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Comment by SkipperCat | Hacker News Reader

I live in NYC and the situation with ebikes is very different from many other parts of America.

We have a huge population of delivery drivers on ebikes (and also elec/gas scooters). They ride on sidewalks, against traffic and constantly run stop signs and red lights. They're not just a danger to pedestrians, but also creating an awful risk for themselves (I just saw one hit by a car next to Barclays in BK this weekend).

I'm an avid biker and have slow rolled my way thru many stop signs, but I've never put myself or other pedestrians at risk in the manner as many ebikes riders do.

The NYPD has ignored this problem, as they do most quality of life issues in the city. I'm not sure how we resolve it but there does need to be dialog among everyone to fix this issue. This is not just an issue of car vs. bike, its an issue of pedestrian safety too.

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I live in NYC and I agree with you. I ride bikes for my entire life in different cities and I've never seen so many bikers with a death wish. They dash in between traffic and blatantly ignore any applicable traffic rule. Not even bikers in India and China dare to ride this fast in traffic.

I just want to add that the food delivery bikers don't ride on the sidewalks solely because they can't go fast on the poorly maintained NYC sidewalks. If they could they would go at 30 miles/hour on sidewalks.

EDIT: I am working in an office at Time Square right now. I just looked down the window and counted 2 delivery bikers going at ~15miles/h on the sidewalk (The buildings are new and their developers fixed the sidewalk.)

Maybe its "food delivery" pushing for those aggressive behaviour, not e-bike.

Exactly. Those e-bike delivery drivers are directly incentivized by Grubhub and Doordash to put themselves at risk. The ever increasing demand for instantly delivered meals and the unscrupulousness of those companies has created the present circumstances, and much as it annoys me that I have to be more cautious when walking around, I don't blame the gig workers barely eking out a living.

If you fine the companies, the behavior would stop very quickly.

They are incentivized because the NYC is designed around cars, not (e-)bikes.

If non-permit holding cars were banned from the city center and bikes given an equal share of space, the landscape would quickly change.

I guess delivery drivers would be much more reckless than average even with perfect cycling infrastructure. It would just be less fatal.

> They dash in between traffic and blatantly ignore any applicable traffic rule. Not even bikers in India and China dare to ride this fast in traffic.

There is nothing new about this. NYC bike messengers have been doing this for decades. The 2001 documentary Pedal:

* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EyitrLKUUJI

* https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0380622/

And from (another?) documentary there were "The Klingons":

> Dubbed the “X-Men” — and wearing hockey helmets, full pads and a mix of motorcross gear and BMX gear — this crew of couriers rode like no one else in Manhattan. Pedaling was fine, but more often than not bikes were just a way to catch up to cars and trucks. “We’re also known as the Klingons, because that’s what we do: cling on to fast-moving vehicles,” says one member in a short documentary on the crew.

> As you can see, the crew wasn’t opposed to riding on the Henry Hudson Parkway, a freeway. As if going 50mph+ hanging on to a moving vehicle wasn’t crazy enough, this was in the pre-Giuliani years where New York was littered with deep potholes and mountain bike technology was still in a pre-suspension, pre-linear brake.

* https://gearjunkie.com/biking/1990s-new-york-city-bike-messe...

I wish states would regulate Class 2+ e-bikes as motor vehicles restricted to motorways only. E-bikes with throttles (instead of just pedal assist) are just motorcycles with electric motors and should be regulated accordingly. They have no business being on trails and sidewalks.

I can’t give a blanket statement for the US, but in the cities I’ve lived in, cyclists of all powertrain types are supposed to be on the street and not the sidewalk.

When I was a bike commuter, I’d on rare occasion take a stretch of sidewalk, slowly, to avoid road construction and hazards I just didn’t feel safe traversing. I would not bother a single pedestrian and was probably coasting at the speed of a jogger/runner. None the less I’d still get yelled at by cops to get on the road. Meanwhile cops do nothing when, at least in Downtown LA, cyclists are running red lights.

