Many Amsterdammers feel endangered by high-speed e-bikes on cycle paths

Many Amsterdammers feel endangered by sharing bike lanes with e-bikes, according to a panel conducted by AT5. Eighty percent said they supported maximum speed limits on bicycle paths.

Participants on the panel said the speed at which many e-bikes drove made them uncomfortable. Three quarters of the people surveyed said they felt that e-bikes were makes bike lanes less safe –– including many e-bike owners themselves.

"It makes me super stressed because someone keeps unexpectedly tearing past you from behind you," one participant told AT5. Although electric bikes are technically only supposed to reach speeds of 25 km per hour, it is fairly easy to "boost" the speed of an e-bike on an app. Many participants would like to see that feature banned.

They also favored the city council's plans to curtail high speeds on bike lanes by setting a maximum speed limit, but only if it could be properly enforced. "It only makes sense if it is enforced and since that only happens sparsely, it is a sham," a panelist said.

Overall, though, panelists believed there is no one-size-fits-all approach. People use e-bikes for different reasons: for example, elderly people and parents may need them to increase mobility. Some panelists said high speeds also make more sense when biking on more rural paths, where there is not as much traffic.

"I am in favor of speed restrictions in the city center, but I am actually even more in favor of geofencing, where speeds can be higher outside the city based on GPS," suggested one participant.

In addition, 50 percent of panelists believed e-bikes should be forced to use roads instead of bike paths.