New York City’s speed limit on electrically assisted bicycles will go into effect next month, Mayor Adams announced Wednesday.
The speed cap, first reported in June by the Daily News, will make it illegal for any e-bike to go above 15 mph in city bike lanes. The limit will go into effect on Oct. 24.
Currently, most legal e-bikes are legally limited to a 20-mph top speed in New York City. However, the fastest and most powerful e-bikes, known in the industry as “Class 3″ bikes, have been allowed to travel up to 25 mph on New York City’s streets and bike lanes.
Citi Bike’s rental e-bikes — the gray bicycles that populate many a bike lane in the city — have already been made slower. As previously reported by The News, the bike-share program’s parent company, Lyft, agreed to lower the vehicles’ top speed from 18 mph to 15 mph in June after the Adams administration threatened to suspend the service if it didn’t limit its machines to the proposed speed limit.
In a statement Wednesday, Adams said the limit would “keep New Yorkers safe while continuing to keep our city moving.”
“As more New Yorkers turn to e-bikes and e-scooters to get around our city, New Yorkers have asked us to set clear, consistent rules to address this issue and protect everyone,” he added.
It was not immediately clear how the speed limit would be enforced. City Council member Crystal Hudson (D-Brooklyn) has recently proposed legislation that would outlaw the sale of faster, Class 3 e-bikes within the five boroughs. Whether the speed restrictions on all other bikes would be enforced by cops with radar guns or by requiring internal governing mechanisms on the bikes themselves remains to be seen.
The move also comes after months of Adams’ NYPD handing out criminal summonses to bike riders — both electric- and pedal-powered ones — accused of running red lights or otherwise riding recklessly, a drastic change from the status quo of bike riders receiving civil summonses for traffic infractions. This has led to penalties that are more severe for running a red light while riding a bicycle than driving a car or truck.
In a statement, Ben Furnas, head of cycling advocacy group Transportation Alternatives, called Adams’ speed limit “completely backward.”
“Why should a person on [an e-]bike get a criminal summons for traveling 16 mph, while the driver of a 5,000-pound SUV doesn’t even receive a ticket for speeding at 35 mph?” he said.
“The mayor can pretend he’s listening to New Yorkers, but the facts are clear,” Furnas continued, “over 90% of [public] comments submitted opposed this rule.”
The new speed limit does not apply to traditional, non-motorized bicycles.
Riders of pedal-powered bikes are still expected to follow the posted speed limit for cars and trucks — 25 mph on most city streets, provided their legs can spin that fast.
Similarly, mopeds — of both the electric- and gas-powered varieties — are treated as motorcycles under the law, and subject to the posted limit. Those vehicles, by law, must have a license plate and are not allowed in the bike lane.
Proponents of a speed limit for e-bikes have traditionally focused on keeping pedestrians safe.
“I have heard, over and over again, from New Yorkers about how their safety — and the safety of their children — has been put at risk due to speeding e-bikes and e-scooters,” Adams said in June.
As previously reported by The News, however, the city data show e-bikes — which are heavier and less maneuverable than traditional cycles — consistently account for more than two-thirds of cyclist deaths in New York City.
Traffic fatalities in general are near pre-pandemic lows, according to city data. As of Monday, Sept. 8 — the most recently available city data — 12 cyclists have died this year on New York City streets. Two of those died while riding traditional bicycles, while the other 10 were atop e-bikes.
A 43-year-old Bronx man was killed in June when he fell off his e-bike after clipping a pedestrian in Central Park, and a 49-year-old man was killed in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, in March after he was hit by a delivery rider who ran a red on an e-bike.
More than 70 pedestrians have been killed by cars or trucks so far this year.
