Moto rider here.
Let's be honest, these are eMotos and that distinction needs to be made clear in the nomenclature. Currently both bicycles and motorcycles are using the term "ebike" and that's half of the problem. If it is powered and has a throttle it's a motorcycle, imo.
An eBike, to me, can only be pedal assist.
this post was submitted on 01 Jan 2025
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Thank God they regulated ebikes, I was worried that they were going to come after my SUV /s
Don't worry, your Child Crusher 9000 will be safe from all that mean safety legislation.
This law regulates vehicles with a throttle AKA what most people would consider an electric motorcycle. ebikes (meaning e-bicycles that you need to pedal to move) are unaffected.
Perhaps an unpopular opinion but I think that if it has a throttle and goes faster than 15mph (25kph) then it belongs on the road with cars.
I see where you're coming from, but we also need to consider the mass of these vehicles, not just their speed. Person+bike at 50km/h vs pedestrian at rest means a roughly 1:1 split on the inertia after impact, and a pedestrian accelerated to 25km/h. Car at 50km/h vs person+bike at rest is a 1:10 or 1:20 split in inertia after impact, and rider accelerated to very nearly 50km/h.
IMO sharing a space with pedestrians is the lesser harm outcome if we cannot provide safe infrastructure which separates such vehicles from both cars and pedestrians.
In the Netherlands we have quite good infrastructure for bikes, but e-bikes/scooters going >25kph really fuck up the safety.
I’m with OP, if you want to go that fast you should be in the road.
It's not all about the impact. It's also about the chance or impact. If you're going at that speed on pedestrian zones, you'll eventually hit someone, or be very close to doing so. Pedestrians go in any direction, and can change at any time in an instant. If you go fast, no matter how fast your reflexes are, they won't be fast enough to brake in time on pedestrian zones.
The roads not being safe for non-cars is not the problem for pedestrians. Use the bike lane in those cases.
I find it so weird that some people are fine with vehicles going faster on bicycle lanes (and even worse with pavements for countries that allow that, which I also find weird, where is the pedestrian supposed to go in these cases ?). These fast vehicles make it so annoying and unsafe for other users.
I agree with you that if people want to go fast, well we already have roads for that.
Yeah, I don't think anyone would be advocating for allowing gas powered mopeds traveling at 40kph (25mph) on the sidewalk but when it's electric they somehow feel differently about it. Where ever we draw the line is going to be arbitrary but it needs to be drawn somewhere. I think 25kph (15mph) is a good limit as it's about the speed you can comfortably maintain with an acoustic bike as well. Me plus the bike is around 120kg (250lbs). That's a lot of energy hitting a pedestrian even at 15mph. It'll definitely cripple a grandmom.
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I would even say that a normal bike with a >25km/h drive does not belong in public traffic. You can only put a certain amount of breaking power on a bike.
My radwagon motor tops out at 32kph, I can pedal it up to about 40kph. At 40kph I can stop in 3m on dry tarmac, about 6m in snow.
For comparison, the cars I'm forced to ride with have a 24m braking distance at 40kph, but let's be honest, there's usually doing over 50kph despite the limit, so it's more like 38-55m
Unless you mean trying to do 60 to 0km/h over a few meters is harder to stop without being launched, there is no way there is any notable limit to braking power. I can easily stop in half what a small car can do in any conditions, and less if I hang off the back and squeeze the seat with my thighs really hard to not launch over the bars. I could probably push it even more and do even shorter but it would need a lot more traction and front vs rear weight considerations and wear the tires super fast.
Now teach this to the senior citizens here who have learned to run their ebikes at top speed without having the skills to control it.
And in case you wonder, they brake with the power they remember from riding a normal bike many years ago.
I dunno, I guess its a regional thing. I live between a couple popular areas for downhill. all the old guys I worked with are downhill mtb and road racers. they taught me the advanced braking among other things.
I also don't get the brake memory thing because hydraulic disc brakes on my first adult bike are way stronger than my kid bike rim brakes from when I was in school and I stopped full power and did that front wheel down rear wheel in the air thing on my second or so ride. Even cable brakes on my brother's ebike stop strong but just feel worse.
Maybe it is. We had several issues and accidents here with elder people and ebikes that resulted from loss of control or insufficient brake use. Of course those bikes have hydraulic disc brakes here, too, but my personal theory is that many older riders who grew up with rim brakes are afraid to use modern braking systems because they are so powerful.
So the list of ebikers hitting something (mostly in the dark), running off the road in curves, or hitting people (often in places where they did not belong in the first place, like pedestrian zones) has become a real issue here.
Most of it is either self-inflicted, or accidents with pedestrians where the biker is at fault.
Well, at least it was a free opinion even if it doesn't turn out to be a popular one.
I do not understand why this is being implemented, after reading the article. What's the safety gain to be had here?
It clarifies their class so if an area is limited with no throttle E-bikes it can allow level 1 and 3 instead of only level 1
I imagine it's to stop them being used like motorcycles? Can't say why, maybe it's for registration / taxation purposes?
My nephew is 12 and has one of these with a throttle that can go over 35mph. His parents let him ride it anywhere (fucking irresponsible, but don’t get me started).
The fact is, because it looks like a bicycle, he’s essentially able to ride around like he’s on a motorcycle, even though he’s too young to have a drivers license and has no formal training in rules of the road.
Throttles are a big factor enabling this legal gray market for e mopeds. Without throttles most of these bikes are basically too heavy to ride as a pedelac. This will push the trend back towards lighter, bike-like bikes.
They need to start allowing e-bikes to be registered and plated in CA. The Stark Varg EX is for sale, it's a perfectly capable street legal motorcycle but CA doesn't have Stark as a manufacturer in their system so people can't register it.
thats so dumb too. you would think the manufacturer detail should be freely written/typed out rather than a choice from a list under the assumption that they come and go like any other business. many car makes don't exist any more.
Maybe this is a stupid question, but how does the law treat "improvised" e-bikes which are pedal-powered bicycles with motors added by their owners? They aren't officially in any particular "class". I suppose they're all not street-legal...
I imagine it's one of those things where it's not technically legal, but as long as you're not doing 40 mph on your e-bike you're unlikely to be bothered about it.