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@ChrisMcCahill also driving elsewhere to buy lunch seems like a violation of the coffee shop working code to me? I guess if it’s suburban, big and empty maybe they don’t care.

@Olithal was super keen to get the SJ or the snallget to Stockholm this summer but they aren’t running on Saturday nights - something about track work on the Kiel bridge? Don’t really want to move other commitments so looking at day trains instead… ah well.

‘Don’t think “if I don’t do it, they’ll just get someone else to do it.” Remember instead that the power, and the trap, of neoliberal thinking is that it divides and conquers and makes us feel that there is no way out of the current system, when there is.’ - Mar Hicks @histoftech

@Sydney_Stations What do you think of the e-ink bus displays? (reddit.com/r/sydney/comments/b)

Bit cluttered to my eyes... need something more like the B1 display, at least at the top with smaller text below.

@Steveb Sure but like... we ban motorbikes from riding on footpaths in parks, even though they would technically fit. Even if they want to ride super slowly to get to a picnic spot. Why? At what point should the same reasons apply to ebikes? In what spaces?

Yeah, I feel safe on Mastodon that anyone who follows me is basically pro-bike, so I don't worry about that kind of thing much. I would speak differently in a different forum, and may not keep this thread around forever.

@Steveb a lot of ebikers seem unwilling to either give up freedom to ride through parks etc, or freedom to go at whatever speed they like. That’s what I mean by the ebike culture wars. The community (insofar as there is one) very split on with these issues.

@Steveb relative to the tiny number of ebikes in Sydney it does seem quite existent.

Cycle paths yes obviously fix many problems. But there will still be contentious spaces. Can I ride through the local park on my ebike or do I have to go around it/park outside? If yes, what kind of ebike? At what speed?

@Steveb I thought it was overcomplicating things until we had a few recent accidents in Sydney with pedestrians getting knocked over and not nonexistent damage.

True about not placating people but... to me current Australian restrictions (same as EU rating) are equally over-management, but neither effective for safety, nor useful for riders.

In Australia we have a 25kmph (15mph) assist cutoff and a 250W power limit.

Personal walking neighbourhoods from some of my survey respondents - WalkSydney followers (blue) and UNSW city planning masters students (pink).

Not a representative sample of Sydney, that's for sure! Got to start somewhere.

@Steveb Safer for you, in mixed traffic situations. But the power required for that performance (maintaining you at 35kmph on the flat) may be unsafe in other situations (accelerating from 0 in a shared space with pedestrians). Depends how it's set up. Thus thinking about more complex controls and rules than uniform speed limits or power limits.

@milesmcbain Ah cool. I always kinda assumed you were German, not sure why... something about the photo and lots of good data scientists there

@milesmcbain Yes agree for both.

Btw, I was wondering what jurisdiction you ride in, and it took a while to work out you're in Australia. Is that intentional?

Not sure where I'm going with this, just wandering. Maybe a flourishing and diverse micromobility sector actually needs less emphasis on regulating vehicles and more on behaviour, as for cars. Nothing about your vehicle stops you from driving 150km/hr through a pedestrian crossing. Only legal enforcement and social norms, which are currently lagging behind in cities without a cycling history.

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Sometimes I feel very out of love with ebikes. That using an to feel safer in traffic or travel long distances in sprawling suburbs is a necessary but ugly temporary accommodation to poor cycling conditions and car-oriented design.

But hills exist even in a carless state of grace, and are the 'killer app' for ebike-as-bike-but-better, for me. So ebikes really need to be able to handle hills well. And cargo, and cargo on hills.

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for example, acceleration limits (with reference to the ground), not power limits. The same power output that can get me up a long steep hill at a moderate speed (like 20km/hr) without sweating, gives acceleration from 0 on the flat that is dangerous in shared spaces with pedestrians. Torque sensing helps with the latter situation but not so much the former (I think, haven't ridden them much).

I change power settings while riding to get the balance I want, but new riders often don't.

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Sometimes I go on r/ebikes and get stuck into various culture wars... Strange as it is to get good ideas on bicycling from the USA, the class system for ebikes makes a lot of sense. Not the specific classes they've chosen (IMO) but understanding that ebikes can have very different characteristics to serve different needs, and they should have different requirements and privileges.

Think we need some technical innovation in controls... (cont)

I’ve got so used to living on a high frequency non-timetabled bus route, it’s great. Today I’m on a normal bus and we’re just sitting here at a stop because it’s running early. Let’s go faster! Let’s go home! But no.

@timrichards Yeah I can think through just the people I go to the climbing gym in mid-morning with and come up with a list. Hospitality, shiftwork, freelance, stay at home dads, programmers who just tell people they're coming to work at 12 if they feel like it.

The relevance to my work ofc is urban transport that doesn't just cater to peak times or some kind of 'standard' trips.

@timrichards yes! I'm always doing things at weird times because I'm a PhD student, but there aren't that many of us (nevermind that can afford to prop up a local café)... Nor writers. Or maybe there are?

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