland.

He wasn't too far off the mark for Reading (boring town west of London, where it's set). That was entirely the point of that episode.

Being sweaty is first of all uncomfortable for myself.

You're just not used to it.

What an odd thing to say.

Ew. What I'm noticing is the opposite trend: "yeah, we got showers installed."

(While a long-term trend away from sterile-squeaky-clean might be useful, I still have a strong emotional aversion to "sweaty at console": I'm not comfortable that way if it's me, plus everyone starts smelling when sweaty. At one job, I even washed up quickly using the hand sink, just to avoid this)

> Maybe they'll even upgrade to a real bike some day :)

Several stories I've read about ebikes point to stats about nearly all ebike owners getting hooked and continuing to buy them instead of regular ones.

That said, an ebike turns into a regular bike immediately after you turn off the assistance.

Regular and heavy as hell; those batteries won't pull themselves (well they could, but you get the point ;))

To give my anecdote, I'm considering getting an e-bike for commuting, or perhaps retrofit onto my regular bike: the ride is not long (~10 miles x2), but hills on both sides are significantly easier with an assist.

One way to think of it: assistance for commuting to avoid sweating / no assistance with battery left at home when wanting to exercise.

Btw. I've had an ebike for 4 years and I'm a skinny 34-year-old man. It can still be plenty of work to ride it during the Finnish winter :)

In 1990 I got a bike (Miyata Triple Cross) and started using it for my daily commute. I started leaving my car parked at the office, so that when at home I only had the bike and so also used it for much of my grocery shopping and trips to bookstores. This all worked out great, although I initially had a problem with spokes breaking on the rear wheel, as I'm a fat guy. I asked the shop to make me a stronger wheel, and they did (48 spokes) and everything was great after that.

That was in Cupertino, California. Then in 1992 I moved to Seattle, Washington to a place on the low side of the U-distract. I got on my bike, took one ride around the block, and learned that while fat guys on bikes might work out fine in relatively flat Cupertino, not so in Seattle. That once around the block felt like it almost killed me. The bike has been in the closest/shed/garage ever since.

An e-bike sounds like it would have been perfect. Let it do the work when I need to go up hill, and let me do the work when I'm going across the hill.

(Now I'm across Puget Sound from Seattle. It's not flat like Cupertino, but it is not nearly as un-flat as Seattle. I've pulled my bike out of the garage and am trying to get it back into riding shape. I'm pretty sure I'm significantly under my Cupertino weight, so I think I should be able to find plenty of places to ride).

> Are electric bicycles desirable mainly because of lower physical effort, or higher top speed?

I don't have one myself, but I know that in Europe, they can't go over 25km/h (higher than that, they're not considered as bicycles anymore) so the interest is to lower physical effort.

> So why would I choose an electric bicycle over my traditional one?

Not everybody enjoy exercising on their way to work, but even if they do, with electric assistance, they can cycle on longer/hillier commutes than what would be possible/convenient with a regular bike.

Yes but the downside is worser handling, more weight, added complexity, added price and maintenance. Not worth in my case (I tried it)

Many of the folks considering e-bikes here are not generally comparing them to traditional bikes, but rather with cars. In which case all of the negatives you cite here, become positives.

In my case it's primarily the assistance the motor gives me up hill. I'm nearly 60 and my knees are worn out so pedaling unassisted is just too painful. There's quite a bit of ego involved among physically fit riders, riders who are into it for physical fitness I should say, but I feel they're not considering that not everyone can ride a bike without some help. And not only that, if you live in a hilly city and there are no showers at work, your coworkers might not appreciate you riding a bike to work.

> I'm nearly 60 and my knees are worn out so pedaling unassisted is just too painful.

Electric assistance is not uncommon in the Netherlands among the 50+ age category, and we don't even have significant hills to speak of.

Not higher top speed. Unless you change your gear ratio's, the electric motor can't keep up with the normal top speed going down hill.

I bike to/from work (on a regular bicycle) over a few hills. I enjoy the exercise in general, but I would still like a electric bike for the summer; a sunny Texas day with 98+ Fahrenheit weather is rough.

Where I live (Netherlands) they are mainly used by seniors (60+) or people covering long distances. Top speed is limited to 25KM/h, and that is more than enough to get quickly to any place on your range distance.

They are also useful in cities (e.g. Madrid) where hills maybe problematic for normal bikes.

The higher speed uphills is appealing to me. If I could climb at 20mph it would shave a lot of time off of my commute, it would probably be as fast as driving most days.

The other appealing thing would be hailing a trailer for groceries and still being able to make it up the steepest hills.

I have an E assist cargo bike and it's average speed is close to its top speed (20 mph). It's not that it's faster, it's that I'm not going slow very often. It also makes me happy to stop at stop signs.

I rode a Stromer for a while it's best feature was a top speed that could easily exceed the auto speed limit on local bike routes (some of those that are still 25 mph instead of 20). Taking the lane at the speed limit sends a clear message to cut through drivers.

