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Comment by twodave | Hacker News Reader

Awesome project Jacques! I saw a comment of yours on an article a day or two ago and was hoping to see this pop up soon.

I've found the most difficult thing about riding an e-bike is the other motorists have no idea how to react to you. You're not really a regular bicycle anymore due to your speed, but you're also not a motorcycle that deserves its own lane. I have at least one car turn in front of me almost every trip out just because they're misjudging my speed. I get honked and yelled at when on the road because folks get frustrated when I'm using the left-hand side of the right-turn lane as a bike path.

Sidewalks/bike paths tend to be a lot less safe in residential areas as well, since cars coming out of their driveways really don't expect an e-bike to come rolling through. I've learned to dramatically reduce speed in areas like this.

Aside from those things, I love it! I ride the e-bike whenever I'm going somewhere in range (I live in Florida so things tend to be spread out) and the weather permits. My bike gets about 80km which is more than enough for anyplace I want to go on a bicycle anyway.

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> but you're also not a motorcycle that deserves its own lane. I have at least one car turn in front of me almost every trip out just because they're misjudging my speed. I get honked and yelled at when on the road because folks get frustrated when I'm using the left-hand side of the right-turn lane as a bike path.

Cycling is my primary mode of transportation, and I've found a couple things help with this:

1. Take the lane any time there's a chance of conflict such as a right hook, and when there is not enough space for a car to safely pass [1][2]

2. Use a headlight all the time, even during the day. This is what motorcyclists do, and when I made this change I noted a major drop in the number of drivers that turn without noticing me.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicular_cycling#Lane_control

[2] This page has descriptions of several types of collision, with example videos and how to choose a lane position that avoids them: https://iamtraffic.org/engineering/behaviors-and-risk/

I totally agree with this. I also find it’s best to take the lane in urban traffic where you’re not impeding the flow of traffic. The people I see getting in trouble/hurt are those (curiously, largely boomers) who insist on weaving around cars or moving up on the right without room. Just get in with the cars and move predictably.

In the USA the situation is much more risky than here.

I don't like riding in traffic mostly because drivers tend to have a short fuse for anything that isn't exactly at the limit, but on bike paths everything works just fine. The problem is that s-pedelecs are technically lumped in with the scooters, even though there is no throttle and there is absolutely no way you are going to sustain 40 Kph+ for anything but a very short period. But they're still pretty new and little by little municipalities are adapting and allowing s-pedelecs to use the bike lanes. What helps is that s-pedelec riders are extremely defensive. In town I simply reduce the assist to 'eco' and cycle with the rest of the bikes, and on the intercity bike paths I go as fast I conditions allow, typically 35 to 38 or so. On a longer trip that averages out to 33 to 35 Kph, which means a 1 hour car trip turns into a 2 hour bike trip, which is acceptable (and never traffic jams, which can turn that 1 hour car trip into a three hour car trip!).

I have an e-bike and I disagree with your assertions. I'm a fat asthmatic and I have absolutely no problem maintaining 40kph for long stretches of time on my bike. The fastest I've done on it (on a large hill but still) is 42.7MPH (~68Kph). Average cruising speed on flat land can easily be 30-33mph(48-53kph). Not all e-bikes are capable of this, but they are certainly not some kind of rare expensive impossibility - mine was less than 3000 USD.

My point is that you should be more ingenuous with your assertions of what the capabilities of these bikes are when communicating with people about it. Nothing makes people more skeptical than reading things that are just plain false from an advocate.

I'm sure there are other e-bikes, but those are not available where I live. The fastest here are the Stromers, they are a little bit faster but not exceptionally so and they also cut out at 45 kph, just like mine.

At a guess your bike outputs more power than is legal here.

>At a guess your bike outputs more power than is legal here.

From a brief look - no. Belgium says "4000 W 45 km/h limited "speed pedelecs", which are classed as mopeds for all requirements."

Mine has a 750W nominal motor, but seems to output around 1050W at peak.

4000 W? That sounds a little excessive :)

A typical s-pedelec is somewhere between 350 and 750 W nominal and with peaks of maybe twice that.

