Originally Posted by
livedarklions
I agree that now all powered bikes are the same thing, but lines need to be drawn concerned the amounts of power used in the assist, otherwise you're asking to set up a loophole where there's an incentive to market what are essentially motorcycle equivalents with pedals in order to skate licensing, inspection and off-road infrastructure limitations.
I definitely see the use of low-powered ebikes as a social good if it increases the number of people able to or willing to cycle, and sharing bicycle paths and lanes with those vehicles really isn't a problem. When you get into high-powered fast bikes or heavy cargo bikes, then you need to keep those off the bicycle infrastructure.
I'm definitely not going to set myself up as some sort of judge as to what kind of vehicle any person SHOULD ride, that's their call. My interest is solely in whether or not it affects the safety of others.
An e-bike is a pedal bike with assistance it is not something with a throttle that does the work. In the U.S. the limit on an e-bike is 28mph which is not exceptionally fast considering most roadies could exceed that. You can illegally modify it but you can do anything illegal if you should want to, plenty of people in cars speeding all the time what about restrictions on all cars?
I get people's concerns for multi use paths and bicycle specific paths but the issue is not e-bikes at all it is *******s and *******s can ride any bike of any sort from a tricked out tri bike to a Wally-Mart special to an e-bike. However that is the person on the bike not the bike itself.
Yes safety is important but e-bikes are not exceptionally dangerous they are bikes and if you feel bikes are dangerous, maybe a bicycle forum isn't quite for you. The padded room forum probably is taking new members? Anything you do is dangerous in some way or another but if you use your brain those activities aren't so dangerous. As a human you should be spatially aware and that doesn't mean constantly in fear but just know what is going on around you and react as needed.