MANY MINDEDNew York City has seventeen e-bike bills and no registration requirement
New York City Council leadership announced a package of 17 bills covering electric two-wheelers. The measures would ban Class 3 e-bikes, which are currently legal at 25 mph, require delivery companies to hold commercial licenses and share rider data, mandate additional insurance for delivery platforms, increase enforcement against illegal high-speed vehicles, strengthen hit-and-run penalties, create a trade-in programme for illegal vehicles, and establish a task force on street design. Hearings are expected to begin in the autumn.
Notably absent: license plates and registration for e-bikes generally, which had been widely expected and would have been the most consequential provision for ordinary riders.
The e-bike is one of the highest-leverage objects in this entire file. It is the cheapest form of powered personal transport ever built, it needs no license, and in dense cities it is faster door-to-door than a car. Local transport is a named need, and nothing else currently moves it toward free at the same cost per mile. Regulation that raises the floor on owning or operating one is friction against that, which is why it is carded even though the stated aim — reducing collisions — is legitimate.
Two limits keep the weight low. These are proposals with hearings months away, so nothing has been enacted. And the source cites no injury or fatality data behind the package, describing the justification as a rise in high-profile crashes, many of which involved cars and SUVs striking cyclists rather than e-bikes striking anyone.
Source: Electrek