Sure, I'm lucky to be having a relative short commute (by choice by the way). But on that commute I come across the following (Netherlands btw):
- Teenagers on e-bikes, all of them have a short commute. 20 minutes max.
- Old people on e-bikes going high speeds with balancing issues.
- Big differences in speeds on bicycle paths. 5-10kmh small kids on bikes, 10-18kmh regulare bikes, 24kmh+ ebikes & small motorbikes.
- Bicycle shops that carry 95% ebikes since they are high margin products
- Bicycle shops declining service on regular bikes
- Obesity and lack of energy for people in general
Disclaimer:
- I worked in an e-bike servicing company before, seen how quickly the products go bad
- I've tried e-bikes and found the lack of energy spent by myself a big issue. It brought me from A to B, but it didn't feel like I had been spending energy. Which I think is an essential part of using any product.
This may be a downside for you personally, but more broadly it's the reason why people may replace cars with ebikes.
Normal bicycles are in a stable relationship with cars, meaning that the sorts of people who would replace their cars with bicycles have already done so. There's no new impetus right now that wasn't present 8 years ago.
Ebikes open up the "replace cars" space to a new group of people that it didn't previously apply to.
You complain that these people aren't on regular bicycles. But the option isn't whether these people should be on ebikes or regular bicycles. It's whether those people are on ebikes or in cars. Which do you prefer?
I'm aware that I'm focussing on my specific area here. Which is flat land, low distance commutes. I see people choosing ebikes over regular bicycles. Which I think puts them a step back in health and increases dangerous situations on the low to mid speed bicycle paths.
Maybe this is a location dependent thing. I see you're in the Netherlands; I'm in the US. Among people here riding ebikes, they're not choosing ebikes over regular bicycles. They're choosing ebikes over cars. Regular bicycles were never an option for those people.
I agree that people on ebikes are more dangerous than people on regular bikes.
But they are so much less dangerous than the people in cars. Every car driver that becomes an ebike rider instead is an absolute improvement.
In a location like the Netherlands where cycling is so much more common, I can see how people could swap from a regular bicycle to an ebike, and that makes things worse.
I can understand these comments from a fit single adult. I basically had to give up biking once we had kids. A cargo ebike has been a life changer.
Your commute is 30 mins by bike, it not everyone’s is… if someone’s commute could be halved from 60 mins to 30 mins by using an e-bike, you’d get all those people in that radius who could bike instead of drive.
Some people can’t ride 30 mins twice a day… 5 days a week… if an e-bike let people go every day, that’s just more people advocating for bicycles/bike paths/hard barriers/infra for everyone.
Also, just making it easier to get into it. People who aren’t fit who wouldn’t even consider a traditional bicycle might consider this. It’s easy and a certain portion of people would eventually get multiple bikes for different purpose.
I used to bike 45 mins to work (7 miles) - we had secure bike storage, showers and a locker room for bike stuff, but again… not everyone has that. If you were less sweaty and gross after biking (that is… less exertion on an ebike), more people would do it.