I’m not an anti-car/bikes-only person but we do need better awareness for all of the rules of the road for cycles and add protected bike lanes. The situation now with a lack of knowledge, blatant violation of stop signs and lights by bicyclists and motorists, and in some cases conflicting and incompatible stop light rules, is complete madness.

It might be only my impression but reckless bike driving didn't start with e-bikes. There were always quite a few bikers endangering traffic and themselves, and this only skyrocketed now when bikes started driving constantly at motor powered speeds (and increased weight too)

> I can’t give a blanket statement for the US, but in the cities I’ve lived in, cyclists of all powertrain types are supposed to be on the street and not the sidewalk.

Yes, and once you realize that 99.9% of the US lacks any kind of safety infrastructure for bikes, you begin to understand how utterly insane and hostile it is to anything but cars.

Putting 15mph bikes next to 45mph 2-ton cars and then slapping a sign like "bikes may use full lane" is a giant middle finger to current and future bike users.

It's a middle finger to everyone, bicyclists and motorists. It's insane that we've normalized the idea of having a single surface shared between 45mph and 15mph vehicles.

Seattle lets bikes ride on the sidewalk.

After getting sort of 'stranded' out in the open going uphill in the travel lanes surrounded by rush hour traffic when a metro bus pulled out and blocked my access to get back over to the right, I started utilizing the sidewalk when the road was a bit too chaotic for my fitness levels.

I have a class 3 and it doesn't have a throttle. However, it will assist all the way up to 28MPH.

We just need speed limits and start issuing some fines. I don't ride fast on sidewalks and at parks. But a lot of the with throttle ebikers are absolutely insane.

ebikes with throttles are not legal in NYC anyway, however its basically impossible to tell at a distance what kind of ebike someone has from a distance.

Do you feel the same about traditional bicycles (not e-bikes)? Practically all e-bikes are limited to 20-25mph, so practically I don't understand what the difference would be between the two.

As someone who is trying to commute more with a traditional bicycle and less than a car, I would say that bicycles have no business being on motorways. In all but the quietest neighborhood streets, cars and bicycles just behave so differently. They move at very different speeds, and neither the motorists nor the bicyclist is ever happy when they need to negotiate on the road with one another.

Cities and states need to build up much more dedicated bicycle infrastructure, where bikes are separated from cars.

Class 3 e-bikes go faster. Traditional bikes are usually more in the 10-15 mph range as well. I think the argument that bikes need their own infrastructure is a good one but that we need to figure out where an ebike is different enough to need it's own infrastructure on top. If we have 80+lb e-bikes going 28 mph (typical class 3 top speed) next to a 12 year old going 8 mph that's potentially very dangerous.

Most e-bikes are restricted, but unrestricting them is typically trivial - so everyone does. 25mph is extremely dangerous both to people around you and to yourself, when you don't have any protective equipment and no fairings.

>Practically all e-bikes are limited to 20-25mph, so practically I don't understand what the difference would be between the two.

20-25 MPH is really fast for a human-powered bike. A reasonably fit person can hit those speeds, but generally only in short bursts and/or favorable terrain. I ride into work everyday through mildly uphill paths, and I only average 13 MPH on a good day (closer to 12 on most). The practical difference is that a throttle-equipped e-bike allows someone to sustain high speeds, regardless of fitness level or terrain. An e-bike rider can (and do) mindlessly go at max speed when human-powered bikes naturally can't.

E-bike and scooter riders are not “creating an awful risk for themselves”. Cars are creating that risk for them.

And I don’t get it: you say e-bike drivers “constantly run stop signs”, but then a paragraph later you say that you also often run stop signs! What should I take away from this? That we should selectively enforce traffic laws against e-bikes but not against you?

Yes, the e-bike drivers are creating the risk by riding against traffic and in crosswalks where turning traffic can't see them coming. This would be an issue even if all the other traffic was bikes and not cars -- though admittedly not as deadly.

They ride against traffic because most streets in NYC are one-way to accommodate cars.

Imagine, if you will, looking both ways and slowly rolling through a stop sign; and also imagine running a stop sign at full speed and not looking. Not all running stop signs are equal. It's not the law that matters.

