Electric bike, stupid love of my life
craigmod.com
craigmod.com
I lived in Los Angeles without a car for a few years. I often met people who lived here much longer but knew almost nothing about the local area despite having intimate knowledge of freeway off ramps. Cars are just so isolating. It's no wonder we see so much unhinged antisocial behavior from drivers.
It's interesting to me that road rage is non-existent between cyclists and pedestrians. It seems to be a manifestation of the frustration of being reduced to a metal box with a monotone horn, a couple of lights and the ability to go forwards and backwards. On a bike you're still a person.
Should they for some reason take notice of you, they will not slow down one bit, but swerve away imperceptibly, infinitesimally, from a collision, thus making sure you are sufficiently rattled by the encounter.
It's what I'd expect by default when riding a bike on a fast street and it wouldn't even occur to me to call it "road rage"
It is possible to do something so monumentally stupid as a pedestrian that you get hit and nobody could have helped you. That thing is to start crossing a bike path and then suddenly go backwards because you got scared.
As long as you don't do that, you'll be fine.
And the cyclists aren't nearly as annoyed by pedestrians as they are by mopeds.
Let's hope those dutch don't purposely hit an American.
You must be living in a different city from where I live.
You can use GPS on a bicycle ... Or even as a pedestrian
And you get cussed out by either drivers or pedestrians, because street design pits you against either one or the other...
Too bad you can't do that with cars or as a pedestrian /s
That said I like doing this both by bike, tram/metro, _and_ by car as well. By bike it's the same process, but you see everything faster and take different routes. Riding the tram/metro connects you to places in other ways and kind of teaches you those routes. By car it's the same thing, but another level. For me the important part is to basically not look at any map throughout the process and find your way around by landmarks, signs, etc. Looking at a map before/after is fine, but during you should just be navigating own your own.
This isn't quite the primary thrust of the article but if you travel to Kyoto I highly recommend renting a e-bicycle to see the area. I will never forget the 2 days that my partner and I spent riding around there.
I can recommend 'Fuune bicycle rental shop' - the proprietor will helpfully annotate a map for you with recommended routes and explain all the turns and paths with a translator device.
Beautiful smart bikes, but the quality of components is horrible.
Anyway digression aside, you might be happiest starting with a bike you like and doing your own conversion - either with a hub motor or a mid drive. Or have a look at REI - their ebike selection mostly look like bikes, with the advantage that they’ll also service them. That’s helpful if the manufacturer kicks it.
They offer the same theft-protection/tracking/insurance thing Vanmoof had, but use off-the-shelf bike components. The only thing they lack is the "unlock through Bluetooth"-functionality Vanmoof had.
The lesson for the sector is clear - make the economics work because funding rounds need to be based in reality, at least for now.
(1) https://electrek.co/2021/09/01/most-funded-e-bike-company-in...
I have the same exact feeling every time I ride my cargo bike as I did the first day I rode it. An exciting open to the world feeling. It has never wore off. It allowed me to really experience the cities I’ve lived in.
I’m lucky enough to live somewhere that I use a regular human-powered bike for my workweek commute. I think pedal-assist e-bikes are great for making this accessible to more people. But I’ve seen too many Class 3 throttle-equipped e-bikes (really, motorcycles) blasting by on mixed-use trails to want stricter regulations on what counts as a bike.
They also make every excuse against bike infrastructure invalid.
1400KW Rimac is street legal, but a 0.5KW ebike is not.
I can highly recommend getting an electric bakfiets with an Enviolo NuVinci Stepless Automatic Transmission Hub. It's a gearless continuously variable planetary hub, with an automatic transmission, that can change gears while you're stopped, automatically shifting from high into low gear when you stop at an intersection, then smoothly shifting up as you accelerate. Yes, it can actually shift while stopped, and while you're accelerating, and it's perfectly smooth. Get a carbon fiber belt drive instead of a chain if you can, too. Low maintenance, long life, and grease free!
Your kids will be safer and you will be much happier concentrating on driving and navigating instead of shifting gears, especially if you tend to forget to shift into low gear before stopping, which is a potential disaster with a normal derailleur and a bakfiets full of kids at a busy intersection, but not a problem with an automatic continuous transmission.
https://www.urbanebikes.nl/cargo-l-enviolo-automatic
I do love the experience of using it though.
My favorite memory of the trip to daycare happened on a shared path where I’d often see another dad taking his sons to work on a long-tail. One fall day, the boys were wearing superhero costumes and those bike helmets with the Roman warrior crests, and they were standing up on the running boards cheering him on as they raced down the hill. It was like a triumphal procession — and quite the contrast with all of the unhappy, raging people on the roads nearby.
https://twitter.com/boltzmannbooty/status/142692847167091917...
https://electrek.co/2023/07/12/dutch-e-bike-company-vanmoof-...
[German]: https://zug.network/@moritzkraehe/110716829137328870
So if I pay $1000 for a Roadster V2, what exactly am I getting? Sure, Citibike can be inconvenient: sometimes I won't find a good bike and sometimes I won't be able to park. For this, I'm not sure it's worth paying the prize.
Having my own bike also exposes me to risk of theft and having to carry it in and out of my apartment (I don't currently have bike storage in my building). Hence, it seems like I've already found my optimal solution.
