Diane Papan
To address concern around e-bike speeds, Assemblymember Diane Papan, D-San Mateo, introduced legislation that would close a legal loophole that allows the motorized vehicles to have maximum peak motor power of above 750 watts.
Although current law prohibits e-bike motors above 750 watts, it doesn’t account for bikes’ peak bursts of maximum power, which can mean that in reality the devices could be going up to 2,000 watts of power and above legal speeds, Papan said.
“It means quick acceleration, and you’re going a lot faster, and that is no longer an e-bike by definition under the law,” she said.
Legal e-bike speeds range from 20-28 mph depending on the class, however, some throttle-powered bikes sold illegally are also exceeding these speeds, local leaders said previously during a town hall hosted by state Sen. Josh Becker, D-Menlo Park.
Papan also hosted a recent forum on e-bike safety, which has become a burgeoning local concern particularly as it pertains to young people. She said that emergency room physicians at the meeting testified to the fact that they’d seen an increase in e-bike related injuries.
“Safety is a tremendous concern, and speed is one of the biggest impacts on safety,” she said. “People were aware of my legislation, and they’re very eager to enhance safety.”
Some areas are piloting age restrictions for e-bike usage. Marin County, for example, is piloting a new program that prohibits anyone under the age of 16 from riding class two e-bikes, which have a throttle feature that allows for quick acceleration.
Papan said her legislation, Assembly Bill 1557, addresses e-bike technology, rather than age limitations, in an attempt to curb speeds as efficiently as possible.
“My legislation does not focus on the rider. It focuses on the machine itself,” she said. “I think that no matter who’s riding, they won’t be caught by surprise.”
If enacted, the bill would make it so that bikes with a maximum peak motor power of above 750 watts could no longer be sold as e-bikes. Instead, they would fall under the e-motorcycle classification, which has far stricter use restrictions.
Although e-bikes can be extremely beneficial if used correctly, regulating safety concerns is paramount, Papan said.
“They have a lot of promise,” she said, “but I just want us to proceed in a way that has some restraint to it, and it’s safe.”
(650) 344-5200 ext. 105
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(6) comments
When have Diane Papan or Josh Becker ever cared about vulnerable road users?
When have they ever promoted safe bike lanes in their jurisdictions?
When have they ever gone after dangerous drivers the way they try to bully these children?
Something is clearly wrong with these San Mateo Democrats.
Bullying children? These are youth that do not know the rules of the road, that do not know the laws and rude their ebikes like immortal rocket ships. Try to look at the bigger picture of the operators of these bikes. Check the statistics of who ends up in emergency rooms because they cut in and out of 3000 vehicles, they run stop signs. Putting them on safer machines with proper training and education is not bullying. Under your definition of bullying, teachers are bullies.
Something bad must be in the water when e-bike fans are willing to criticize common sense safety legislation for our kids's and grandkids'sake.
This is not about "safety", this is about bullying, plain and simple. And I come with evidence:
- During the e-bike meeting with Becker the researchers said, kids get hurt by cars and when there are no bike lanes.
- Has Diane Papan every approved bike lanes while on the city council? I remember constantly voting against children and bicycles.
- If Diane Papan was all about children and "safety" - San Mateo would have the best Safe-Routes-To-School bike lane network in the Bay Area.
- If the Papan-dynasty was all about "safety" - San Mateo would not have to pretend to be a real "Vison Zero" city.
- A child was killed on a Burlingame sidewalk, no call to action from Papan.
- Another pedestrian was killed in her own city. Again, no call to action.
- During the e-bike meeting with Becker the researchers basically said, there is nothing to see here, go after cars.
- During the e-bike meeting with Becker the researchers said, it's not the kids that get hurt on e-bikes it's mostly adults.
... and of course the researchers said, the problem are still cars.
https://youtu.be/jnNQEO6U2J8?t=2875
Papan is taking us for fools. It is your own decision of course to play that fool or pay attention.
Has Papan ever gone after cars and drivers? Of course not. If you get killed in traffic it won't be by a kid on an e-bike, it will still be a car.
Here is what regular drivers are doing in San Mateo County are doing that is hard for children on e-bikes to replicate:
- killing >40,000 people per year
- killing each other over parking spots
- running over dogs, cats, deer, mountain lions, bears, ...
- speeding and endangering others
- drinking, driving, and endangering others
- rolling through STOP signs and endangering others
- rolling through right-on-red and endangering others
- driving over the bike lane line and endangering others
- forgetting to use turn-signals and endangering others
- turning into parking lots without watching the bike lane and endangering others
- coming within 3 feet of a bicycle and endangering them
- blocking intersections and endangering others
- blocking a Bikeway and also NOT blocking a Bikeway and endangering others
- pulling out their phones at intersections and endangering others
- parking in front of fire hydrants and endangering others
- parking in blue spots and endangering others
- parking on the sidewalk and endangering others
- blocking zebra crossings and endangering others
- blocking sight-lines and therefore preventing daylighting
- parking against the direction of traffic
- using windshield wipers while having their headlights still off
- carpool violations
- Toll Bridge cheating
- Oakland Sideshows
- Fast and Furious Street Racing
- the 3 modes of transportation that cause emergency services the most problems: speeding cars, driving cars, parked cars
- Driving without license plates
So who are the bad guys here? Certainly not the children.
Faulting one legislator for a long list of your grievances against the automobile is not what would normally be considered as balanced.
CA Lawmakers seem to disagree with you.
In a legal environment that is based on the philosophy called "deterrence", there actually has to be some deterrence. CA Democrats removed that from the equation over the last few decades. This shows now as CalMatters has shown.
Calmatters has an outstanding series about this topic.
https://calmatters.org/series/license-to-kill/
And it already leading to changes:
"California has a dangerous driver problem. A bipartisan group of lawmakers wants to fix that"
So why don't we see bills written by Josh Becker or Diane Papan on these real "safety" bills rather that these political grandstanding bills bullying seniors and children?
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