BillRS22

I see a lot of teens zooming around the paved trails in our local parks. They are clipping along pretty good. We had to pedal when we were kids. I am SO jealous. Bill

raqball

I'm 57-years old and still enjoy riding my bike.. I am slower now but that's okay as I ride for the fitness / exercise aspect and for the views.. If there comes a time where I can't pedal anymore or the amount I can pedal is seriously diminished then I'd consider an eBike to help me along.

I think eBikes are fine for the most part but I don't want one until I absolutely need one..

indyfabz

Ah...But how many more people will be getting in theirs cars to drive to trails to ride their eBikes when they otherwise would have stayed at home absent those bikes?

dedhed

Your part of the state is all about making every road an ATV/UTV route

phughes

Considering you have only ridden the path a couple of times in seven years calls into question the worthiness of any discussion of any of it. I sort of figured initially that it was a place you rode often.

Reflector Guy

Where I ride, the e-bikes aren't even allowed as per the rules... "No motorcycles, no motorized bicycles or gas- or electric-assisted cycles of any kind". But there they are. I suspect sometime soon the rules will be amended to allow them. The bike shops who support the path (monetarily, advertising, volunteering, etc) sell a LOT of e-bikes and they aren't going to sit by and see them get banned.

The other day, I followed a guy for more than a couple miles and he never pedaled one time. I decided to watch and see how far he went before needing to pedal again.... I couldn't keep up. He was much faster than me; I was completely out of steam. But hey, at least he's not in a car I suppose.

Maelochs

This thread is @rydabent-approved.

icemilkcoffee 

I rode an e-bike once and it was a lot of fun. BUT at some point people will learn that there is insufficient bone loading and you'll end up wearing your hips out. This is already an issue with bicycling. E-bike just exacerbates this problem.

msu2001la

My neighbor's teenage kid drives a 400+ HP car that will go 150mph+, but sure... age and speed limits for e-bikes because they're so dangerous and what not.

howsteepisit

I have to say I am not wild about the e-bikes, but there are OK I guess. It seems to me they are a much cleaner motor-driven bike. Now those 2 cycle motor-driven bicycle conversions, those I detest. The pollution aspect is obscene.

But on the grander scale, it seems to me like over the 40 years or so there have been many new ways to move about. Following skateboards (more like 60 years ago)roller blades, dryland skis, scooters, sit-down scooters, mobility cards, gold carts, longboards, and so on. The competition of road and path space is ever widening, all with different speeds and styles. I guess the real solution is for people to just accept there are and will be for more different users of roads, walkways, and paths, and we all need to calm down and accept that it's gonna be different.

KPREN

prj71 I am calling your bluff. Too many of your posts are just like the first post. Something about e bikes that you have never seen before. I don't believe is happened. I think you came up with a plausible scenario to spread more e bike dislike. I get that you don't like my e bike. I live near an urban area and ride the bike paths nearly every day. I see 90% old people and very few young people on e bikes. To the young, e bikes are grandma and grandpa and not cool. I fit that bill. I don't need to ride and e bike, I have a car, I ride an e bike because they are fun.
So from one Yooper to another, I ain't buying your bill of goods this time.

downhillmaster

I have yet to see someone on an ebike with such poor riding skills that they actually ran into another cyclist. I am sure it has happened but it has to be few and far between. Just like regular cyclists occasionally colliding, it happens. Pretty sure if you have basic riding skills and hold a line you will never collide with an ebike so not really sure what your rant is about?

3alarmer 

.
...I was doing one of my regular routes along the river MUP here, and took the fork that goes behind the almond factory, and straight into town for some reason I forget now.

Coming out of town , headed straight for me, was some sort of organized "group E" event. besides every sort of e-bike, from the small wheeled scooter types, to the fat tired motorcycle imitations, there were also people on e-scooters, e-skateboards, those "wheel' things with a platform that tilts as a speed control, and a wide single wheel amidships, and possibly some alternate e-thing I missed. It was very educational, must have been 40 or 50 of them, all younger than 30, probably living in Midtown, and it had kind of a Harley club ride feel to it.

Some of them are very problematic, and few bother with helmets. If I discount the extra costs to our shared medical system, and stay out of their way, it's probably a self limiting problem in the longer term.

It is a little frustrating, given how hard the cycling community worked in establishing the American River parkway trail system as dedicated to motorless transportation. But they snuck in the back door, pretending to be bicycles. Pretty sure that it will take some deaths out there to get any change of policy. But it's still safer than riding the city streets, at least on weekdays.

3alarmer 

...I am pretty experienced, so can usually get out of their way. But our MUP is also a favorite pedestrian walking area. I worry about them.

Koyote

Sooo much wrongness (or potential wrongness) in this post...

Did you stop and take a medical history from each of these youngsters in order to make sure that they don't have physical conditions that would make acoustic bikes challenging?

There's this thing called "bike commuting." It's the motivation for the overwhelming majority of cycling, worldwide.

So what?


