If Mayor Adams gets his way, New York City will institute a new speed limit on electric bicycles, reducing the cap to just 15 mph (24.1 km/h) from the previous e-bike speed limit of 25 mph (40 km/h). It’s a move that is ostensibly meant to protect New Yorkers, but which experts have said will actually result in risking more lives.
It’s a prime example of doing more harm than good, says Michael Replogle, the former policy director for NYC’s Department of Transportation and an internationally recognized expert in the field of sustainable transportation.
The issue is that the reduced speed limit means that slower e-bikes will constantly come into conflict with higher speed traffic, routinely being passed by multi-ton cars and SUVs.
Despite the 25 mph (40 km/h) city-wide speed limit for cars in NYC, the de facto speed limit is really 35 mph (56 km/h), which is the speed at which traffic cameras begin to record infractions and issue citations.
Previously, electric bicycles were permitted to travel at speeds up to 25 mph, helping them more closely match the speed of vehicular traffic and thus reduce the conflict rate between vulnerable cyclists and dangerously large and heavy vehicles. “I can tell you it feels much safer as a cyclist if you’re going close to the speed of the traffic than if you’re going half the speed of traffic,” Replogle explained.
“I strongly oppose the proposed rule to limit e-bikes to a 15 mph speed limit. It is an ill-considered idea to improve safety which will be counterproductive,” Replogle continued, according to NYC Streetsblog. “It is also likely to put New Yorkers at risk of a criminal record or entrapment in President Trump’s immigration dragnet.”
A large portion of the e-bike riders in NYC are immigrants who work as food delivery riders or bike couriers who are depended upon by thousands of New Yorkers every day.
“It’s a war on bikes, it’s a war on immigrants, and it undermines traffic safety,” Replogle added. “I think it’s Adams basically trying to mount a populist assault on cycling.”
Top comment by JayB4141
As someone who lives in NYC, doesn’t own a car and rides a bicycle often in Manhattan, usually on bike lanes (1,000+ miles of bike lanes in NYC), I prefer the proposed 15 mph speed limit.
Why? As mentioned in the article, a large portion of e-bike riders are delivering goods. At least in my area, they are in the bike lanes and not in the automobile lanes so they are not side-by-side with multi-ton cars and SUVs but are cruising parallel to sidewalks and perpendicular to crosswalks where pedestrians are crossing and more likely to have a close call with a speeding bike. The bicyclists are often going at the max speed, sometimes going in the wrong direction (avenues and streets are usually one way) and are often looking down at their mobile device looking for the next order rather than looking at where they’re going.
Another issue is delivery bikes are usually black, rarely have lighting or reflectors and, like many New Yorkers, delivery people wear dark clothing. So at night these bikers aren’t too visible. If it’s raining it only gets worse.
So as a pedestrian often crossing a bike lane, the 15 mph makes more sense. As a bicyclist I can deal with a 15 mph max speed limit.
Despite e-bike accidents being cited as the supposed reason for the city’s reduced bike speed limit, cars account for virtually all of NYC’s traffic-related injuries and deaths.
Electrek’s Take
I know this might come as a shock, but the experts here are correct and the politicians are wrong.
Reducing e-bike speed limits won’t make things safer; it’s just more likely to get people killed due to increased car crashes with cyclists.
This whole issue came about because a few pearl-clutching New Yorkers with money and power saw an e-bike whizz past them closer than they were comfortable with, and wanted it to stop. This has nothing to do with protecting people’s lives. If that were the primary goal, then they’d limit cars to 15 mph, not e-bikes. Only one of the two is a highly effective killing machine, and I’ll give you a hint – it’s not the one that weighs as much as a small child.
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