Also, cars aren't creating the risk. Drivers are.

Guns don’t kill people either, amirite?

Google Idaho stop. If anything it's pedestrians who are failing to look out for cyclists at intersections.

In most countries pedestrians have priority at crossing. Seems that a lot of people riding a bicycle want to have priority over all traffic (you can easily see that when bicycle and pedestrian have to share the same street, bicycle will use their "ring" all the time to make way…) The other day I was even hit by a bicycle in a pedestrian street as the guy was just slaloming at high speed.

In NYC and particularly in Manhattan and the built up areas of other boroughs, almost every crossing is signaled and timed. This isn’t a suburb where pedestrians walk out into a crosswalk and traffic stops outside of the normal light cycle.

Maybe the cars made him do that. /s.

As per the OP this is an NYC specific phenomenon. The e-bike/moped delivery drivers will blast through stop signs and red lights at 20mph with pedestrians in the crosswalk. As a pedestrian having a bicyclist slow rolling a stop sign on pedals feels safe (they aren't that heavy or fast), but getting buzzed by a dude with a motorized vehicle rolling at 20 mph feels actively dangerous and I have seen enough crashes to think that this is not just an impression.

The prevailing opinion is that pedestrians should be thanking the person on the e-bike in that scenario for not driving a car.

All I can say is, as an NYC resident who occasionally takes a cab or borrows a friend’s car and does not ride any sort of bike, the vehicle that has the most net negative impact on my day-to-day life is the automobile.

Not NYC specific: any European city of medium size has these now. They all, all, behave appallingly. Why? Because they can, no plates means no accountability and who doesn't like speed - wheels go brrrr! Occasionally they crash and die.

At this point, to be honest, I'd be tempted to let Darwin do his thing, if it weren't for the fact that they traumatise pedestrians and drivers.

What the poster is saying is objectively true. At least in NYC. I would add they are particularly dangerous to pedestrians.

Whether the poster has previously slow rolled through a stop sign or cars are dangerous to bikes are separate points.

I would say e-bikes are not the root problem. They are fine. It is the drivers not following any rules is the primary problem.

Drivers don’t follow rules bc there’s no enforcement. E-bikes are grey area vehicles. There should be no gray areas. If you have a motor on your vehicle it’s a motorized vehicle and needs to be registered and plated, driven on the road, given tickets like any other vehicle.

> E-bikes are grey area vehicles.

No, they aren’t, in most US jurisdictions, which have specific rules for motorized bicycles (and often distinct rules for electric one.)

> If you have a motor on your vehicle it’s a motorized vehicle and needs to be registered and plated, driven on the road, given tickets like any other vehicle.

The fact that you don’t like the specific rules for e-bikes doesn’t make them a “gray area”.

> The fact that you don’t like the specific rules for e-bikes doesn’t make them a “gray area”.

My understanding is that the rules in NYC governing e-bikes and electric mopeds were very fuzzy until around 2020, but there is still some uncertainty.

Before 2020 most of the delivery "e-bikes" ridden in NYC were technically illegal and were subject to occasional/erratic police enforcement such as stings and seizures despite being about as ubiquitous as taxi cabs. This was controversial when I lived there.

I no longer live in NYC but since then my understanding is that the city and state governments have worked with delivery riders to clarify the legal status of their vehicles but there is still a bit of "gray area" in practice.

This is a very uncharitable reading of what he wrote.

I said I "slow roll" thru stop signs. And and like most bikers, if you are at a stop sign and there's no peds and no oncoming cars, its pretty safe to go thru the stop sign. Just like how everyone jaywalks in NYC. If I get a ticket for that, I own it but at least I'm not putting other peds at risk.

But the crux of the issue is that delivery ebike are riding recklessly. Any the majority reason for this is because they are paid by the number of deliveries they complete. This creates an incentive for them to take risks which a normal rider would not do. If the didn't have that incentive, they would probably operate in a much safer manner.