And an electric bicycle makes it way more convenient while still being quite efficient. I share the love of electric bikes with the author and I am sure that huge progresses in UX and efficiency are it to come in the field. Would love to work on it one day ! (But hardware is hard…) I am happy to see the subject on HN frontpage. If anyone know any quirky projects on the subject, I would love to know more !
I'd imagine the movement of the legs while pedalling would affect the aerodynamics, but is there something else happening?
More complex braking system might introduce a lot of problems to a bike where that should be a simple thing, probably easier to have extra set of hydraulic brakes in case the battery is dead.
Keep going this way and you'll eventually reach the efficiency of converting solar power to movement, which is again directly comparable, and electrical systems win compared to biological systems.
After riding my motorcycle in almost every European and Central Asian country, I'm about to sell it because every nice motorcycle day is a better bicycle day.
My motorcycle is stuck on the road. I can ride my bicycle to the lake and back along nice trails. All of my friends have bicycles, so they can come too.
I can also ride my bicycle wearing shorts and a t-shirt, and not lug a helmet around all day. I don't need thousands of euros worth of heavy, hot equipment. I don't need ear plugs that still leave me with tinnitus. I don't pay insurance or plates. I don't worry about inspections every other year or oil changes or tired. I need only five tools to fix everything myself, and it's dirt cheap.
I'm over my motorcycle phase, but I'll ride a bicycle until I'm physically unable to.
The scooters are the real menace. I see more mishaps on those than anything else.
E-bikes and scooters are the future of city transportation for the able. I love them.
I'm glad that works for you. This is explicitly forbidden in my office, for good reason. It takes up a ton of space in the elevators and there's not much space in the office to store it. In the winter it would create a muddy, slippery mess. Most places I have worked have a bike locker for this reason.
Many people go full-assist — twist the throttle and go. If they had to pedal significantly they would be disinclined to even ride an ebike.
When the power is out, actually pedaling an ebike is one of the worst riding experiences ever.
Pedals generally mean your seating position is higher, feet not touching the gourd when seated — this too will disincline a larger number of people from ebiking.
We should not be putting up hurdles for ebike adoption.
My city has a rental bike system (Bixi, or City Bike elsewhere) and they're clunky tanks, made to be abused. In the past couple of years they've expanded their fleet with e-assist bikes. They're amazing. They're still unwieldy tanks, but the boost makes them fly up hills with little effort.
In my limited experience with different types of e-bikes, the ones where you need to pedal to make them go seem better than the ones with some kind of a throttle / lever etc. The act of pedalling engages the rider more completely than sliding some thumb lever, it feels safer and more connected with the ride.
The only issue is how do you get rid of that ridiculous looking grin on your face. You just had a huge rush, got a bit of exercise, paid nothing for parking, eight pennies for 'gas', and beat all your co-workers who were stuck in traffic. The grin is real and not a good look professionally at the office when commuting.
Thanks ebikes.ca, endless sphere forums and Sheldon Brown. True spirit of the internet.
This is the most hilarious non-satire comment I've read in a while. The grin is indeed an issue
That said the ramen truck would be quite a detour if I took the fremont bridge as it's in interbay near fishermen's terminal.
And even if you have good and safe parking at home and at the office (great!), which will cover the vast majority of trips it still limits the usefulness of a vehicle to be so tied up.
Yes, there are solutions/mitigations/compromises. But expensive and heavy locks suck and the ever present thought in your head planning a good parking spot etc. kills the joy of it.
I still make occasional trips on the Lyft bikes, which are fine. And I've been thinking about getting another bike. But especially with e-bikes, which are much more expensive and therefore much better theft targets, I just can't sign myself up for years of fretting about theft.
I've been eyeing the Bromptons but without a commute it's harder for me to justify the cost.
How practical is this really? You bring your folding bike into the restaurant where you're eating, into the bar where you're meeting friends, into the gym (it doesn't fit into a locker), into the little corner store with narrow aisles, etc? I feel like taking the folding bike indoors can work for a commute if your office doesn't have dedicated safe bike storage, but I think it falls apart as an overall response to "I'm inhibited from using my bike as my primary transportation b/c it is an easy target of theft"
Supposing I did have one, though, what do you imagine me doing? If I know where a criminal gang has taken my bike, help me understand what you see as the next step.
I've had 6 bikes stolen in a quarter century of commuting, but I've saved about $17k over what it would have cost me to use public transit for the same period. More importantly: cycling is enjoyable, I look forward to my morning commute on a bike. Not so much with other transport options.
Besides that, the rule is to always make your bike the least attractive to steal. Use two locks eg. a ring lock through the rear wheel and a chain lock through the front wheel, frame, and attached to something stationary (so they can't through the bike in a van and break the locks later). In general it's also good to put it in places where someone would notice if anyone tries to steal the bike, but not so busy that no one would notice and feels responsibility. Bonus points (remember the 'least attractive' rule), put it in some place where there are bikes that are much easier to steal (eg. not attached to a fixed object).
But expensive and heavy locks suck and the ever present thought in your head planning a good parking spot etc. kills the joy of it.
