Electric bikes

[ShawnoftheDread]

@Vicegrip 147727 wrote:

OK now you are messing with me too. Well except the rich, fancy schools and landscaped yard parts. :rolleyes:

And fancy German sports cars!

[hozn]

I support e-bikes, though I have also noticed more of them. And there is one west-bound rider that I cross paths with near Vienna usually that absolutely flies on his e-bike, must be going well over 30mph which feels excessive to me on the trail. Having experienced unpredictability of the slower traffic for many years, my concern there is quite simply that someone might die.

My favorite recent interaction was when culimerc and I were waiting at Gallows Rd on Weds or Thursday and some jackhole on a Spec Turbo rode through the light coming toward us and started yelling at a passing car that “this is a 35 zone not a 65!”. I pointed out that it was “also a red light”. I gathered from his mocking and explitive response that he didn’t quite appreciate the humor of that situation the way we did. I suppose I could have also pointed out that his bike was also illegal on the trail, though I would prefer that regulation not be enforced in the general case.

[OneEighth]

@ShawnoftheDread 147731 wrote:

And fancy non-Bavarian German sports cars!

Fixed it for ya

[Judd]

@Steve O 147720 wrote:

(There are thousands of posts on this forum decrying the behavior of others of all types: drivers, cyclists, dog walkers, ELF owners, joggers, ninjas, pathletes, bus drivers, taxi drivers, segway-istas, Pokemon-Go players, etc. (but not unicycle riders, AFAICR )

Except for this guy below, who totally ruined the Hains Point 100 last year:

[ATTACH=CONFIG]12604[/ATTACH]

[Vicegrip]

@ShawnoftheDread 147731 wrote:

And fancy German sports cars!

Doh! Busted….

[sjclaeys]

Wow, go away for a bit and miss all of this fun, so let’s jump in! How about this? We shouldn’t make general assumptions about e-bike riders. However, we can make general assumptions about e-bikes, namely that they can be operated essentially as electric mopeds in an unsafe way and at speeds well above those of the fastest lycra-naut. So it seems to me that an easy solution is to require e-bikes to have a speed limiter so that it won’t go past 15 mph solely on electric power. If an e-bike rider wants to go faster than that, then they can pedal.

[EasyRider]

I’d think we’ll see posted (and sometimes enforced) speed limits on trails before we see speed governors. Moped speeds are a major selling point for e-bikes.

For the ACPD, at least, enforcement will be focused on quiet Sunday mornings, just like it is for cars. No e-biker will ever be ticketed, since they’ll still be asleep at that hour.

[JorgeGortex]

@jnva 147722 wrote:

There’s been a lot of posts recently about bad behavior on the bike path. I think it’s indicative of the type of people who live in the DC area. I regret raising my kids in this area and plan to retire somewhere else. I can’t wait to get out of here…

I grew up here, in Arlington… I’m not one of THOSE people. Usually the opposite, unless I make a mistake, which I will admit to when it happens. Please don’t generalize.

I do agree that this area does seem to draw a certain type-A personality that hasn’t always been educated in their youth the importance of manners and consideration for others before one’s self. Still you can find that anywhere. And that is why I read this forum because i believe that the kind of positive people I want to meet on the trail, be them faster, slower, eBike, hybrid, unicycle, or N+ enviable road rider, are here sharing ideas. I hope we are out spreading the word through example. I believe you’ve come to the right place too… with the rest of US people.

JG

[lordofthemark]

I could see myself some day getting some kind of e-assist bike. While I am still improving my riding speed and strength, and I am inspired by folks older than me who ride faster and stronger than i do, at some point age will tell, and at least at this point I cannot see wanting to give up the joy of biking.

But. If I could maintain 25MPH uphill, or even consistently on flats, in any wind – there are many streets that I now consider high stress that would be much lower stress in that case. It makes me reflect, what are our increasingly crowded trails for? What is the justification for mixing fast riders with slow riders, joggers, and sometimes very slow walkers? In some ways its like biking on sidewalk issues (where I generally want to focus on the behavior, not the bike, but will make exceptions). It seems that there are more reasons than just discomfort with going slower than motor vehile traffic – some very fast muscle powered riders prefer the trails – some folks are just uncomfortable mixing with traffic at any relative speed – in some cases the only direct parallel route is a 45MPH road (which means traffic at 50MPH +) which I guess is an uncomfortable speed differential even if you are riding at 25MPH +. Most trails have fewer intersections than most roads. On a trail you don’t have to deal with auto exhaust. And trails have views, nature, etc.

But still it seems that IF we get to the point where we need to ration the trail space (and we are close to that on the most popular trails, at the most popular times) then folks riding E assist bikes, or ebikes, should get lower priority, if only because they have better alternatives than others do (though I suppose walkers could use sidewalks – but I don’t think getting walkers banned from the trails is feasible, for several reasons).

[sjclaeys]

@ShawnoftheDread 147731 wrote:

And fancy German sports cars!

They’re almost as bad as those smug fixie riders!

[Dewey]

Just wanted to give a shout out to Doug Smith of WABA for the warm welcome to this ebike rider. I asked to attend a WABA City Cycling class and he assured me ebike riders are welcome to participate. He politely asked if I would turn off the motor during the drills portion of the class, and I was happy to comply, I found the class useful and would point new ebike commuters to the WABA class schedule.

For ebike riders who would like to take out insurance, my auto insurance provider USAA would not extend liability coverage to a motor adapted bicycle, I took out a separate policy with Markel.

For electric bicycle laws People for Bikes put together this summary of US/Canadian regulations.

A special shout out to the lovely people at my local bike shop Papillon cycles on Columbia Pike for removing the bottom bracket from my 20 year old bike so I could install a 250W motor, adjusting my brakes, and adding a wide range cassette to help me get up hills.

[Author]

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