Yeah it's totally excessive, lol. That's just what wikipedia says about your country's laws. No idea if it's accurate, haha.

Anything over 45kph or 750W is illegal unless registered as a moped in California at least (and much of the rest of the US as well). Enforcement is lax in most places though.

I'm not sure why you would assume the author is being disingenuous. Your bike is almost certainly very different from the author's, and a more powerful motor is going to get you faster.

Fun fact/side note - power requirements generally scale with the cube of speed due to rapidly increasing air drag, so going at 50km/h is much harder (and requires a much stronger motor) than going at 30km/h.

I specifically did not choose the word disingenuous. I asked him to be more ingenuous.

His assertion was "there is absolutely no way you are going to sustain 40 Kph+ for anything but a very short period". I disagree, and I think minimizing the capabilities of these machines in the rhetoric is counterproductive to converting skeptics.

In the US it's 100% legal to go 28MPH on them for as long as you can - which for me would be nearly forever on flat ground.

Depends on the jurisdiction. NYC only allows 25MPH: https://www1.nyc.gov/html/dot/html/bicyclists/ebikes.shtml

At some point, we do need to restrict faster vehicles from operating in the bike lanes and the sidewalks, because the speed differentials will probably end up killing someone.

They had this problem for years in Amsterdam and last time I've heard about it they decided to ban moped from bike lanes in the city. Electric moped were particularly problematic because of their speed, of their silence and weigh. I don't know what the rules are with regard to ebikes though.

The full sentence was: “ The problem is that s-pedelecs are technically lumped in with the scooters, even though there is no throttle and there is absolutely no way you are going to sustain 40 Kph+ for anything but a very short period.” He is explicitly talking about S-Pedelecs which are the fastest legal E-Bikes in most of Europe. He never said that you are generally not able to sustain 40+ MPH in general.

He said KPH. That is about 25MPH. Legal in the US is 28MPH.

A side pedantry note, in the hopes that it's appreciated:

Usually "more ingenuous" would mean "more naive" or "more childlike" or "less capable of deceit", none of which seem to be what you intended.

Ah, I did not know of the naive/childlike connotation. I was simply using it as a synonym for something like candid, frank, truthful.

Thanks.

I'm curious - what ebike do you have that can easily cruise at 48-53 kph for extended periods?

In most countries that would be far above the legal limits imposed on ebikes. As a result, the ebikes available for purchase are all limited to 25-32 kph max and typically have power limits of 250-300 W. Since ebikes are a lot heavier, exceeding 32 kph for more than a few seconds is generally very difficult.

I don't think GP is being disingenuous with any of his assertions. In the US there might be ebikes with much higher top speeds, but jacquesm doesn't live in the US and neither do most of the other people on this planet. Most ebikes sold do exactly what he's describing.

I have a JuicedBikes CrossCurrent X. They only made my particular configuration for a short amount of time around early 2018 - it has a massive battery, a 52v system, a 750W Bafang hub motor, and location tracking within the battery (though I stopped paying for it since I moved out of the city). Their newer models are just as, or even more capable.

Yeah, that is the legal limit but I turned it off in the bios. When cycling on roads I want to be going as fast as possible to keep things safer for me by moving at roughly traffic speeds and disincentivizing dangerous maneuvers by motorists. On bike trails and such I keep to 20mph or so as safe.

I actually tried to get mine registered as a moped with a license plate and insurance coverage etc. but was essentially told to take a hike by the state and insurance companies. So I did.

"I disagree with your assertions about sustained speed because I turned off the assist limit."

Okay, you should have said that in the first post. If you're not using the class of vehicle the comment was talking about, your experience isn't really relevant.

These vehicles are capable of doing so - they simply have a limiter on them. It's like saying an NVidia card can't mine cryptocurrency because they added a limiter in their drivers or something. Or that a truck with a governor on it could not go faster than that with the governor removed and no functional changes to power output.

Even so, I can go at least 4MPH greater than OP's suggested maximum speed legally.

OK, so you disagree with assertions because you ride an illegal vehicle. And want...what? Your use case to be taken as standard? Or for people to understand there are lunatics on the road?

