Amsterdam testing system that can remotely slow e-bikes down

nltimes.nl Amsterdam testing system that can remotely slow e-bikes down

Amsterdam is one of six European cities that will soon test a system that can remotely limit the speed of electric bicycles. Amsterdam’s traffic alderman, Melanie van der Horst, tested the system herself last week, NRC reports.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/13081471

Alrighty,
So your system knows the exact situation and still is slowing down my bike, just at the moment I need to accelerate to avoid being overrun by that large truck heading into me.
How stupid are these folks? We've got rules, when people don't follow those rules, you fine them. Case closed.
No system to prevent a bike speeding, teach people to obey the law.

Mildly Infuriating @lemmy.world

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11mo ago

Amsterdam testing system that can remotely slow e-bikes down

nltimes.nl /2024/03/12/amsterdam-testing-system-can-remotely-slow-e-bikes

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13 comments

Does Amsterdam have a speed limit on bike paths? Is there a different speed limit for different types of paths? Intersections? Near shops?

So your system knows the exact situation and still is slowing down my bike, just at the moment I need to accelerate to avoid being overrun by that large truck heading into me.
This look like a problem with trucks, no? Maybe we should have a system to prevent trucks from running over people.
- Just make them higher, then they'll safely go overhead.
- It's called brakes. They can only do so much with 80k pounds. A bike can decelerate much better. It's not better when it's in front of a truck.

Do this to cars first and then we'll talk
- I had the same thought, it turns out the tech to do this has existed for a long, long time but it's never been implemented.
  
  From a purely technical perspective, it should be possible to do this with an ODB-II device with GPS and BTLE. You could send everyone with a car the option to buy a device and register the device to associate it with their license plate.
  Put a couple of plate readers around vulnerable areas with BTLE and make sure that the plate that's being read has an associated device. Any time one doesn't traffic enforcement comes in. You could even connect it to retracting bollards to make it physically impossible to enter vulnerable areas without a car that has a registered remote controlled governor.
  Even from a security perspective it's not super hard to design, assuming the city is the trusted authority.
  From an economic perspective, most of the hardware could be paid for by car owners since they would be buying a device that acts as a permit to enter the city. A device could additionally require a subscription, which would pay for the yearly costs of the server infrastructure and maintenance.
  Once you had such a system in place, it would be pretty easy to even charge people tolls for entering sensitive areas. Hell, you could probably replace most of parking enforcement by just charging people a constant rate for being in the city. You could even use GPS to charge different rates in different parking zones.

FWIW, e-bikes sold in France (possibly in Europe, not sure) only have assistance up to 25 km/h. Past that the engine turns off.
You can get devices without this limitation however they no longer qualify as bikes, they're classified as mopeds/motorcycles and need a license plate and a proper registration. The same goes for those "pretend bikes" that actually go without the rider pedalling.
However the law isn't really enforced at the moment as it's not very easy to tell them apart at a glance and the owners will of course do everything to disguise the real nature of their rides (same problem with the scooters, which also have a speed limit). Also the police are lazy, because they're the police.
- Sweden has 250W tops for bikes at 25km/h.
  Moped class 2 are the ones who can ride in the bike path with up to 1000W and 25km/h for cutoff. These do require insurance (~€6/mo) , but are mostly for delivery services where 250W just isn’t enough. These also require a helmet.
  So far this system has worked pretty well with no insane speeders in the news yet. With anecdotal evidence it’s usually the insane wattage that really encourages bad behaviour.

This actually sounds like a good proposal. Also, I disagree with the quoted comment. A system solution is miles better than regulation for the simple fact that people WILL break rules, no matter how you teach them not to.

So... after reading the article, i think that this is an even better idea than i thought before i had read it! Very interesting and good initiative by the city when fast ebikes stop people from using bikes all together!
This plan does something to cyclists’ sense of freedom,” she acknowledged. “On the other hand, their current freedom also affects the freedom of others. Their speeding now limits this
My original comment:
Increasing speed will very rarelly save you from an accident. Slowing down, or braking will.
If in any case you need to move away from something combing at you, a higher top speed will not help you. Acceleration will though and ebikes still have that.
If you're going full speed, more speed will not get you away from a truck moving towards you. You're much better off stopping or slowing down or even turning

13 comments