It's also a cultural/facilities thing. Eg. in The Netherlands many cities have bike parking with supervision and nobody minds if you attach your bike to eg. a lamp post. And most cities have plenty of lamp posts, so no real planning necessary :).
If you don't want a crappy bike you are going to stand out, guaranteed, and double locks won't deter.
Lamp posts is exactly what I had in mind, you can only have one to two bikes per lamp post. So depending on your destination you have your goto and a few backups ready planned.
Yes, double locks and a lamp-post in a public place will probably be good enough during the day, it is still such a hassle.
So that’s progress at least.
I would like to see more ebikes include an integrated handlebar locks in their ebikes. Cheap and effective.
Whether an E bike is the best form of travel is going to depend on a lot of factors. It's certainly less flexible than a car.
For one person who doesn't need to carry a lot and who lives somewhere that has dedicated bike lanes or can at least safely share the road with cars and where the weather is neither much too cold nor much too hot and there aren't daily thunderstorms, sure.
I don't mean this to be critical of E bikes or biking in general. I wish the built environment (in the U.S.) were more supportive of biking. Things like the weather are what they are, but the lack of dedicated bike lanes are a choice we made in the U.S. It can be especially bad in the suburbs and rural areas.
Personally (U.S east coast, mid-atlantic), I could reasonably use an E bike for a limited set of my trips in the spring and fall except the roads near me are hostile to bikes and there are no sidewalks in many cases. In the summer (July - Sep), an E bike isn't suitable due to heat, humidity, and on a lot of days severe thunderstorms.
In my area traffic is completely quiet. In a car you can go 120km/h in the highways fine, and even almost that in some specific non highway streets.
I always want to get one until I remember:
1. I WFH and “university FH”. Both are >100km from my house for when I rarely need to go.
2. My gym is 15km away and I barely get there in time in my car at the aforementioned speeds. There are no closer ones.
3. My non-e-bike is just my weekend workout (which I love) but if using for workout, e-bike doesn’t make much sense.
4. The only other use case for my car is getting groceries for my entire family or other cargo heavy things.
If you have time,
or don't have time, but still want variety in your route/scenery,
there's no better option.
If I didn't live on the 3rd floor[1], or had bike storage downstairs, I'd get one ASAP.
[1] I need an e-bike for the same reason I can't carry 20kg up 4 flights - my right knee is functionally useless.
Folding bicycle?
* https://www.bicycling.com/bikes-gear/a20048132/best-folding-...
* https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/reviews/best-folding-bike...
There are e-bike variants available as well.
(General consensus seems to be Brompton is (at) the top tier, but not cheap.)
Most electric folding bikes, the fold allows easy moving in cars/elevators or storage, I would not personally recommend them for multi-floor stair commutes unless you are comfortable with what you are getting yourself into.
I've also had two former colleagues trade folding e-bikes for folding e-scooters just to avoid the hassle of taking the folding e-bike up two flights of stairs at the office end. The e-scooters are far easier to maneuver/stow on busy commuter trains if that is a factor too - you can get roughly the same range at 50% of the weight and its far smaller folded.
As a typical example:
* https://www.radpowerbikes.com/products/radexpand-electric-fo...
That's a 64lb/29kg bike, and not uncommon for a folding ebike.
Yeah, that's the problem, unfortunately.
> The e-scooters are far easier
Alas, they have the same "my knee is made of soap" problem.
Been riding a motorcycle in London though for the last 15 years. A bit more effort to get started I guess but worth considering. From a theft point of view there's so many motorbikes about that a 10 year old boring one with a decent chain is quite unlikely to get stolen, probably cost less than an ebike too.
I'm 6'2" 260lbs and can ride a lectric xpedition all over Seattle hills with my girlfriend on the back and enough gear to have a picnic and go shopping for a fun day out. The same bike has a two seater orbiter for little kids on the back and still room for cargo.
I just got back from Paris and Amsterdam. In Paris, I saw a dude riding a bike towing a trailer with 6 more ebikes on it. This was around Montmartre, which is notoriously hilly.
In Amsterdam, there's this thing called a bakfiet, which is super popular and carries even more cargo than that lectric bike I have. It's big enough for you to put two teenagers into with a parent driving, or two dogs comfortably, or enough groceries for your doomsday shelter.
I don't buy the cold either. Bar mitts exist, and are on almost every bike in NYC, which definitely gets cold in the winter. I've seen it in Boston too. You can also get studded tires for the snow, and to be real I'd rather lose control in the snow on a <100lb bike over a >2000 pound car if the snow is really that bad.
That said, yeah, there's no climate control in a bike. If you dress in layers and with the appropriate gear it's mitigated but definitely less convenient imo. Also if you're a super commuter, yeah ebikes will take forever, but to be fair super committing sucks regardless. Sucked my life out doing 3-5 hours a day in Philly traffic back when I was doing that, really happy and privileged not to have to do that anymore. The gas was stupid expensive too, I was filling up every other day at minimum.
I'm not saying we should get rid of cars. I am saying that there are and always have been alternatives, and those alternatives are pretty darn nice these days, and for me better in every case save for Costco runs and camping/road trips. Mostly, I'm saying that we shouldn't resign ourselves to being car dependent, because it sucks.