The biggest question is: if you're such a serious cyclist, why on Earth are you riding 40 miles on a MUP?

3alarmer 

...my city was early into the e-bike fad, and that's more or les how it went here. It went from "no motors' to "they're just bicycles" in the space of a year. There are limited resources for enforcement of the rules out there, and they were quickly overwhelmed.

prj71

Lol. You aren't wrong. But that's a whole 'nuther can of worms!!!

Pretty much all of the roads that aren't state Highways are open to them damn things now. Doesn't even make sense...Drive around a $15k UTV bar to bar on the SAME EXACT ROADS you can drive a car on.

prj71

I ride it a handful of times every summer for the past 7 years. This past weekend was my 4th time there since May. Probably won't be back anymore this year now.

prj71

That's fine if you don't buy my bill of goods. I've been out and about riding long enough and in many different places to notice the change. In addition to this paved bike path I ride, I've been on some local rail trails including a famous one in SD this past summer. It's been about the same everywhere. I see more youngs than olds riding e-bikes on the multi-use trails. Stopped at the local MTB trail over the weekend and visited with a bunch of 20 somethings riding one of these on the trail...

https://onewheel.com/?nbt=nb%3Aadwor...SAAEgK6dvD_BwE

prj71

Of course not, but statistically you know well as I do that they don't. It's not that hard to figure out.

The MUP I was on is a scenic recereational trail connecting a few small towns that have restaurants etc. to stop at. These aren't trails for commuting to the store or to work.

I mix it up. My girl and I like to ride these trails a couple of times a year for something different to do and then we patronize the local establishments for food, drink and music. Most of my road biking is done right from house and I also mountain bike and fat bike in the winter a lot. I put on about 5k year between the disciplines. I would say I'm a serious cyclist.

SpedFast

I have seen them chasing pedestrians off sidewalks. I have had them play chicken with me when I am in the right. No, I have nothing against ebikes. I love my motorcycle. But there are rules of the road and lots of idiots out there, in all walks of life.

phughes

Oh, okay... I was basing my response on the fact you stated earlier you only rode it a couple, (two) times in the past seven years...

"
Originally Posted by prj71 View Post
The couple times I have ridden this trail over the past 7 years...I have never seen it before with non-pedal assist bikers. This trail is a mix of road bikes and hybrid bikes."

Maelochs

The primary issue here is dangerous behavior. I think OP has wildly exaggerated the dangers he so very bravely faced .... as a person who has traversed the occasional MUP I have found that dog walkers with extendable leashes and walkers with earbuds are by far the greatest hazards .... what bothers some cyclists ("Strave! Strava!") is that just as roads are Obviously for cars, MUPs are meant to be dedicated bike paths, and why should a cyclist have to adapt to people using other modalities.

Seems to me the OP just wants to complain.And do i doubt he was ever in any real danger----let alone repeatedly on a single short ride---Yes. He is just yelling at clouds .... "Things were different when I was young ..... "

The real thrust here is that the OP doesn't like ebikes. He thinks only the aged and inform should be allowed to ride them .... because by gosh, if they have "bike" in the name, people are supposed to Pedal them. (As with "motorbikes," right?) He resents people riding machines which look a little like his, but aren't .... and he has to work so hard to go fast, and they can just sit there. it isn't fair!

I go into a nearby city every weekend for a specific job and see tons of people riding free municipal ebikes and scooters (well, they aren't free, you can take them with a phone or card, though, and everyone above the age of three has a phone or debit/credit card, it seems.) Despite people riding in a busy city, usually on the sidewalks, and probably never or rarely having ridden a bike or skateboard, everyone seems to do okay.

As for a lot of young people buying ebikes .... ebikes are Expensive, and lack any sort of "cool" factor, and are not real practical. You cannot take out a date on an ebike .... you cannot go out with your friends ..... they are short-ranged .... in most parts of the nation they are not year-round ... Any kid who could afford a new ebike would probably much rather have a crappy used car.

Will there be a lot in a few concentrated areas? Yeah and probably most will be rentals, older folks on limited incomes, semi-homeless poor people (surprising number seem to like that they can get motorized transport without a license or insurance.) Is it an issue? Only for people who choose to take issue with it.

What I suspect is that the OP is having a bad day and saw an opportunity to craft a rant and did .... so positive marks for creativity. Eventually the weather will change, some clouds will form, and OP can busy himself there.

Maelochs

Be right back ... i need to look out the window and see what the atmosphere is doing .....

prj71

Not sure why people keep bringing up dog walking. Sure they are there, but not in the same numbers as bikes / e-bikes. And there hasn't been a recent explosion of dog walkers on the trails.

For the record...I'm not against e-bikes. I realize that there may come a day when I need to ride one due to a physical limitations.

What gets me though with them is 1.) The amount of physically capable young folks on them and 2.) The folks with little to no bike handling skills bobbing and weaving all over the trail. I haven't seen that behavior on the trails prior to the e-bike craze.