I'd love to upgrade my bike to an electric one. A couple of things holding me back. In Seattle in rains a lot. So for those days I use alternate commute. Electric bikes are pretty expensive. I wish there was a monthly payment option like car loans.

It is incredibly difficult to sell electric bikes in a normal bike shop, for every one sold there are hundreds or maybe even thousands of regular bikes sold. This is a pity as electric bikes can be very good.

Some electric bikes are a lot heavier than they need to be, you have a rear rack that contains brackets to house boxes that have more brackets on them and deep inside those boxes are some batteries held at the worst place for centre of gravity.

All of this needs to be done as a system with the battery made a structural part of the frame. Then the bike as a whole can go back to being performance oriented instead of senior style.

In my opinion the extra torque more than makes up for the weight when it comes to handling. Electric bikes don't feel heavy when you are riding one, it is just getting the thing up the stairs to your flat at the end of the day that is a pain.

I hope some player from outside the bicycle industry - a Tesla - re-engineers the electric bicycle to make it a whole new product. As it is the electric bicycle just does not catch the public imagination.

Not just electric bikes, but also electric skateboards and other electric personal mobility devices. Unlike bikes these things can be brought on public transit, and greatly reduce time spent on the last mile (or two). For example the boosted board can travel 25 MPH, which is much faster than rush hour traffic, and even at times the grade-seperated light rail in San Francisco.

I've just ordered a kit for one of my bikes, I'm hoping it will allow me to replace more car journeys.

I don't have an e-bike but I agree completely. The only downside to my bike is that I can't really go anywhere in nice clothes because I'm likely to break a sweat. An e-bike would be a true all-purpose city vehicle.

One ingredient is missing, some innovation to secure the bike against theft, since $1000 electric is a target.

most electric bikes I see are ridden dangerously to pedestrians; by NYC deliverymen (doubt I've ever seen a woman on one), swiftly and silently sneaking up to run you down on sidewalks or the wrong way on one way streets.

I would vote hard in favor of limiting speed and or requiring them to make artificial noise, unless we could get some other type of pervasive and privacy intrusive monitoring of riders' behavior.

I sometimes ride my pedal bike the wrong way, and sometimes on sidewalks (two avenue blocks out of your way in NYC to get around the block is quite a long distance) but I always do it "respectfully": slowly and yielding the right of way. Till there is a system in place to effectively educate the constant churn of the class of people who deliver goods, I am soooo anti.

electic bikes are technically illegal in NYC; it's a law that is never enforced.

edit, addition: the mix of cars vs pedestrians works as well as it traditionally has worked and I and many other people don't have a problem with it; due to various types of complexity theory, adding bikes to the mix does not work as well, it particularly degrades the pedestrian experience, and is quite dangerous for bikers.

I find electric bikes even more destabilizing and most objectionable, because they are faster and quieter, and I think because they are favored by a statistical sample that skews toward more selfish/self-interested.

Why is it so hard for discussion groups to accept that somebody has an opinion with muddying it up? What I said originally should not require so much refinement for people to grasp that it's my one little opinion and it doesn't threaten your worldview more than your worldview needs to be shaken up.

Cars are by far the most dangerous things to pedestrians. If electric bikes get people out of their cars, pedestrians will be better off on balance. Rather than banning electric bikes, NYC could to better to build separate infrastructure for bikes.

That has almost nothing to do with the post you responded to. Electric bikes are faster than normal bikes, and people treat them as mini mopeds rather than normal bikes (and there's already a problem with bicycle/pedestrian collisions).

> most electric bikes I see are ridden dangerously to pedestrians; by NYC deliverymen (doubt I've ever seen a woman on one), swiftly and silently sneaking up to run you down on sidewalks or the wrong way on one way streets.

Both of those uses of a bicycle - operation on a sidewalk and riding against traffic on a one-way street - are a violation of NYC traffic law [1]. The operator is the one causing danger, not the bicycle.

[1] http://www.nyc.gov/html/dot/downloads/pdf/bicyclerules_engli...

what you say is true, but what I said is also truly what I wanted to say, so to clarify:

NYC has widespread ignoring of many traffic laws, and that does not bother me. I am talking about, in the context of widespread violations, what does bother me: the electric bikes. You could accept that there is some validity in what I say without agreeing with me.

Given the choice, I would not be in favor of pedestrians and bikers being forced to follow all traffic laws. However, I would be in favor of electric bikes being forced to follow all traffic laws, especially the one that bans them! :)

I see, and I agree that the accountability of cyclists (and slightly less so for motorists) in NYC is almost zero. I also agree that electric powered bicycles should be held to a higher standard than normal bikes, particularly in that their use is entirely illegal so it should be much easier to spot and ticket them. I mostly posted these facts because most non-NYCers don't even realize that these uses of a bike are actually against the law.

EDIT: I just read your edit,

> I find electric bikes even more destabilizing and most objectionable, because they are faster and quieter, and I think because they are favored by a statistical sample that skews toward more selfish/self-interested.

This is a good summary of my thoughts about electrical bicycles as well.

> requiring them to make artificial noise

Baseball card in the spokes, enforced by government regulation.

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