Comment by vineyardmike
4 years ago
I love the idea of e-bikes and would love to be able to use them and not need a car (which i don't own), but i just don't feel safe using them in US cities... NYC has too much traffic, SF has too many hills, Seattle is too wet.
I wish there was more alt-transit for commuter scale transportation to get around without a car, but the autonomy of not using a bus. Scooters seem promising but they're a pain on the roads (with laws banning use on sidewalks), and i've heard horror stories of how unsafe they were.
I feel like the ideal form factor is a pallet dolly: You have a handle, its wide so its comfortable to stand without balancing, and you can ride in the road confident a car can see you and not run you off.
You can always come up with a million reasons not to do something. Plenty of people bike safely in NYC, SF, and Seattle.
You don’t have to wish for an alt-transit solution that’s not a bus. Bikes exist. The more people who ride them the safer and more normalized they get.
I’ve bicycled (conservatively) 7,5000 or so urban/downtown miles over the past decade or so in Portland, OR. I get wet, I get sweaty, I get tired, I get into the occasional close call with cars, I get scared.
My biggest tips are: don’t buy a bunch of gear at once. Buy 1 thing at a time once you figure out what you might like. Ride slower, it’s not a race. If you get too scared, pull of the road, walk your bike, and take a break — I still do it even after a decade of riding.
> Plenty of people bike safely in NYC, SF, and Seattle.
Oh i know and power to them. Personally, i'm very clumsy and not very balanced, so i don't feel like i'd be comfortable riding in the city. I've rode a bike around silicon valley a bit, and it was fine.. most of the time.
I used to bike a lot in youth, (mostly on bike paths for fun), and for sure i know that a mostly-bike/ped environment feels much safer.
> The more people who ride them the safer and more normalized they get.
This is why i've been keeping an Ebike in the back of my mind (and hoping for alternatives to emerge). I'm hopeful for a future where cars are second-class citizens on urban streets.
Maybe i'll try biking around my neighborhood this spring, and see if I can get used to it.
(BTW thanks for the tips :) )
> i've heard horror stories of how unsafe they were
Wait, scooters are not a thing in the USA? As in, obscure enough that the closest experience you have is "heard horror stories" and that's it?
I feel like every second person here (Netherlands) owned one, or perhaps rather, at least I would expect every teenager to know someone with a scooter. I personally never saw the appeal but then I also hate cycling (too much work, can't transport groceries well at all, and you get wet) so I consider myself an outlier anyhow.
Electric Scooters (the kind you stand on, like Bird) are very very common in US cities.
The small wheels mean it’s easy to get knocked around whenever you hit any small side walk bump.
Oh those! To me a scooter is a thing you sit on, pull the handlebar and get to 45km/h (30mi/h), and typically using gasoline (though electric ones are becoming more of a thing). In dutch we call the other things "step" because you, y'know, step to go forwards.
These electric stepless steps, to me, seem mostly dangerous depending on the driver. They're in a number of cities here now and I almost killed one of them because they were coming out from behind a tree at full speed, and I was driving less even than the speed limit (50km/h) because I was approaching a crossing, but I didn't see nobody and this person just flashed by right in front of me. They could have seen me coming but I couldn't really have seen them, so that's just stupidity on their part (even if likely I'd have been responsible because they went straight, if on the sidewalk because the actual street was closed for construction, and I was turning off and so should give right of way also to pedestrians). Also on dashcam videos online you see similar stupidity, i.e. them driving on a part of the road where cars are also allowed, not considering other vehicles at all, but it's outliers by and large. If you're a responsible 'step' scooter driver, you'll be fine.
I used to live in Seattle and a personal scooter is where it's at. Plus, it's impossible to look like more of a dweeb than the tech people riding electric unicycles.
It's great for 8 months of the year at least.
Hills are the reason to get an e-bike! I live in the Texas hill country and that's why I've thought of one.