We know :)

(to be fair and charitable: I agree that moving with traffic is, everything else equal, safer than not moving with traffic. But everything else is NOT equal - I am not convinced you have the weight [i.e. centre of gravity, inertia, ability to absorb bumps, etc], maneuverability, traction, braking power, and as you point out insurance or license and possibly training, and possibly protective systems as other vehicles moving at the same speed)

No. I disagree with his assertion that one cannot go >~24MPH indefinitely. The legal limit here is 28MPH. I can certainly do so indefinitely.

1) That's a pretty high legal limit... And doesn't feel all that relevant, given that you report riding at such a ridiculously much higher speed.

2) "Moving with the speed of traffic for my safety" is a... "Nice" (that was sarcasm, I mean egocentric) attitude.

3) "The speed of traffic" may be higher for you now that you live in the countryside, but A) sounds like you rode / ride about as fast in the city, too?; and B) the typical use case relevant to the discussion is not yours but the city/suburban one.

It's bad enough that you can go so fast indefinitely; please don't.

I commuted by bike along Peachtree Street in Atlanta for 3 miles each way for just under a year. Going too slow ends up with motorists making aforementioned risky maneuvers. I don't think I would have done so for so long had I been riding a normal bicycle. There aren't too many people who commute by bike there, and for good reason.

The rules vary widely in the US.

Anything going faster than 25MPH (40 km/h) without cutting out in NYC is legally classified as a moped. https://www1.nyc.gov/html/dot/html/bicyclists/ebikes.shtml

Class 3 limits in the US (pedal assist only, no throttle allowed) are set at ~28 mph (~45 kph). Class 2 limit (throttle allowed) is ~25 mph (40 kph). I've also ridden some DIY'ed ebike conversions with unlocked controllers that'll happily hit 40 mph (65 kph) if you're feeling particularly suicidal that day.

I have a modified ebike with an unlocked controller.

Without commenting on safety, let me just say that 40mph is a fantasy, unless you're going down a VERY steep and long hill. It also requires you to be in a road racing bike position, or air resistance will flat out not let you go that fast (people are quite wide)

But my bike is otherwise stock. There is no extra power added to the stock Yamaha motor (250W rated, ~400W peak power). The only thing that is removed is the 28mph limiter.

The DIY conversions that let you go 40mph (I've seen the videos just as well) are more in the realm of electric mopeds and motorcycles than bikes, IMO.

> I'm curious - what ebike do you have that can easily cruise at 48-53 kph for extended periods?

Those speeds sound like bogus. I can maintain about 40kph on my ebike on a flat surface, but that requires pedaling in addition to the motor and is a fairly energetic exercise.

Also, pushing beyond 45kph, you really start to feel the air resistance and it becomes exponentially harder to go beyond 45kph for any long period of time, unless going downhill.

Most ebikes don't really come with the chainring size to go up to high speeds, unless modified with a giant 50+ size, which is more apt for racing road bikes (non-electric)

> you really start to feel the air resistance and it becomes exponentially harder to go beyond 45kph

Nitpick: it becomes cubically harder. ;)

Nitpick to nitpick: cubically is a subset of exponentially.

You are both wrong. Air resistance increases quadratically with speed, not cubically. And you mixed up polynomial with exponential.

Quadratic: x^2

Cubic: x^3

Polynomial (eg. 3rd degree): a + b x + c x^2 + d x^3

Exponential: e^x

Drag force rises quadratically with speed. Power is force dot velocity; in this case force and velocity are in the same direction, so dot product becomes simple mulitiplication making drag power (exertion, formally: work per unit time) cubic with speed.

Oh, you are right! Sorry.

Power assist cuts out at different points, depending on design choice (and jurisdiction). Norwegian e-bikes, for instance, disconnect their power assist above 25kph and you need to pedal like crazy to go significantly faster than that.

Most if not all electric bikes here in EU won't get close to those speeds, regardless of your fitness. I don't think it's even allowed.

If it's capable of doing 50KPH it should be treated as a motorcycle, away from other cyclists and pedestrians and the rider should have the same knowledge as a motorcyclist wrt to how to behave in traffic.

