>>1533123There is another reason, OP: sheer laziness.
Most people will go out of their way to avoid anything that even remotely resembles exercise. It's basically 'work' to them, and they're not going to do 'work' if they're not getting paid to do it, and they're especially not going to want to do it if they have to PAY to do it. To these people, a bike ride isn't something fun, it's something hot, sweaty, painful, exhausting, and dangerous, all made worse ironically by the fact that they're overweight, weak, have little endurance, no personal discipline to speak of, and the whole 'trip' to them is utterly pointless, they're not 'going anywhere', they're just 'riding around', why would you do that, they think.
Now add to all the above the fact that the average person buys into bicycle hate (an attitude no helped by how shitty too many bicycle riders act on public roads, riding like both traffic laws and laws of physics don't apply to them somehow), how insecure the average person is about what you *wear* when riding (thus they wear normal street clothes, ironically making discomfort even worse), and their likely opinion that 'bicycles are for children and poor people'.
So at best they buy an overpriced, underperforming e-bike. Then they mod them so that you don't even have to pedal, turning it into a licenseless/registrationless electric moped.
Then they proceed to clog up MUPs, getting in the way of actual cyclists, creating dangerous situations, because they utterly and completely lack any skill with a two-wheeled vehicle.
To make matters worse, they buy a 'fat tire' e-bike and mod it so you don't need to pedal, so it's as heavy and unweildly as possible, making it even more dangerous to everyone around them.
E-bikes should be banned from MUPs, universally.
They should also be required to have a license plate/registration, and insurance, and you should have to take a class in how to ride one safely.
With any luck that would kill off the e-bike market quickly.
