> 5 miles is a very easy bike commute

Having done a similar distance in the cycling capital of the world for about a year I wouldn't exactly call it "easy". I was happy to exchange it for a bus + tram combination even though it added ~15 minutes. Though I'll admit it's nice to be able to commute that distance by bike once or twice a week; but to do it day in and day out gets tiring.

> to do it day in and day out gets tiring

Can confirm this: I'm doing a 14 km commute and yes, for the first few weeks it's really tiring. Wanted to go to sleep as soon as I got home every afternoon. However, after say 2 or 3 months, your metabolism sort of adapts to it and you do it "naturally", without thinking too much about it. The idea of taking the bus again makes me anxious, though.

It's a very easy bike commute for the kind of people who self-select as riding bicycles.

General population would struggle. I used to bike commute twice that distance regularly and think that'd take me more like 25, maybe 30 now that I haven't done it for almost 2 years.

Funny thing about exercise is you get better at it, people who have had ebikes for a while (especially the ones that assist based on pedal power) tend to be less overweight and fitter for a reason. Also trikes work just fine for someone with mobility or balance problems (although a decent e trike is by no means cheap, similar up front to a second hand car).

I live in a city with mediocre to poor bike infrastructure at best, and I see plenty of 50-70 year old women doing 25km/h on ebikes or 10-15km/h on regular bikes.

Granted I wasn't overweight when I started, but after 5 years of largely being a couch potato and doing office work, I averaged around 20km/h or ~12mph door to door over a commute of 10 miles on a 40lb trike.

After getting fitter I'm about the same speed but a shower and change of clothes at the other end is optional now even on a 32C day rather than being drenched.

Your experience can only be due to bike hostile infrastructure or laws. If you had to stop three times for 2-5 minutes a piece at each intersection in a car while the empty lane for bikes and pedestrians got a green light on the off chance they showed up, you'd probably be complaining about how inconvenient driving was.

> Your experience can only be due to bike hostile infrastructure or laws.

No, I'm just a person with very little natural fitness who happened to enjoy riding a bicycle.

That's what e-bikes are for.

Google maps estimates it about 35 minutes, so almost twice as long as you're thinking.

I do it every day. It depends on elevation gain (so it could take much longer depending on the route) but usually I'm closer to 15 minutes than 20. 15mph on average for a daily bike commuter doesn't seem unreasonable at all to me.

It depends on location, if you're biking in a city at rush hour you're stopping every other block, getting stuck behind other cyclists, and at least where I live, constantly slowing down to avoid getting killed by potholes. There's basically no way you're doing 5 miles in 20 minutes.

On the other hand, if you are in heavy traffic stopping constantly at lights other traffic is also going to be travelling at that same slow speed.

That's fair. I biked in San Diego last week and the lights/potholes were brutal.

You're claiming you can ride 5 miles in closer to 15 minutes than 20, and through a city?

If you commute you will mostly ride on dedicated bike lanes without many stops so you can go at full speed most of the way. I've commuted around 3 miles in a not so bike friendly city in Europe and it took about 15 minutes since there are dedicated bikeways without any traffic lights you can take most of the way.

If you commute in rush hour that is actually a lot faster than going by car, so biking is the fastest option available.

Edit: And that was at a leisurely pace, similar to the effort of walking.

Google maps pads their bike times by a huge amount. (I just googled 8km in 35 minutes and got results asking about that as a running pace).

That's due to the sES spamfest fitness blog driven results.

Google maps calculations are decided by Google and take into account padding plus some degree of inclination calculation

I used to do a 5 mile commute. I didn’t have to deal with any major elevation changes, and it was about 35 minutes. Maybe a professional athlete could do it in 20, but they would still have to wait at stoplights occasionally. You will definitely arrive sweaty unless you are in a very cold climate. All that said, I consider 5 miles to be pretty reasonable for a bike commute.

You are both right: 5 miles is about 20min on an electric bike, but 35min on a traditional bike.

I do a 4.8-mile trip on a class 3 ebike (28 mph) consistently in 14 minutes in San Diego north county.

That would be an extremely leisurely pace. If you commute regularly on a bike and are reasonably fit, you should be able to ride at about 12 mph without breaking a sweat, which gets you a time of about 25 minutes.

Obtaining a speed of 12mph is not difficult for most reasonably fit people.

_Averaging_ a 12mph pace with signal lights, traffic, and stop signs is an entirely different story, especially in a busy cities.

Sure, if you never have to wait for a stoplight.

Seems possible indeed: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Atkp8mklOh0

YMMV. Google map estimates for cycling are very inaccurate in my experience.

It depends on where you ride. My commute is 5 miles, and it takes 30 minutes, even though I'm used to bike, because of the circulation, all the time I have to stop.

I agree it's easy if you're fit though. But I know it can be a pain for people who don't do sport at least weekly.

Well, first of all, if you bike regularly, you get all the training you need. The first couple of weeks are perhaps a bit hard, but that's about it for anyone in somewhat ok shape. And then there is the catch which is also the headline of the article we are discussing here: e-bikes. They allow anyone to go at a reasonable speed even uphill. That is, why they create a huge biking crowd.

Indeed!

On a quiet flat road 5 miles is a pleasant cruise, through a hilly busy city even 1-2 miles can be a huge pain.