Have you spent time in Manhattan? It’s common to get buzzed by bikes going 15mph+ down sidewalks on streets (not avenues) where the street is mostly clear (and cars don’t ever go very fast on streets anyway, they really can’t).

Yes I have and no it’s not.

Happens to me a few times a week so thanks for the absolutism.

It’s not “absolutism” to say it’s not common.

> And I don’t get it: you say e-bike drivers “constantly run stop signs”, but then a paragraph later you say that you also often run stop signs! What should I take away from this? That we should selectively enforce traffic laws against e-bikes but not against you?

Legally there may be no difference between slowing to 2 mph (while yielding to traffic) and blowing through a stop sign at 20 mph. But I think you're smart enough to know what was meant by the person you're replying to--as a matter of physics and safety, those two things are completely different.

More than one thing can be true:

- Cars can be dangerous for cyclists, even when those cyclists follow all the rules, as the article makes clear

- E-bikes can also be dangerous for other road (or sidewalk) users, especially when they disregard the rules (riding on sidewalks etc).

And these can _definitely_ be true in wildly different environments! Manhattan streets and an arterial road in Encinitas are very different.

One is slowing down and is preparing to stop if need be, the other is weaving through traffic —one is more reckless than the other.

> Cars are creating that risk for them.

What BS. It is their choice to do things dangerous to themselves and others. If the road is too unsafe, then don't use an ebike. Period. Putting pedestrians at risk is disgusting. When the scooter craze started, I watched in horror, during my 1 hour commute by walking, as they moved to the sidewalk. Whipping in and out of pedestrian traffic, I was bumped a few times, but had no collisions. Those collisions could have been fatal, btw, as the scooters were going 15-20 mph. I definitely read about local pedestrian/scooter collisions, some people being seriously hurt. It is illegal to ride them on the sidewalk where I am.

> It is their choice to do things dangerous to themselves and others. If the road is too unsafe, then don't use an ebike. Period. Putting pedestrians at risk is disgusting.

Who do you think is making the road unsafe? What type of vehicle do you think results in the vast majority of pedestrian injuries and deaths?

I'd say that someone riding against traffic is making it unsafe for themselves and others.

Can you answer the question without moving the goalposts?

> They ride against traffic because most streets in NYC are one-way to accommodate cars.

> Who do you think is making the road unsafe?

The person riding against traffic is making it unsafe.

Can you just re-read the comment to which I directed that question? They were claiming that e-bike riders choose to ride alongside pedestrians because the roads are too dangerous.

If you really want to pull in that comment of mine from elsewhere in the thread, I’ll expand on it. My point there was that designing our streets for cars has made them dangerous for bikes.

It’s more dangerous when cyclists go down one way streets the wrong way instead of going down the correct street.

Okay, I don’t really know what you’re trying to do here. It doesn’t sound like you’re interested in conversation. Have a nice rest of your day.

Can you just re-read the comment to which I directed that question? They were claiming that e-bike riders choose to ride alongside pedestrians because the roads are too dangerous.

I never said "alongside" because that is BS. Sidewalks should be for the exclusive use of pedestrians and wheelchairs.

This is a crazy discussion. Are you saying because the road is too unsafe for bikes, scooters, etc (yes, sometimes because of cars) that these vehicles should be on the sidewalk? It seems you're saying that.

Perhaps it's not either/or but both/and?

The problem with ebikes/scooters in NYC is that I no longer feel safe on sidewalks. 5 years ago, I always felt safe on sidewalks but would always cross roads carefully (I have a rule about never looking at my phone when walking across a road).

But now on sidewalks e-bikes will zoom past me from behind at fast speeds startling me. I fucking hate it. I can no longer walk in peace in the city anymore.

I've lived in a few cities over the past two years, and am currently in NYC and you're right on the money. E-bikes are a very positive change in every other city. E-bikes in NYC have gone too far. I was riding the bus to Red Hook and the driver had to slow down several times because delivery riders were swerving between the sidewalk, road, and bike path at any given many moment. Stop signs didn't even exist to them.

at the same time, other cultures around the world with big, urban centers have adopted to the more chaotic traffic. Big, safe, 4-wheel vehicles have brought gridlock to the core city, and with that is waste. Its a challenge for sure, but strict traffic enforcement in a 1960s way seems gone in 2023.