Almost all ebikes are limited to 25km/h here, which is a reasonable speed in my opinion. It makes cycling accessible to everyone regardless of fitness level or hills, but it also ensures that ebikes go at a similar speed as most other riders (most riders on the cycle paths go between 20 and 30 km/h (12-19MPH)

There are some people who modded their ebikes to go faster, but I've only encountered them very rarely.

If something has that average speed capability, why is not licensed, registered, insured and held accountable as any vehicle would be? My 50cc scooter appears to have comparable speeds (maybe 10kph higher), and I wear proper armour & helmet, took the classes passed the test, am registered, licenses & insured.

That's my massive pet peeve & safety concern: I WANT to love e-Bikes, and all those sorts of things; and like a fellow poster, I've been riding both 500-650cc motorcycles and 50-125cc scooters for more than a decade so 2-wheelers are part of my life; but basically all the ads, shops, and salespeople over here are focusing on "You don't need license, you don't need insurance, you don't need to behave like a vehicle and obey the rules" as their main and primary sales point; and therefore the behaviour of riders is equally nonchalant. In the Toronto area (and it's important to be explicit because this is definitely different in different geographies), the relationship between cars and non-gas two-wheelers is charitably described as "strained" ("murderous/self-righteous hate" may be more accurate), and we all need to get better and understanding how we can co-exist and behave responsibly on the road.

I drive, walk, and bike often in San Francisco. I rode a 650cc motorcycle for 10 years when I was in my 20s.

In the Panhandle, for example, there is a mixed use bike / walking path. It is very dangerous for the walkers even with normal bikes, as the bikes are whizzing by the walkers at 20mph. However one day I was walking, and a HUGE mutant E-bike with massive fat tires & very heavy frame, flew by me at what seemed like 30-40mph -- and to me, it felt exactly like a near miss from a motorcycle.

There are other safety concerns with recent trends, with the Slow streets. Everyone walks in the middle of those streets & the pedestrians treat them as their exclusive domain: kids playing, etc. But the drivers long ago stopped respecting the "slow street" concept, and whiz around the traffic cones, and then go 30mph down the street. The city is still treating them as an experiment, which is a part of the problem.

I love both E-Bikes and the Slow Streets, and they should be a huge part of our future: * Cities should make the Slow Streets official and modify them to make them impractical to use for driving a car (perhaps making them have a single curving central lane). * Likewise the E-Bikes need a bit more regulation and limited strictly to bike only lanes, not the mixed biking / pedestrian paths.

As it is currently the progress of society and technology has created a bit of a dangerous situation.

a single curving central lane is one solution.

i also like the dutch solution, in which entrances into these slow zones are generally with a raised crosswalk that acts as a speed bump.

You get caught speeding in a slow street here it will put you in serious trouble, and rightly so.

One of the problems with SF streets (especially in Sunset where I live) is street width. With residential streets wide enough for six cars side by side, drivers feel like they can go faster without danger to themselves.

The solution is to make streets feel more dangerous to them: narrow streets, or at least obstacles like concrete planters that force drivers to go around them.

I’d love to see half of the width of Sunset’s streets reclaimed with wider sidewalks, planters with trees, and bike lanes. But I don’t see it happening to anywhere near the extent of Netherlands efforts, and simply narrowing the roads to Japanese or Korean neighbourhood width wouldn’t be realistic since they are already built.

I know here in Ontario, Canada we do have regulations for ebikes. They are not allowed to exceed 32km/h (or ~20 mph). This seems like a somewhat reasonable limit. They also impose other requirements like minimum wheel widths, having two independent braking systems with stopping distance requirements. You can't even ride them if you got a criminal conviction that prohibits driving (such as a DUI).

Reference: http://www.mto.gov.on.ca/english/driver/electric-bicycles-fa...

I think the only problem here is that some of these things can be hard to regulate with making random enforcement stops. And people typically aren't much of a fan of random stops which is understandable, I'm not either. So I guess you'd have to happen to catch them by LIDAR, but I don't even know how accurate such a reading would be against a small bike. Not sure it would be admissible in a court.

