Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The popularity of e-bikes isn’t slowing down

nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 599 posts

Re: The popularity of e-bikes isn’t slowing down

#51

Post by criddell »

zwieback wrote: post #26

I'm a year-round non-e-bike commuter in Oregon. I love e-bikes but until you can ride without getting soaked it'll be successful only part of the year in most of the US. We need something between the e-bike and golf-cart style EVs to fill the gap, some kind of sophisticated fairing or a 3 wheel format that isn't super dorky.

> until you can ride without getting soaked it'll be successful only part of the year in most of the US

I'm in Austin, TX and get soaked for a different reason - sweat. We get about 3 months of 100 degree days. I'd love a golf-cart EV with good A/C.

Re: The popularity of e-bikes isn’t slowing down

#52

Post by notatoad »

zwieback wrote: post #26

I'm a year-round non-e-bike commuter in Oregon. I love e-bikes but until you can ride without getting soaked it'll be successful only part of the year in most of the US. We need something between the e-bike and golf-cart style EVs to fill the gap, some kind of sophisticated fairing or a 3 wheel format that isn't super dorky.

i live in a place that's not quite as rainy as oregon, but the combination of proper full-coverage fenders and bike paths where i'm not getting splashed by cars means there's only a couple days a year where i'm going to get "soaked" and am going to choose not to ride.

biking in the rain mostly sucks because of splashback from the road. once you've eliminated that, it's no worse than walking in the rain.

Re: The popularity of e-bikes isn’t slowing down

#54

Post by joshlemer »

parineum wrote: post #27
paulgb wrote: post #4

The thing that excites me most about e-bikes is that they change the politics around cycling. Proponents of efforts to make roads safer for cyclists have always gotten pushback from people who think that cycling is a niche hobby of rich lycra-clad yuppies. With e-bikes becoming more common, I know a number of people who would not have touched a bike share but are using it as a replacement for Uber/Lyft rides. People…

I support the efforts to make cities more friendly to cyclist traffic but the increased popularity of both ebikes and electric scooters in downtown areas has made life as a pedestrian and a motorist stressful, especially around closing time. All the things that annoy me about cyclists (running stop signs when driving in the street and driving on the sidewalk are my two biggest annoyances) have gotten worse. Cycling a…

I thought this video addressed nicely this criticism of cyclists https://youtu.be/HT_KdFCVEdc

Re: The popularity of e-bikes isn’t slowing down

#55

Post by TulliusCicero »

parineum wrote: post #27
paulgb wrote: post #4

The thing that excites me most about e-bikes is that they change the politics around cycling. Proponents of efforts to make roads safer for cyclists have always gotten pushback from people who think that cycling is a niche hobby of rich lycra-clad yuppies. With e-bikes becoming more common, I know a number of people who would not have touched a bike share but are using it as a replacement for Uber/Lyft rides. People…

I support the efforts to make cities more friendly to cyclist traffic but the increased popularity of both ebikes and electric scooters in downtown areas has made life as a pedestrian and a motorist stressful, especially around closing time. All the things that annoy me about cyclists (running stop signs when driving in the street and driving on the sidewalk are my two biggest annoyances) have gotten worse. Cycling a…

That's generally because of terrible infrastructure. Lanes designed for cars are everywhere. Most cities, sidewalks are just about everywhere.

What percentage of streets have physically separated lanes for biking, the way we have them for walking?

Bikes don't fit well with pedestrians or cars, and painted bike lanes are a joke -- imagine if you replaced every sidewalk with "painted walk lanes".

In places where there is good infrastructure, like the Netherlands, cyclist reputations for behaving badly are basically no different from pedestrian or motorist reputations.

Re: The popularity of e-bikes isn’t slowing down

#56

Post by silicon2401 »

rcMgD2BwE72F wrote: post #22
multjoy wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you remove the speed limiter you are riding an electric motorcycle, which needs to be somewhere other than with pedestrians and cyclists.

>with pedestrians Do some cities actually let cyclists bike on sidewalks? I bike 24/7 but this seems crazy. Bicycles needs their own, separate, protected paths, at the road level. Period.

