ITT: old people that have had one bad experience with bikes and ebikes, but know they can’t ban bikes anymore so they go after ebikes. Probably knowing several or more people who have either been injured or killed in car accidents.
Pedestrians, bikes, and ebikes are all on the same side: making sidewalks and bikelanes bigger and safer for a more walkable city without cars. Especially in car centric american cities where no normal person will ride a normal bike up steep hills or extraordinarily long commutes where ebikes excel. Or towing gear and groceries.
I don’t live in NY, but I used to drive everywhere because the buses are slow AF (1hr+ to go less than seven miles) and I’m not walking 14+ miles up hills to see friends and family. Ebikes are used here to get up steep 18-28% grade hills. Because of ebikes, I’m able to run errands that I used to have to drive to, for pennies in electricity instead of $70 in gas and $30 in parking. The vast majority of all bikers stick to the bike lanes where available and obey the 15mph limits unless they are in lycra. But lycra types aren’t riding ebikes anyways, lol. Incredibly, one of our family friends got pulled over for getting clocked at 40mph on a traditional road bike.
It’s really annoying, though. If I ride in the street, I get honked at by cars for “going too slow” as the ebike can only do 20mph sustained. If there are no bike lanes, biking on the sidewalk is the only safe option on stroads and 35mph bridges. There’s this massive gap in infrastructure where bikes usually get tossed the scraps of “just use the bridge sidewalk even though it’s only 24 inches wide”.
Cars routinely park in the bike lanes here, too, forcing most riders into the street because of Amazon drivers or people pulling into hotels and putting their hazards on. Some riders specifically avoid the bike lanes here because they get the worst lights at traffic stops (eg, one 15 second light every few minutes while cars and pedestrians get green lights and crosswalks for much more time, incentivizing people to ride with cars or crosswalks).
I think the most relevant solution is to significantly step up funding to ensure that most roads have wide sidewalks and generous, barrier-protected bike lanes where people cannot get doored and landscaping isolates pedestrians from the bike lanes. If Japan, France, and the Netherlands can do it, so can we.
Damages From PFAS Lawsuits Could Surpass Asbestos, Industry Lawyers Warn - The New York Times (Free article) (www.nytimes.com)
Was this considered 'piracy' back in the day? (lemmy.zip)
Back when we would record onto VHS, is that considered piracy? Found a super bowl XXXI tape from my Uncle circa 1997. I’m curious lol....
EU ministers fume as ‘outrageous’ Hungary yet again blocks military aid for Ukraine (www.politico.eu)
A large number of EU resolutions on Ukraine are being blocked by Hungary, said Lithuanian Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis....
The NYTimes is once again trashing the most promising mobility innovation of the 21st century (lemmy.ml)
Link to original Tweet: x.com/DavidZipper/status/1795048724021862898