After getting my first big boy west coast job, I was determined to never have to go through the bs trauma I got being car dependent again, and I'm much happier for it.
No more getting stuck on the PA turnpike for hours due to an overturned 18 wheeler. No more rear end collisions from rush hour cloverleaf merging. No more snow rusting out my brake lines and limping back to my mom's house to replace them with my dad before driving back to college to drop my gf off for work. No more borrowing a friend's car because my transmission gave out and my office had a super restrictive WFH policy. No more hailstorms and dealing with insurance who didn't want to cover the brand new rental car I was using when my transmission failed (yes that was literally the same month). No more inspections or tags or biannual maintenance or anxiety over how to get to work when things go wrong. No more stressing about geopolitics affecting the price at the pump when I was barely making enough to get by in the first place.
After 7 car free years in Seattle, I bought a car again. I love my Subaru. I've modded it a ton, and drove it all over the west coast. I will continue using my Subaru. My Subaru is a luxury, and it is a convenience, and I'm so much happier that I don't need to treat it as a requirement to earn a living or feed myself or whatever.
It's not super popular. The things are a hassle to carry anything with, and any small things are easier done with a regular bike with a satchel or just carrying the bags. Doubly so in a place like Amsterdam, where general commodities are within walking distance and any big things are near a central station.
>It's big enough for you to put two teenagers
Two teenagers? With the average Dutch height? Are you trying to break their legs?
I've seen them before in Seattle too around 2017 when prime now was still a thing.
I shouldn't have said super popular, you're right, and more like early than late teenagers (thinking of my brothers), and even then I don't think it would be comfortable. I am saying they're an option if you really need the cargo room though.
Stuff like this is comically large imo
https://urbanarrow.com/family-bikes/family/
And then there's the absurd https://www.icebike.org/biggest-cargo-bike/
Realistically this is my gf's bike, albeit with the running boards and a pop up basket in place of one seat in the back
https://ebikeescape.com/lectric-xpedition-review/
And this is a newer trim of my bike, although I have paniers and a pop up cargo basket on the rear rack
Now that he lives in Amsterdam with three young children, he goes Christmas tree shopping with a cargo bike with the kids in the front cargo space.
2020: https://www.dcrainmaker.com/2020/12/getting-the-christmas-tr...
2021: https://www.dcrainmaker.com/2021/12/getting-christmas-by-bik...
2022: https://www.dcrainmaker.com/2022/12/getting-christmas-by-bik...
During the weekends I'd often cycle through the mountains/hills as well. Sometimes with our 3/4 year old daughter in a Thule bike trailer.
The only downside was that Germany doesn't have a lot of dedicated cycling lanes and drivers are either too careful or completely reckless around bikes. And it was definitely not normal for German standards, I often got questions from Germans how I kept up with it through all weather.
At any rate, I have so many good memories of the daily cycling and it's a thing that I miss now. We do pretty much everything by bike now as well, but we live in a city (in The Netherlands) and everything is nearby. I do frequently go for longer trips in nature in spring/summer. The upside is that cycling is much much safer here (dedicated bike lanes, etc.).
Transport e-bikes can take several people, furniture etc. No problem bicycling in bad weather either, people regularly bike in ice and snow.
Getting buzzed by an SUV or honked at a stoplight works for me
Where are you located, and what behavior of yours do you suspect these people are taking such issue that they're threatening you with their vehicles? Just being a cyclist?
There was so much smoke at my work on thursday (forest fires) that those who biked in were hitching rides home because physical activity outside was to be curtailed due to air quality.
Essentially, it becomes a choice whether or not you want to use it as workout.
Not to mention that it is impossible for some people, 1:30 with a train, 45 minutes with a car and about 3 hours with a bike, makes thr choice rather obvious.
No doubt it can be dangerous and no matter how honed my instincts are with regard to predicting how cars and pedestrians are going to act there’s always unpredictable risk, so I understand not loving that.
In another life I wish I had done a few years as a bike courier, I would have loved it.
Illegal. And suicidal.
It also grinds my gears that there's tax breaks for getting e-cars and nothing for getting e-bikes. It's almost as if politicians are employed by car manufacturers.
[1]: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jan/17/motonormativit...
[1] Tangential reading: 'Why Buddhism is True' by Robert Wight:
They require a secure indoor storage space at both ends of the any journey, and many potential users lack that, either at their workplace or their home (e.g living in an apartment only accessible via stairs)
Why can't e-bikes be this way? My answer: they can and are, just not all of them yet.
Bike theft is down there with shoplifting or recreational drug use when it comes to policing priorities. But when a bike is stolen, often a person is losing an important means of transportation, so perhaps it should be taken more seriously.
Not going to happen in a ‘soft on crime’ society, though.
I believe the Kia/Hyundai debacle of the last few years supports this idea:
> So far this year, Minneapolis police have received 1,899 Kia and Hyundai theft reports, nearly 18 times the number for the same period in 2022. [1]
[1]: https://apnews.com/article/hyundai-kia-tiktok-theft-stolen-8...
Fighting car theft lowers insurance rates. But virtually nobody insures a bike.
I would also venture to guess that most officers don't cycle to work or in their free time.
