Comment by mikepurvis
4 years ago
At a certain point, you've added enough extra mass to the vehicle in terms of batteries, motor, beefed up brakes and frame, etc that you need to start asking questions about how much kinetic energy it's carrying and what happens to it all in case of a crash.
Silly comparison, but we wouldn't let a car drive on the sidewalk even if it had a special module that limited it to 5km/h.
The weight of the bike + rider is still well below what some riders weigh all by themselves. Compared to a scooter it's a featherweight, compared to a regular e-bike it's about a 5 Kg premium.
> Silly comparison, but we wouldn't let a car drive on the sidewalk even if it had a special module that limited it to 5km/h.
We do in the UK - it's perfectly normal for cars (including police cars) to mount and drive along the pavement, before being left there
Same in practically every European country I’ve been to.
And it’s not like it doesn’t happen in the US either. Most residential streets don’t have sidewalks in the first place so technically parking in front of a house without a curb or lane is the exact equivalent. Just because it isn’t explicitly marked as a sidewalk doesn’t mean it isn’t treated as one when it’s the only option.
There has been some talk of changing the law on that, although I can’t see how that would work in many streets.
Same in China. Doesn’t matter if they are allowed to park there or not.
Yes. Maybe a stopping-distance requirement. Many "e-bikes" are under-braked and under-tired for their speed and mass.
Big-tire "e-bikes" with disk brakes are really light motorcycles. Forget the pedals and admit it.
I completely agree— electric fat bikes are totally a fun time, but I think they really land in an odd place when it comes to where they belong on the road. They're likely too bulky and heavy to be in the bike lane, but shouldn't really be in the car lane given their speed limit. And the speed limit shouldn't really be dropped without imposing licensing, and once you're there, there's no point— it's just an electric motorcycle.
I have a fairly large cargo e-bike; it weighs 75lbs. I weigh 200lbs. I'm sure you'd feel a difference being hit by me that rather than me on my 18lb road bike, but I go faster on my road bike except when climbing.
I'd love an Electric Hot-Tub Bakfiets, but the batteries don't last long, they aren't very maneuverable, and they spill a lot around corners.
Those things are amazing. Here are a few photos I took of a dude in Amsterdam riding a bakfiets carrying an outdoor urinal.
https://imgur.com/a/nq2rnBW
Yeah, there's an argument to be made somewhere here about banning obese people from running. :P
There’s an order of magnitude between a 2 ton vehicle and a 250 pound vehicle+rider.
Cars also have huge blind spots and if a bike rider gets in an accident, it’s usually very painful for them too, so their incentives to avoid accidents are quite high.
Okay, then take away the blind spots and some of the mass and ask the same question— why don't we allow motorcycles to drive on the sidewalk or multiuse paths assuming they pinky swear to always go really slowly?
Seriously? 1. Motorbikes weigh at least 10 times as much as bicycles, and can't be picked up any moved around by the rider 2. Motorbikes are much wider than bicycles 3. Motorbikes can accelerate much faster than bicycles 4. Motorbikes emit noise and exhaust fumes 5. Motorbikes have a much larger turning radius than bicycles 6. Motorbikes are capable of keeping up with cars and therefore have no need to be on bike lanes.
Probably a lot more reasons as well.
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