I live in a city that explicitly allows cyclists to bike on sidewalks, and I'd never bike otherwise. One time I tried road-riding the mere 15m home from the gym and had 3 close calls from drivers. We also have separate, protected paths at the road level. Anybody who wants me to ride on the road can send me a blank check to cover medical expenses in the case of an accident if they are so invested in my riding according to their preferences.

Re: The popularity of e-bikes isn’t slowing down

#57

Post by TulliusCicero »

FridayoLeary wrote: post #40

The politics now are about banning ice. The electric cars being more expensive makes this discriminatory against low earners. I wonder if it would be far more effective to ban large suv's (uk). Of course e bikes and scooters are the way forward in cities.

Electric cars are rapidly approaching the point where they're actually cheaper than ICE cars, due to lower operating costs. As they scale up, they may well become cheaper up front, too.

Re: The popularity of e-bikes isn’t slowing down

#58

Post by stefan_ »

jacquesm wrote: post #19
paiute wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I love mine, I think it opens up some opportunities to work on relations with cars and pedestrians. I feel less in the way when I can maintain a better speed up hill. and on trails it's not a burden to slow down when passing pedestrians on foot. Nothing is worse than a bike whizzing by when you don't expect it. I just wish they'd remove those stupid speed limiters.

Those speed limiters are indeed stupid, especially because on a 'regular' bike you can fairly easily outrun a normal e-bike (though probably not for as long unless you are in very good shape). Normal ones should be limited at 35 or so and speed-pedelecs at 50 Kph so you don't end up holding up other traffic. Where I live a speed-pedelec has to be in traffic but it isn't allowed to go as fast as that traffic, which cr…

It's intentional to limit these to $regular_speed - 5km/h, same as with mopeds. I assume it's so you are converted to a real vehicle (car) by virtue of being assaulted on the roads by those driving them?

I certainly don't agree with 35km/h on bike paths. The current 25km/h is plenty and given their popularity with older ages, already producing outsized numbers of injuries and deaths.

Re: The popularity of e-bikes isn’t slowing down

#59

Post by gnarcoregrizz »

notacoward wrote: post #36
paulgb wrote: post #4

The thing that excites me most about e-bikes is that they change the politics around cycling. Proponents of efforts to make roads safer for cyclists have always gotten pushback from people who think that cycling is a niche hobby of rich lycra-clad yuppies. With e-bikes becoming more common, I know a number of people who would not have touched a bike share but are using it as a replacement for Uber/Lyft rides. People…

> they change the politics around cycling While I agree with e-bikes being a generally good thing, I also think they involve a lot of secondary consequences and we still need to figure out the best solutions. For example, having more e-bikes on the already overcrowded bike path near where I live is becoming a disaster . There had already been enough problems with mismatched speeds, impatience on all sides, etc. There…

Maybe the problem is that bike paths are too small? Cars are granted 12 feet per-lane, often with multiple lanes.

Re: The popularity of e-bikes isn’t slowing down

#60

Post by Robotbeat »

missedthecue wrote: post #46
Robotbeat wrote: post #31

They also don’t last as long (miles-wise, possibly time-wise as well?), so you may have the same person buying multiple bikes over time when the first one wears out or breaks or is stolen. Usually for electric cars, the vehicle enters the used market and doesn’t leave (for the junkyard) until 15-20 years and 200,000 miles later.

Are there any 20 year old electric cars?

There are 20 year old used hybrid-electric cars, which work exactly the same way. Older Priuses are still around. I found several used 2002 Priuses (have to go to Japan to find earlier, I think). (Although Prius didn’t really start selling a lot until the 2004 refresh.) https://www.edmunds.com/inventory/srp.html?make=toyota&model...

People regular go hundreds of thousands of miles on their used Priuses.

I own a 2012 Leaf and a 2013 Tesla that I intend to drive for another 6-10 years. Both work great. (Also selling a 2012 Volt which is fantastic but doesn’t have enough seats so I’m selling.)

Post reply on HN