I'm particularly fond of theft magnets, very attractive stealable cars equipped with cameras and remote shutdown and a team watching from a distance. Park it at a mall or on some side street, wait for the trap to be sprung, and poof! One less thief on the loose.
Bikes, not so sure. A good U-lock and a plastic-coated cable are a start, but these can be defeated within a minute by a professional.
I just heard on one of the YT China channels that people are indeed taking their batteries with them when they park their bikes, not so much out of fear of common theft, but because the police are empowered to confiscate e-bikes for a variety of infractions and it's almost impossible to get them back.
I also saw Mark Rober speak yesterday, I think with Allen Pan. He mentioned doing some sort of video where they built bait bikes and used them to sucker thieves. And I think Rober said they are doing another bike theft project where they'll be trying to trace things to the higher ups.
So I think the lack here is more that of a motivated anti-theft team. But motivation may be hard to come by. Not only are bike thefts notoriously low priority, only 21.5% of SFPD officers actually live in SF: https://missionlocal.org/2023/07/sf-police-firefighters-supe...
Quality of life crimes matter a lot less when it's not your quality of life.
To steal a 15 lbs bicycle, one need only pick it up and walk away.
My motorcycle is 500lbs wet. Close to 700 with full cases.
Are you really suggesting it's just as easy stealing a 500-700lb bike as a 20lb bike?
So you do agree with me, that it's a lot more work stealing a motorcycle than stealing a bicycle?
All locks can be picked, but it takes more skill for the better ones. Modern encryption is (so our math says, though i'm not sure what the limits are) essentially unbreakable, and so a better solution.
The ability to gain entry is trivial given a few minutes and intent.
The locks in my house are there so the glass has to be broken. The glass is there to give me enough time to respond.
If someone is picking my lock they are involved in a hit, not theft.
Which I then questioned what the hell am I doing adding a deadbolt to a door with a massive window. If someone wants to get in, they're gonna get in. The only thing that really keeps my family safe is the fact the vast majority of my neighbors don't want to hurt me, not some lock on my door.
Just further shows the futility of putting an expensive lock on a regular home door. If someone wants in, they'll get in. The lock is definitely more of a "please don't come in" than anything real.
Cameras and alarms help a bit more.
The possibility of someone being home or men with guns responding is a big deterrent. Smash and grabs are usually done on cars not homes.
That's an electric moped.
So I guess it would look, almost exactly, halfway between these
https://currentebikes.com/wp-content/uploads/california_elec...
They have some good cells and some bad ones?
hit up the homebrew powerwall forums for more sources.
I wandered around a few weeks ago taking photos of all of the pink bikes because I appreciated them: my Jeep is a lovely fuchsia.
With a heavy chain and a cafe lock, theft is pretty low on my list of concerns.
If they store the stolen bikes somewhere, then it'd be easy for police to set up a honeypot bike operation with a tracker inserted into the frame. Lock it up somewhere that's known for thefts and wait for it to be nicked.
It’s really tiny, like half a stick of gum but lasts weeks between charges. Sends a notification whenever the bike is moved and tracks location when it’s on the move.
Also hidden an Air Tag and added a rear-light that doubles as an alarm when the bike is moved.
Still won’t leave the bike out for the night but feeling a bit better when I’m not around during the day.
Not everyone is willing to take matters into their own hands, like this person's dad did.
https://road.cc/content/news/cyclist-couple-challenge-counci...
Although I don't really understand why you can't reserve/pay for the spot outside your own house, for a vehicle OR a bike, which would seem to me a solution that would please everyone.
Quite rightly too - it's simply not legal for them to put it there.
There are proper processes in place to get an official hangar installed. These might be challenging, but that's the only fair way to do things.
I think the biggest problem with cars is that we happily accept the impact they have on the entire community, just so that some people who use them can have more convenience. The cost of having a car is passed on to everyone.
Similarly, with bikes it's never going to be possible for every single person in the city to have a cargo bike parked outside their house - there simply isn't room. This isn't ideal, but a situation where only someone who gets there first can do it isn't ideal either.
I don't believe the council provide official hangars that can fit a cargo bike and there's a significant waiting list for hangars as well as needing multiple neighbours declaring that they're going to use them. Unofficial solutions seem to be the only thing possible.
Hell even if my bike got stolen every month it's still cheaper to just buy a new one than car ownership once you factor in gas and maintenence, let alone parking.
I hate parking. Not paying for it, but finding a spot. It sucks. And I'd rather deal with someone taking something off my bike than smashing my window again.
Idk man, I encourage anyone to give an ebike a try. They're fantastic.
But what they're missing is that the SFPD has always been like this for bicycles. A while back I had only locked my front wheel and my frame, so some dedicated thief stole the back wheel. I walked in to the nearest police station with the remains of my bike. The cop on the desk asked why I was there. "To report a crime," said I, holding up the bike. He looked befuddled, asking if I needed it for an insurance report or something. "No, I thought that the police might want to know about a crime." He shrugged and took the report, but clearly did not give a shit.
If cops took bike theft as seriously as car theft (which they should given that in both cases it can be somebody's primary transportation) I think we'd see a lot more e-bike usage.
We weren't missing much from that theft, but some of our neighbors were.
