Several old friends came to visit my wife for her birthday. She wanted to ride on a nearby trail, a 5km ride. One friend hadn't biked in 20 years, and was not really wanting to ride that far.
So my wife leant her friend the e-bike, and took an old hybrid bike. The friend was blown away: "this is sooo much fun!".
That's what #ebikes can do. People who just aren't interested in biking get to have fun on a bike again.
From the perspective of a non-technical user, an e-bike that is built and designed to use a motor will generally be superior to a regular bike turned into an e-bike with a conversion set.
At least in Finland conversion sets are fairly rare. Arguably there are obvious issues with the vendor lock-in that major brands like Bosch push on their users, but the reliability is okay and there are certified maintenance shops. #ebikes
"At this fair, instead of pony rides, games of chance and fried food, visitors took electric bicycles and scooters for a spin, watched cooking #demonstrations on #InductionStoves, and learned about other ways to make their homes and lives more climate-friendly."
My town has one every year: it's a party. People bring their EVs (two and four wheeled) for show and tell. Vendors have a showcase. There's food and music, and lots of people.
"Electric vehicles as a whole displaced about 1.5m barrels of oil a day globally in 2022, according to Bloomberg. Two-thirds of that – almost 1m barrels a day – was just from electric bikes and mopeds, which are known as electric micromobility."
Die Zahl der Diebstähle von E-Bikes und Pedelecs in Niedersachsen hat sich in den vergangenen drei Jahren verdoppelt. Mehr als 30.000 Fahrräder wurden laut Kriminalstatistik im Jahr 2023 gestohlen - darunter auch Tausende E-Bikes und Pedelecs.
Pro Jahr gibt es an deutschen Bahnhöfen etwa 2.700 Fundräder. Die Deutsche Bahn bewahrt diese mindestens zehn Wochen lang auf - dann werden sie versteigert. Dabei kommen sogar E-Bikes unter den Hammer.
other than market #enshitification or bias toward absence of real hills and cargo, why are there no #eBikes with both crank+hub drive motors combined?
Hub motors give smooth power and regen braking but can't gear down for steep slopes. Getting started with the crank drive gets the hub up to an effective speed without putting so much force through the chain (and human-scaled cassette) while the hub bridges the shifting gaps. Regen braking greatly reduces brake pad maintenance & extends range.
@jef that was my original plan for the bakfiets, but I like keeping the rear light so I can lift it and wheelbarrow around obstacles. The longtail has a similar ability to lift the front wheel and pivot. Spreading the traction to both wheels might be worth the added front weight for some applications but I think you need a fairly large geared hub motor to get good regen braking.
searching for e-bike recommendations for my disabled ass, that won't break the bank and have an amount of cargo capacity even if it's like a few bags of groceries (more is better, i'm a disaster)? I need to nearly-never pedal and especially not up any hills or anything
"Finally, we find that even when #eBikes incentive programs are designed cost-effectively, the costs per ton of #CO2 reduced still far exceed those of alternatives or reasonable social costs of GHG emissions. We conclude that the argument for allocating public funds for e-bike incentive programs must be based on the co-benefits of e-bike travel and ownership, and not solely on GHG reduction" (like the 40k/yr people killed with cars, injuries, asthma & sedentary diseases)
Or we could account for the cost of driving as simply road wear and maintenance, plus the high cost of housing for cars (through subsidizing car parking, mandatory parking requirements, that non-drivers pay in their rent and groceries, anywhere that charges below market rent for parking spaces.) Or, who pays for all of the space between destinations, that makes it too far to walk?
“Bicycle deaths in New York City hit a 23-year high in 2023, according to new data from the NYC Department of Transportation. Of the 30 cyclists who died last year, 23 were riding electric bikes. “
So I looked up the article, and that is all it says; that’s the entire thing. Nothing about how they died, just that they died.
It seems that the #NYTimes is having a War on Bikes, especially #eBikes, and I wonder why.
I’m going to assume these bicyclists were hit by cars (not an unreasonable assumption), so why is the #NYTimes framing it that #eBikes are somehow dangerous, and not #cars?
One final thought (well, maybe 2), but does anyone ever notices that the word “crash” is almost never in the reporting, and 2) when these things are reported, they never mention that there are #DRIVERS in the #car; but sure, #bicyclists are keeling over dead.
It’s really weird how the #NYTimes can shift-blame everything in such a short blurb.
a tilting steering trike with suspension, that you've never heard of because it has a 250W motor and 16in front wheels. #eBikes carrying this much load need more power and gear range than a pencil sharpener, and regen braking. (but you can lock the tilting from the handlebar, so that's cool for low-speed stuff.)
@acdha let's make the outside lanes of every 4-lane urban street into bus/bike-and-turn-only while we're trying to figure out how fast the e-bikes are allowed to go
the removable locking tote on each side of the frame is super cool, but the removal locking is over-complicated, just put a latch lever inside the locked box.
If you way underestimate the climate benefits of #eBikes, subsidizing them is still a good deal. (Does driving cost society more than $0.02/mile? Yes, by a factor of 100 at least, but that also seems like a super low cost for the carbon. They say reforestation would be more cost-effective, but lately the forests burn up a lot.)
In Bloomberg CityLab, I wrote about a new study that explores the power (and limits) of e-bike rebates.
TLDR: E-bike incentives can compel more people to ride (especially those with moderate/low incomes), unlocking benefits for public health, street efficiency, and urban quality of life. But they're an inefficient way to fight climate change.
I think that from a local administration point of view, investing in bikes with the only objective of reducing CO2 emissions would be very short-sighted. I would love to see if this could affect traffic ( and so public space use) more than everything. Moreover an investment as such would work best accompanied to infrastructure improvement towards active mobility, is this happening too?
@davidzipper this conclusion only accounts for the cost of carbon emissions and likely way underpriced, besides my experience that e-bike miles each displaced 3 car miles, and the safety-in-numbers impact where each person on a bike encourages others to ride.
Dismantling car supremacy has way more climate impact than your individual car's co2 emissions
"[at $51/2500 miles] an individual e-bike would need to replace over 200,000 miles of car travel..."
In the last five years, #eBikes caused only 3.8% as many injuries as bathrooms. Wear your bathroom #helmets, and shame your friends and family until they stop taking baths
@enobacon I have no skin in any e-bike safety debate, but my skin crawls when I see nonsense statistics.
Only about 7% of Americans use an e-bike at least once a month (according to YouGov), and they likely use them a lot less often than they use the bathroom. Also, bathroom injuries happen disproportionately to people with disabilities or the elderly, because it can be wet and slippery, have sharp corners and edges, and is often visited during the night when balance isn't at its best).
"As currently written, HB 4103:
...would restrict some of the most affordable #eBike styles to [16yo and up]
...[allows localities to] ban the use of certain e-bikes from accessing multi-use paths and trails
...Enforcement based on e-bike class will be highly subjective and confusing for users
...Misses the mark on providing a clear definition... [cargo / 4 wheels, bigger motors]"
@cy the legislative emergency is a formality that allows it to start on passage instead of next fiscal/legislative year or something. It's still just a task force / study group, nobody is being granted an emergency e-bike dispenser or anything.
@Edelruth My family have one of each, which we use for groceries and family trips with two little kids. I generally prefer the basket-up-front model: it's nice to be able to see the kids, and to be able to chuck a bunch of stuff in the basket without having to pack it into paniers.