The situation on NYC's bridges (particularly between Manhattan and Brooklyn/Queens) is egregious. I see drivers on gas/electric scooters recklessly overtake on the narrowest parts of the Queensboro or Williamsburg bridge at well above the legal speed limit.

I don't want to ruffle too many feathers, but I've developed a lot of animosity for cyclists; largely due to having interacted with them in parks, where they can be so incredibly selfish.

Of course, I get some frustration when I'm stuck behind a bike, but I try to restrain it be safe. Meanwhile cyclists act like they rule the road. I've had them yell at me. They run pedestrians off the sidewalk.

Cyclists aren't exactly "the good guys" much of the time.

I think part of the difference is that one asshole driver makes people think "that guy was an asshole", but one asshole biker makes people think "bikers are assholes". There are certainly plenty of assholes in both groups, but American society is so car-centric that we don't generalize observations to the whole group of "drivers".

No, no, no. I tend to think it's that cycling turns people into selfish jerks. I'm not sure exactly why.

I think the main reason is that ethics in cycling has never really caught on as an ideology. So there's this sense of simultaneous anarchy and entitlement the permeates cycling culture.

This leads them to thinking they have no responsibility to share the road with drivers, riding as slowly as possible, and not leaving room to pass. Then they go on mixed trails and suddenly the rules are different. Pedestrians must get out of the way, and they don't have to yield traffic laws. They're the ones that will be yelling threats!

I really have to push back on this "criticizing bicycling is like racism" concept you introduced. First of all, people do generalize about cars being assholes. We talk all the time about it. Most of the violence is actually car on car... we just notice more the car vs. pedestrian matchups, as they can get pretty brutal.

The other side of this is that most cyclists have had credible casual death threats delivered to them from passing motorists during their commute on a regular basis. Having someone swerve into your lane because they think vehicular manslaughter is cute at 8:45 in the morning will make anyone aggressive. Whenever you see a cyclist taking the full lane there is a good chance that they nearly go run off the road when someone tried to pass them with no margin, or they had a door opened into their face. The reality is cars are very dangerous and lightly regulated. A lot of people who are barely competent to operate heavy machinery drive 3 ton cars around without the proper training. I appreciate that you are restraining yourself in some frustrating situations - that is generally how a good driver behaves. Sadly you are getting the blow back from the actions of a lot of reckless and poorly qualified drivers making the road less safe for everyone.

Lol, no that doesn't follow. Maybe if you mean like how people who experience abuse actually being somewhat more likely to perpetuate it (although contrary to popular opinion it's still quite unlikely to be passed on).

I say this because I'm walking on paths far away from vehicles. We don't really tend to care the background of people who do bad things. If someone is treating you like garbage, you should be more respectful to others, not stoop to their level, and take it out on someone completely unrelated to the person you're mad at.

I don't think a general "cyclists" category is a helpful way to classify people--it's not like the people who ride bikes have a particular character that can be distinguished from that of people using other vehicles; rather, they behave in the way that the infrastructure, culture, and laws around them influence them to act.

There is an intersection directly in front of my house (also in NYC) that features a flexible barrier and signs telling people "No left turn". All day long, hundreds of times per hour, drivers roll right over the barrier (or swerve around it into the bike lane), turning left illegally, rather than going around the block as they are supposed to do. Should we cast moral blame on these drivers? Or are they simply average human beings? They are taking a dangerous shortcut because the intersection is poorly designed, because our culture encourages them to prioritize their own momentary convenience over pedestrian safety, and the enforcement is non-existent.

If everyone is doing the same wrong thing, then something structural needs to change.

> Of course, I get some frustration when I'm stuck behind a bike, but I try to restrain it be safe.

I'm rarely ever stuck behind a bike for longer than 30 seconds. I don't get frustrated and I don't need to restrain myself in order to be safe.