And so it is extremely unlikely that I'd leave my cheap bike anywhere, let alone my electric bike or scooter, no matter how well-locked it was. It 100% goes with me, or I don't take it at all.
Cops don't care about it, virtually nowhere in the World
The same goes for bikes in most cities. Strangely enough they seem to care about theft of jewellery more, even if a bike is more expensive.
If that becomes more widespread, e-bike theft will be a lot riskier, and hopefully easier for companies to insure.
One thing at a time.
Bikes are a local thing. If the weather is too hot, or cold, or wet, or snowy, you're out of luck.
Cars appeal nationwide. They'll get you hundreds of miles, comfortably, between remote destinations that aren't served by public transport or airports.
Or, they'll help you get groceries for the whole family.
If you think your area would be better off if tax breaks went to e-bikes, write your city and state governments. Depending on where you live, they're already taking upwards of 10% or more of your income, plus taxing the goods you buy and the land you live on.
> If the weather is too hot, or cold, or wet, or snowy, you're out of luck.
I really don't think the weather is as much of a barrier as it's often made out to be. The Netherlands is famously windy and rainy and Oulu, Finland has snow 5 months out of the year, but nevertheless lots of people cycle in both places.
But yes, if your bike lanes and paths are unmaintained (or worse, have all the street's snow plowed into them) it won't be attractive to cycle in the winter. That's a question of infrastructure and priorities though, it's not the weather alone.
> Or, they'll help you get groceries for the whole family.
I ride an Urban Arrow Family, and it works fine for bringing home lots of groceries.
I'm not making some wild guess, I'm going based on observations of riders in the nearby metro where I once lived. Bike usage plummets twice a year- very few people want to deal with -40 wind chills or have a shower at work after biking in 90F/33c sun.
Hence, my argument that e-bikes tax breaks make more sense at local levels than they do broadly applied.
Hot days aren't an issue for ebikes until you get to extreme temperatures. I've found it to be much better than walking; I'd sweat more waiting for my car to cool down. This is in Sydney, up to 40C and fairly humid.
Extremely variable based on local climate. I'll take cycling in a 68F rainstorm or the snow compared to 98F at 76% relative humidity.
These schemes have boosted the adoption of e-bikes and most cities, big and small, have been playing catch-up to provide bike lanes in and around city centres.
Currently travelling across France along canals and rivers and the network is pretty extensive all over the country. It’s basically the same story all over Europe (and the UK), with varying degrees of coverage.
You can also buy (or rent) tricycle-style bikes that have a large space at the front to carry heavier loads - children, pets, or just shopping. I assume there are electric versions of these as well.
In fairness, most of this assumes that the city is reasonably bike accessible, mainly in terms of having all the necessary amenities within a cycle ride from home. If you live in suburbs, this may not be as possible. But I think that says more about the inadequacy of poorly planned cities than that of electric bikes.
We have kids and since moving somewhere with good cycle infrastructure and convenient city planning I have never missed having a car. It works fine with cargo and individual bikes.
Cycle to work schemes let you buy a bike before income tax. I'm not sure how that compares to e-car tax breaks though.
All your employer if they have such a scheme.
(I'm not looking to buy an e-bike as I'm more of an acoustic cyclist)
That's just a technicality, I assume to make it comply with other laws about using company money to buy personal items. Payments are deducted from your pre-tax earnings each month, so the saving come from paying less income tax; you can't give the company a wad of cash up-front, or have it all come out of one month's salary.
> you hope that your employer will give the bike to you at the end of that period
They will always give you the bike: Cycle to Work schemes are offered as an employee benefit, the company doesn't want the bike. More important is what happens if you leave the company before that period; e.g. when a previous employer folded I had some some balance remaining to pay (around £500), which was deducted from my redundancy payment.
> The problems are that your employer might not want the extra hassle involved of potentially owning unwanted bikes (my employer has no interest in the scheme)
That's certainly true, and probably the main reason to avoid it (as an employer). Still, it's not much different to having surplus office furniture; at the higher-end, I imagine it's similar to an employee requiring some specialist desk chair, which the company can sell off afterwards.
> he last time that I checked, the tax break was on only the first £1000.
It varies per employer, e.g. I got one up to £1500. More annoying is that it must cover the full price: e.g. you can't pay £100 cash to get a £1600 ebike (although some sellers may fiddle the price tag to get around this!)
The only time I used cycle-to-work was many years ago, so I might have misremembered. However, I've heard that current schemes tend to just give out vouchers that can be used in certain bike shops (e.g. Halfords) on bikes and bike accessories and can be used in part payment for bikes. To be honest, increasing the price limit only really helps people who already committed cyclists, so maybe it's at a fair level.
Where I live in Texas there’s a $800 rebate for e-bikes.
More generally, I feel like this is a subject that doesn't get discussed often enough. Yes, most probably the writer of this article can eat the 2000 euros loss if his e-bike gets stolen, but the majority of the population cannot. It also sucks that the majority of said population is also made to feel like it is its fault for not riding this type of bikes instead of driving their SH cars to work and back.
E-bikes can also be leased, to lower the barrier to entry. As an alternative to providing costly downtown parking, many employers in USA subsidize month-to-month e-bike leases with a final cost of like 30 bucks a month.