In the US my ebike stops giving assist at 20mph. (Class 1 I think) I can go faster just pedaling but not for very long.

My average speed on the ebike only increased by 3-5 mph over my regular bike, but my distance and usage has gone up.

In the EU, they are. Ebikes are hard-limited to 25 km/hr. If you have one which is capable of more than that (manufactured or modded), it is regarded as a motor vehicle and you need a license.

In part because regular bikes can go that fast with top athletes. The world record 1h speed is over 55kph on level ground, people can go significantly faster over shorter periods especially in sprints or down hill.

Should regular bicycles have to be licensed? When I studied in Vietnam I'd ride my bike amongst traffic in bursts of 55 KPH and cruise around 40kph (I had a Garmin mounted). Generally I can only do 30 kph in the countryside, but in the city & amongst traffic there is much less air resistance.

Additionally a bicycle can do Lane splitting much better than a motorcycle can.

I however don't ride my bike in the US because it's not safe to. There's not the proper infrastructure which just annoys drivers, but if there was I wouldn't have a problem sticking to riding 20kph in the city until I get to rural parts for training. Riding fast in bicycle lanes seems irresponsible if you're amongst commuters.

I suppose I just kinda answered this. There should be speed limits for bike lanes inside cities.

I hope you realize you're one pebble or pavement imperfection away from breaking every bone in your body at those speeds.

At those speeds bikes are incredibly stable. The only way a pebble of pavement imperfection will harm you is if the bicycle fails mechanically (e.g. a wheel folding in on itself).

I'm pretty sure that the risk of being hit by or hitting a vehicle is multiple orders of magnitudes higher. Which isn't exactly better, but let's at least worry about the correct sources of danger.

Cornering grip at speed and some gravel can really ruin your day, in spite of the bike itself being stable at speed.

Very cool project. I'm currently evaluating whether I could commute 75km per day on a pedelec. In Switzerland there is a small bike manufacturer that makes long range pedelec : https://www.speedped.com/ (German only). It's very expensive though but the battery pack can be updated to something quite impressive.

You definitely could, but .ch is a bit more mountainous than where I live to put it mildly so it's not the distance that I would worry about but the elevation change. If that's within bounds you likely would be fine in three seasons but winter would be problematic, if not downright dangerous.

Since they are registered and used as mopeds, why not get an electric moped instead? Then you don't have to pedal and can sit more comfortable, maybe even with a windscreen.

I don't really see the point of pedelecs, unless you disregard the law and just pretend they are less powerful e-bikes. But then you'll lose it if the police notice.

Whatever you do in traffic, be very careful. I'm still driving a car and inner city traffic is basically slaloming between cyclists. If something goes wrong, only one of us will end up in hospital.

I do also ride my bike on weekends have have been riding a 650cc motorbike for 15+ years, so not at all against 2 wheels. It's just that most people on two wheels seem to have started very recently and they don't know how to behave.

As a cyclist I tend not to care so much about all the mistakes other people do. Realistically it's a very small percentage of people that are new in traffic, the problem is that you usually only see the mistakes people do. You will never see that cylist who changed their pace 20s ago to avoid you.

What has been shown is that people who travel by many different modes; cylists, pedestrian, motorcycle, car, bus etc, are usually much safer and better at navigating traffic. We are all still masters at judging people only based on feelings though that will probably never change.

I agree and provide examples.

As a cyclist I know that a road bike is faster than a car in a roundabout so when I drive my car I don't overtake bikes right before roundabouts: either they'll try to overtake me right where the road gets narrower (unsafe) or have to slow down behind me (and they don't have an engine). So I slow down a little and overtake them after the roundabout. Same thing when approaching a red traffic light. I'll have to stop anyway.

Some pedestrians keep the left on mixed bicycle / pedestrian roads (this is a drive on the right country) probably to defend against the occasional crazy cyclist. That's dangerous IMHO because as a cyclist I get surprised sometimes when I didn't realize they are walking or worse running towards me and I get suddenly closer to them than I foresaw.

And as a driver it's really difficult to see a bicycle with no lights at night (nearly all food deliveries here.) At least wear some reflecting clothes, but buy a rear light and charge it as you do with your phone. Front lights are important too. One of them nearly crashed into my left door on a rainy night because I didn't see him when I came out from a stop.

