https://nitter.net/mrlevine/status/1696597364751081575
"Bikes are unsafe" says Mike of the Ford company, known for its "ChildCrusher (tm)" trucks.
I'd rather my kid cruise around on an e-bike than kill someone in it's Maibatsu Monstrosity.
Look.
Just because pedestrian deaths went up 70% between 2010 and 2021, much of which is attributed to light trucks, and just because trucks have gotten significantly larger and more geared towards NOT doing the things they were designed for, that doesn't mean Mike here is a clueless jackass who is also complicit in making life more unsafe for pedestrian-wait
I think there's some merit to this, but:
-Saying teens should just ride regular bikes in a country that, for the most part, has shit cycling infrastructure and a car-centric culture that is hostile towards sharing the road with cyclists is a non-starter, unless you are also advocating for changing that.
-If you want to whine about how dangerous it is for teens to ride e-bikes that can go over 20mph then surely you would have a problem with the states that allow teens to drive vehicles that can go much faster than that and cause way more damage to those involved in an accident with them.
cars, dead pedestrians, unwalkable cities and communities, >42,000 deaths/year from car accidents in the US: freedom
threats to car manufacturers' net worth: danger
I commute in my child crusher™ gigatruck that somehow has a worse mpg than if I were to chug diesel and walk the same distance by foot
ebikes are 'gay' or something idk
Oh man, when I was growing up, kids used to ride all sorts of weird things, like fucking gassed up go-karts. An e-bike would have been a relief.
Yeah, kids were all about the terribly, terribly illegal petrol scooters, though I was a bit young for that fad.
Speaking as a curmudgeon, “Today’s Teens” will inevitably find a way to use any new technology for something stupid and dangerous, judging an invention by its misuse is the definition of bad faith.
Car accidents are famously a negligible cause of death amongst teenagers
On the flip side: some old dude ended up in the hospital because he rode his ebike into the back of my husband's car. No helmet, didn't even attempt to brake, bystander said it looked like the dude even sped up before the collision. We even declined the cop's offer to issue the dude a citation. Insurance auto defaulted to finding the car driver at fault. Inattentive morons on ebikes are still inattentive morons.
I have nothing against ebikes, but I think they deserve stricter safety requirements like required helmets and better brakes.
Insurance auto defaulted to finding the car driver at fault
You know what to do comrades, get to biking!
So let me get this straight: a police officer offered to provide paperwork proving the other party at fault for the collision, you said no, the insurance company sided with the party you chose to absolve of guilt, and you have a problem with that?
ACAB but when the pigs are involved, you need to make the system work for you.
I didn't feel like being vindictive to a person that was about to be fucked up, down, and sideways with hospital bills because of this shit hole country's healthcare system.
Okay, then change design and zoning to make bycicle transportation feasible for more people.
"we can't because biking isn't currently feasible for enough people." –local politicians
rinse, lather, repeat.
How many children were killed by collisions with Ford vehicles last year?
That's not really an argument against e-bikes though, it's an argument for lowering the maximum speed they're allowed to reach using assistance from the motor.
The problem here is if you live in a place with hills and want bike paths to be major transportation pathways that serve double-digit percentages of the population, you need to.
Grandma is not cycling unpowered for 10 min up a 10 degree incline to get to the shops, even if she can in principle do that. As long as speed limits are enforced, it's fine to have a motor.
Grandma is not cycling unpowered for 10 min up a 10 degree incline to get to the shops, even if she can in principle do that.
You know who is, though? Joe Biden.
You know who else is?
What difference does it make if e-bikes are restricted to a speed that the average "analog" bike can easily do though?
A better solution might be capping the power output of the rider and motor combined at something like 300W (ie a good sustained effort for a strong cyclist), and disabling power assist if the rider breaks that threshold.
This is almost exactly what is done in the country I live in and it seems to work, the only difference being that it's capped at 250w rather than 300w
So that's what I was trying to say, but I should have been clearer lol
Reasons why E bikes are actually better than presented here
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My knees like the support of E-bikes, after having argued against them for more than a decade for similar reasons to yours.
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I also take them when I am exhausted, since I can tune in some support if I need it.
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My friend with MS does use her E-bike and when that isn't possible her electrical wheelchair.
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I use the bike even for hilly and steep routes since then I can add a bit power
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I have more control over when I get to some points, meaning that I ride the bike more (since I can add/reduce the power that is supplied by the motor)
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long trecks and tours are much easier with a group of five when everyone got E-bikes (as long as no wheel gets hurt). In our case that involved kids who we normally had to curate routes for very well. Now we have an ease of use that wasn't there before.
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the overall product quality of the E-bike is higher and that means it is much easier to ride and the components do last longer than what I would've bought instead. The maintenance though is slightly more expensive.
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driving in cities is much less a problem since I am not angry having to stop in front of signals and also getting speed is much faster, meaning I can cut a few minutes from most distances
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transporting heavy things is actually much easier (this includes material from shops, food, but also bike trailers for kids
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I feel much more save with E-bikes next to cars. For various reasons, one is that the base speed I got is good and when I use a short muscle power burst I can get the 28-33km/h that are at tempo 30 zones usual. Couldn't ride that speed the whole distance though.
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I just use the bike much more than my non E-bike during similar times and get more distance covered with it.
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Yeah, even on an E-bike...going over 35km with motor is getting dicey. Luckily where we are they are already illegal (though the government is looking at moving to slightly more permissive NZ standards that allow 300w motors up to 30kph.
20mph
Omg this is so dangerous, I am so much safer with a 2 tons machine that goes 180mph and needs the driver to pass a exam that a monkey would pass.
I wish a monkey could pass the test, then maybe I'd be able to. I keep failing it because I'm disabled. That's why I need and love accessible infrastructure.
Also, it's not particularly hard to reach that speed on an acoustic bike.
modified to go more than 20 mph
Pretty sure e-scooters can do that without modification already