Which should tell you how good an idea it is to leave one unattended.
This made for a bit of a tricky scene during title transfer, how do you pass the keys to the new owners if there are no keys...
Bikes have to be better equipped and infrastructure should be developed, sure. But solutions exists. I know many people who are using electric bikes daily in neighborhoods known for theft of all kinds, and they never got their bike stolen. All they do is carefully lock them to a fixed point with a good U-lock or chain and keep the battery with them if they are really worried. Not much more a hassle than for a motorbike.
Having a motor also means saddlebags and hence the possibility of using a motorbike chain
Another pro is that it’s so small you can easily take it indoors so no risk of them getting stolen.
All that said, mine has been doing nothing but gathering dust in the basement. Aside from 'pleasure cruise' there is no valid use case for the damned thing, at least in my city. Locking it, especially securing every valuable component on it, is unfeasible and would add ~20 lbs to my pack weight just to lock it. All efforts at creating bike storage lockers have failed, as it became common knowledge that the fragile sheet metal is effectively a lootbox for the taking.
My roadbike on the other hand, cost $100, can be maintained with a small pouch of tools, enjoys effectively infinite range, and is unassuming enough to remain undisturbed at a lock post.
It's a shame, because I'm a big believer in electric micro-mobility vehicles, but the security and usage issues means that the Bird scooters blighting our sidewalks are about the most workable solution we have at the moment.
Freeride/Enduro/Downhill helmets exist (https://mountainbikeguys.com/downhill-helmet/) but nobody has come up with a rating yet afaik. I own one, and it probably saved my life at least once, but can understand how nobody wants to wear one outside a downhill bike park.
Obviously more training can help. For example it would be useful to practice riding in the rain, ice, and wet leaves. But at what point does more training not help? When will you be safe?
Riding a bike next to cars is inherently unsafe. When a car hits you, you are ducked. There's a limit to how vigilant you can be and most riders accept it's a when and not an if.
Note motorcycles have mandatory training but still have 10x the death rate.
You can hold the throttle wide open, and it won’t matter if any amount of brake is applied.
E-bikes just aren’t that dangerous, especially compared to a full power motor vehicle. I suspect that the bulk of injuries to children on e-bikes are happening in throttle models because those are cheaper models. You don’t buy your kid a $5k mid drive ebike when you can get a $1k rear drive one. Mid drives are physically unable to have throttle, whereas rear drive bikes almost universally have them.
If you are truly interested in saving children from injuries, the best thing we could do is put speed and power limits on cars. Speeding cars maim, kill, and injure several orders of magnitude more children than e-bikes.
Total agreement on the other part but the injuries I’m hearing about have been kids riding their class-2 e-bikes into fixed objects, not crashing with cars.
https://support.radpowerbikes.com/hc/en-us/articles/44061799...
I upgraded to hydraulic brakes and wanted to keep the motor cutoff - it was hard to find levers with the integrated switch. I ended up with a kit using XOD brakes, which have the integrated cutoff and are otherwise just fine. I did, however, toss their included brake pads after a bit of riding and replaced them with Tektro P20.11 metal/ceramic pads, and those made a huge difference. That and bleeding the brakes properly.
Imagine the equivalent argument for cars.
Are you, and this argument, the reason so many newer and/or electric vehicles don't have "idle creep"?
There are some (a small amount) that support throttle. For example: https://bafangusadirect.com/products/bafang-1000w-bbshd-mid-...
Sure, but we don’t let children drive full power motor vehicles (except older teenagers after passing a test, and obtaining liability insurance).
If your argument is “somebody think of the children” then you have to consider that any child in the US is far, far, far more likely to be maimed or killed by a car while on their bike, then by their bike while on the bike.
If we are going to ban a category of vehicle for the sake of children based on injuries to children, then the logical vehicle to ban is the one that isn’t already speed and power limited.
My position is that it doesn’t matter if the kid is driving cars or not, if large, multi ton, unlimited speed, unlimited power vehicles (cars) are what is killing kids by the thousands, then why are we suggesting banning something which just isn’t as dangerous in an absolute sense.
If you want to compare motor vehicles to bicycles, then let’s add in trains, planes and ferries. And why miles driven and not time spent traveling. There’s a million ways to slice this, but there is no getting around the fact that if your kid dies in a vehicle accident, it’s almost always going to be a car.
By those measures we should get rid of bikes AND cars and stick to public transportation options.
I already think that e-bikes are over-regulated so I push back hard on reactive arguments like the GP. To ride legally I have to limit myself to 2/3 HP (500 watts) regardless of vehicle and rider weight, go no faster than 32kph, ride on road lanes where the other vehicles travel at 2x-3x my speed, wear PPE, have government approved lighting and reflectors, etc.
These things are already massively regulated in ways that limit their actual utility without necessarily helping safety. We don’t need to ban them outright because parents allow their children to do stupid shit on them, or adults are riding them without the proper skills. We don't suggest banning things like downhill mountain bikes even though children ride them, and they are far more dangerous to use as intended than e-bikes.
That's not what I said. I think e-bikes with throttles are too dangerous to be on the market for any buyer. It is a bad, dangerous human-machine interface. There is a reason that the big e-bike brands do not offer them. Yamaha doesn't. Specialized doesn't. Trek doesn't. It is a proper use of consumer safety regulatory powers to set requirements for the controls on a dangerous machine. Without them, you just get a race to the bottom.