The second (to walk on the left) is actually the recommended way to walk when there is no footpath because you see the oncoming traffic and they see you. Which is much better than being hit in the back by something you never saw coming.

OP was referring to pedestrian/bike paths. I believe everyone should stay on the right. I agree, with car traffic, pedestrians should be on the left.

I realize: and that's why I wrote that, after all, bike paths also have faster traffic on them, notably scooters and those can be very quiet, especially e-scooters.

> You're not really a regular bicycle anymore due to your speed…

The top speed (with assist) for class 1 & 2 e-bikes is well within the speed range of a regular bicycle. 15 MPH is considered a reasonable average speed for beginners, and 18-22 MPG is not out of the question with training. I've ridden my own e-bike past 20 MPH with no assist on occasion, and being a foldable model designed for electric assist it has a higher mass, smaller (20") wheel radius, higher rolling resistance (due to low-pressure 3-4" tires), and lower gearing than your typical non-electric commuter bike.

> … but you're also not a motorcycle that deserves its own lane.

Bicycles should have their own lane, whether electric or not, regardless of speed. It's not safe to share the lane with another vehicle.

I've tried driving over the top of the motor on this bike and it is almost impossible. I'm a pretty strong cyclist and I never managed more than 48 kph and that only very briefly. The drag is insane.

Trying to exceed the 32 km/h limit on my ebike is similar. It's like hitting a brick wall when the assist drops out.

I assume it's a combination of the extra weight and the extra losses from pedalling the motor as well as the wheels (mostly the second part I think). Going faster on my non-electric mountain bike is significantly easier.

This is my biggest gripe with ebikes. On a regular bike, there's a nice curve where you can always push yourself a little more to get a little extra speed, tapering off a little as your speed becomes too high for your gears. On an ebike, you have the assist until you don't, and (especially in high power mode), the wall when exceeding the assist threshold is too extreme to be worth fighting.

I wish someone would make an ebike that gradually dials down the assist in the last 5-15kph (depending on max speed; my experience is mostly on a US class 3 bike that caps out at 45kph; I'd like it to gradually ease off starting at ~30kph).

22 mph = 35 kmh. The average speed of Tour de France is 40 kmh: https://www.procyclingstats.com/race/tour-de-france/2016/gc/...

I wasn't talking about a long-distance race like the Tour de France. This is average speeds over a one-hour period. If an ordinary cyclist can reach those speeds, even for just a few minutes at a time, then cars need to be equipped to deal with it. The fact that an e-bike can sustain such speeds over a longer interval doesn't fundamentally change anything.

> If an ordinary cyclist can reach those speeds, even for just a few minutes at a time, then cars need to be equipped to deal with it.

Cars per se have the technical equipment to deal with that; it's the drivers' brains -- experience / expectations, basically -- that need to catch up.

The average speed over the TdF is completely irrelevant, they cross the alpes. Generally on a race bike riding at 40kph if you have a slight tailwind is very doable over extended periods. If you are riding in a group of riders riding along at 40 is very straight forward, you can easily go over 50 (the fastest TdF stages are around 50 average over more than 180km distance. I can easily ride 30km/h on a regular commuting bike over extended periods (and I'm currently quite unfit).

30 is pretty easy to do, 35 is significantly harder and 40 is insanely much harder.

People saying regular bicyclists do 40-45 kph seldom have much experience on bikes. And someone going that in city traffic, like a lot of ebikes do, is just not a thing =/ too much stopping/starting and with dedicated lanes you still have to slow to traffic. O ly ebikes get up to those speeds in that encironment

I believe your speedometer is broken!

I've never seen an armchair with a speedometer.

> You're not really a regular bicycle anymore due to your speed, but you're also not a motorcycle that deserves its own lane.

Even human powered bicycles are entitled to their own lane. They are vehicles like anyone else.

Cars misjudging the speed of oncoming bicycles is a huge problem, even without pedal assist. I have added significant length to my bike commute to avoid places where cars turn across my path. I can take a 1% risk once in a while, but not twice a day.