> I've had them yell at me.

I've never had a cyclist yell at me.

You might be doing something wrong.

No, the issue is that there's mixed pedestrian and bike traffic. There's a lot of cyclists that just want to got full clip like the pedestrians aren't there.

Now they're the ones shouting threats. I've been fucked with multiple times while walking too. I don't really mind waiting for cyclists, even on main roads, which is an unheard of ideology where I'm from.

I'm just saying you can get a little impatient. It seems odd to me that you're bragging about not getting a little frustrated having to drive 5 mph for a long time.

Seems odd to me that you think I'm "bragging" or that 30 seconds is "a long time".

Most bicyclists can also easily maintain more than 5mph, that's a pretty slow jog.

It’s less that and more getting high and mighty about me being slightly annoyed, as most drivers are.

Counterpoint: When people are riding ebikes with car traffic instead of pedestrian traffic, the bike riders are getting killed. So while I don't exactly disagree with you that ebikes need to be separated from pedestrians or at least slow down significantly when that is not possible, I do very much disagree with the framing that the problem is on the individuals riding the ebikes. I don't live in NYC, and while I'm sure it's bike infrastructure is better than many places in the USA, I can confidently say that this country needs much better bike infrastructure. We should build out many more lanes dedicated to bicycles.

I nearly got nailed by an e-bike the last time I was in Manhattan, going against traffic in a pedestrian lane. They seem to have proliferated in the last year or so.

The trouble seems to be that people are trying to maintain a biker's traditional laissez-faire attitude toward traffic laws on a vehicle that can do 30+ mph and accelerate with electric torque.

Yup. These morons also ride on the greenway, a bike and pedestrian path, on gas powered scooters weighing hundreds of pounds to do deliveries. They also ride the larger gas and e-scooters in bike lanes. Sidewalk riding is infuriating as they have plenty of street by me but nah, sidewalk it is! I was almost hit from behind walking home from the store on a sidewalk after some dick rode up from behind me on a big e-scooter - you cant hear them coming. And never mind the number of near misses Ive witnessed from complete disregard of anyone's safety. Cops don't care at all. I mean all the illegally plated cars and out of control street racing is also ignored so whatever. Fuck the pedestrians and cyclists - motorists rule the pavement regardless the number of wheels.

Solutions cant be talked about until the morons in city hall start giving a shit and doing something about the useless cops.

My city is substantially smaller than NYC, and for the most part delivery drivers aren't using electric bikes.

But we otherwise have all of these same issues from ordinary people riding these things. It's really turned my attitude about e-bikes. At first, I thought they were a great idea. Now, however, they've proven to be a very serious hazard to others. I'd love to see them classified, licensed, and regulated as scooters are.

I agree 100% with your complaints about delivery e-bikers in the city. However, while "New York" is in the submission's title, if you read the articles they don't discuss issues at all specific to NYC.

I think drivers and bike riders agree that NYCs pedestrians are always walking in the road and bike lane. Or maybe it's just easier to hurl insults at pedestrians than it is drivers.

Maybe calling NYPD fascist and racist for enforcing laws around quality of life issues isn’t the best way forward.

Those problems are real and valid, but they seem to be downstream of the problem the article is about: roads are unsafe for cyclists.

I don't have a study proving it, but it seems plausible personal mobility device riders would be less likely to ride on sidewalks etc if they could safely ride on the street.

This is me. I occasionally ride my bicycles (acoustic and electric) on sidewalks. I do so at walking pace, though.

Everywhere you see a cyclist on a sidewalk, that's a sign that the road isn't safe enough. If the road were safe, don't you think they'd prefer not worrying about pedestrians?

That would help a little bit, but most of the illegal biking by ebikes is done to save their time not because they're feel unsafe. Things like salmoning (going wrong way in an already existing bike line); careening down the sidewalk the last few feet to get to restaurant (instead of walking the bike like they're supposed to; running red lights; gas mopeds illegally using a bike lane; etc.

Even the most protected bike lines everywhere wouldn't fix the above.

We need better roads for ebikes

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