In most states you can buy a 49cc scooter which is heavier, faster, more powerful, and has identical controls and operate it without any specialized training. Is that also something we should ban?
The human interface for a hand throttle on e-bikes isn’t novel, it’s been around for the better part of a century on most motorcycles and that seems to work just fine.
I’m not talking about little electric folding scooters. I never mentioned those.
49cc scooters have the same controls as throttle equipped e-bikes. One brake on each side, and throttle on the right. The only difference is that rear brake on the scooter is on the left.
The main difference is that the ebike is arguably safer since you can’t apply throttle and brake at the same time due to the cutout.
Huh, I always thought that virtually everywhere treated these the same as motorbikes (ie you need a license, insurance etc).
The bike featured in the article, a BESV PSA1, is considered a "class 1" machine under the most common framework. It has a low-power motor, pedal assist, and no throttle. I am not aware of any place that requires licenses or insurance for such a bike.
One of us is misunderstanding the GGP.
Are you talking about something with a throttle?
In the EU (and still the UK), anything with a throttle is treated like a motorcycle - it needs licence plates, tax, insurance and a driving licence. A child would therefore not be able to ride one. You also can't ride them on bike paths or lanes.
A pedelec on the other hand, which is what "ebike" usually refers to, still requires pedalling and can only offer motor assistance up to 15.5 MPH - these can be used wherever bicycles can and by anyone, and have no legal requirements to use.
I understand that the US doesn't really regulate non-standard vehicles, but it does seem to me like a child shouldn't be using something with a throttle.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedelec#Legal_status_of_pedele...
That said, most of these points would be moot if the US had dedicated bike lanes separate from automobile traffic.
I really love the electric scooter. It folds into a small space. I had a bad fall on the electric skateboard and traded electric bike for a v light weight race bike.
Author is correct, Electric scooter/bike are some kind of magic cheat code. Take very little electricity, cheap to buy and great for the last mile commute.
Although they do suck when it’s rainy or you need to carry more.
I’m looking forward to someone guiding 1-2 passenger, something with A/C mini electric vehicles.
Tesla selling $50k vehicles seems crazy to me, some with other electric car manufacturers.
I think there’s a great niche for light weight personal vehicles meant for city driving.
I spent a ridiculous amount on a Gazelle HMB 380+. It’s so much fun to ride. Every component is top quality. No maintenance issues ever.
Recently got a carbon fiber road bike from a Taiwanese factory. Just as fun. Weighs 7.9kg.
I will say when I tested the VanMoof I hated everything about it. The automatic shifter is extremely counterintuitive. The parts suck, a lot.
Shimano hydraulic disc breaks are pretty much set it and forget it type things, so I personally wouldn’t form an opinion of the quality of disc breaks based on the VanMoof.
Ride a regular bike.
In terms of theft, just use a beater bike for commuting.
By getting rid of the 'E' part of the bike, you'll get more exercise and won't have to worry about theft.
For years I rode a beater that I found in the garbage and that I fixed up with some parts I had lying around. Later I upgraded to a singlespeed because derailleurs freeze up in the winter.
It's a trek earl. Seriously bikes are so ridiculously efficient why do we need to add batteries and motors and geegaws to them?
If you’re reasonably fit, or only use your normal bike on routes you are confident you can ride at your fitness level, then do that with a normal bike.
E-bikes will however free you from doubting you can achieve whatever is in front of you, and that removes a powerful barrier that prevent a lot of people from using bikes at all.
I see lots of elderly people and people of all shapes travelling long distances on e-bikes.
Maybe you don’t get 100% of the benefits of human-powered travel, but if you use the assistance sparingly, you easily get 70-80% of the benefit.
I set le lowest level of assistance of mine to only 15%. Helps me lug the 60lbs of stuff I carry with me on my journeys and I still get a good cardio pushing myself, riding a few hours a day.
I do use a normal bike sometimes, and prefer them for agility and for the pleasure of feeling lighter, but my e-bike is taking me farther and faster (and I’ve lost 15lbs since last year and never felt better in my life than I do now).
I rented e-bikes to show relatives around, and they're fantastic if you can't or won't exercise that day. Sometimes it can make the difference between taking the bike or the car.
I see so many people on e-bikes that wouldn't ride a bicycle at all otherwise, and I think "good for them".
Generally on my way to the office I don't want to get all sweaty and have to use the showers, so point two for the ebike. I can use higher pedal assist or lean on the throttle a bit more on the way to work and arrive fresh. On the way home I can turn down/off the pedal assist and ignore the throttle as much as possible to start acclimating myself to a truer bicycle commute.
Incidentally, I also custom built a “mini velo” similar to the author’s “orange city bomber.” It really is the best bicycle for urban environments, pure fun, no idea why they aren’t more popular in the states.
Hills. Unfit people. Older people. Not getting to work sweaty. To carry children, cargo, or pull a small trailer.
where I live no shop is going to let you try one. Not even a regular bike, you want to try? Buy it.
Heck, you normally can't even get a test drive when buying a new car.