This is rule #1 of bike safety: avoid risky situations.

You deserve your own lane, although the rules vary from state to state. Some states have FRAP (as far right as practicable), others (such as mine) say that a cyclist should take the lane. As a motorist, and cyclist, I cringe when I see a cyclist half-in and half-out of traffic. As a cyclist, I avoid streets with fast, congested car traffic altogether. Fortunately, my locale has a lot of alternatives for bikes, including some bike paths plus neighborhood streets.

When getting your motorcycle license here in Belgium they teach you to always take the lane. Ride 3/4 of the way in. If you give the car some space, they'll drive closer to you, try to pass and then get impatient & aggressive when they can't. If you take up all the space they'll usually just accept it.

Obviously rules for bicycles may be slightly different but more and more inner city roads here in EU are now clearly marked as bicycle friendly.

In the US, we have something called "sharrows" which are a picture of a bike, and an arrow, painted on the street. The arrow is supposed to show drivers the "line" that a cyclist can occupy. Coincident with sharrows, my locale has designated "bike boulevards," that are considered to be preferred for cyclists. I live on such a street, that is a favorite route for riding from a large residential area towards the center of town. So I get to eat my breakfast and watch the bikes go by every morning.

They exist here as well. As a cyclist they don't make me feel very safe - when driving a car I've noticed that cyclists are often hidden from view by the cars in front of you and only "appear" two cars ahead of you.

Every day I see drivers playing with their phone and that two car distance is short enough for them not to look up and read end the cyclist.

When my kids reach the age when they can cycle by themselves it will worry me even more.

> You're not really a regular bicycle anymore due to your speed

I don't understand, ebikes are regulated and the assistance will top at 25kmh in most EU countries, which is a very average speed for a bike without assistance.

Unless you're talking about speed bikes, that can ride faster but are regulated like a motorcycle with license plate and can't ride on cycle paths. So it's just an electric motorcycle that looks like a bicycle.

Electric moped that works like a bicycle.

Still, the "mo" in "moped" comes from "motor". It's a vehicle with a non-human power source, just like a car.

So I find it kind of weird that they're often allowed in bike lanes, especially where those are separated from pedestrians by just a painted line on a sidewalk (or sometimes even worse, explicitly mixed in with them!).

Because there are limited resources and e-bike cyclists will be much nicer to other cyclists than cars are to any kind of cyclist. Besides that if there is an accident it won't be a fatality right away.

* You're not really a regular bicycle anymore due to your speed, but you're also not a motorcycle that deserves its own lane.*

If you’re traveling at normal road speeds, wouldn’t you be a (electric) motorcycle? And require lights, tags, and insurance like any other motorcycle?

That's how it is for S-Pedelecs in Germany.

In Finland you get heavy fines for going faster than 25km/h with motor-assisted ebike (if using motor). If you go faster, depending on the speed, you are fined based on taxes avoided on using this kind of vehicle, plus fines based on driving unlicensed vehicle, plus fines possibly driving without driver’s license and some other fines too.

E-bikes in the US require pressure on the pedals to avoid being classified as vehicles (they’re cycling assist devices). That said, many people have retrofitted those assist systems with garage modifications that remove the need to push the pedals or even add a digital “throttle”.

Illegal? Sure. Are they going to get charged for it? Probably not.

>>Illegal? Sure. Are they going to get charged for it? Probably not.

Until they get into an accident and they discover that no insurance will cover them in any way because they were riding an illegaly modified vehicle. Also good way to find yourself 100% at fault in any collision.

No they don't. Federal class 2 ebikes are allowed throttle power without any assist.

I just discovered electric bikes lately, and started going to the office on an ebike instead of subway!! I then discovered how dangerous this can get especially at the end of the day when my brain is tired!

I thought of stop riding bikes, but then chose to have a life insurance instead

> I thought of stop riding bikes, but then chose to have a life insurance instead

This is how i treated cars, but it feels backwards. You're made right after the accident, but you're already dead.

> I then discovered how dangerous this can get

Presumably this has nothing to do with biking and everything to do with other motor vehicles?

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