The EU Court of Justice yesterday ruled that e-bikes are actually bikes, not motorbikes, which means e-cyclists aren’t obligated to be insured in the same way as motorists.
Start by printing this and keeping it with you. Then dig around until you can find the specific federal regulation and regulations pertinent to your state, print those out, too.
I used to do motorized bicycles, got pulled over with a friend once. Cop was all “You have to have registration and insurance and and and.” I said, “Wait, I have the Illinois law on my phone here, this went into effect Jan 1 this year [I forget now what year that was].” Cop took the info back to his car for a few minutes (in the meantime, I was putting my chain back on, it had fallen off). He comes back and says, “I learned something new today. Be safe.”
Told him we had our route planned out to avoid the high traffic roads already, that we always followed the rules of the road for cars and bicycles. I’m sure it didn’t hurt that we were both wearing full face helmets and armored jackets.
One cop literally drove onto the sidewalk so his car was half on the sidewalk and half on the road to cut me off and started screaming at me about CCs and horsepower.
When I explained it was an electric bike, he seemed very confused and then repeated the 50cc maximum and drove away.
Make sure you actually print these to paper. I’d done that, but didn’t have them with me on my encounter. I would not do this today, but on that day so many years ago, I let the cop take my phone back to his car with him.
Start by printing this and keeping it with you. Then dig around until you can find the specific federal regulation and regulations pertinent to your state, print those out, too.
I used to do motorized bicycles, got pulled over with a friend once. Cop was all “You have to have registration and insurance and and and.” I said, “Wait, I have the Illinois law on my phone here, this went into effect Jan 1 this year [I forget now what year that was].” Cop took the info back to his car for a few minutes (in the meantime, I was putting my chain back on, it had fallen off). He comes back and says, “I learned something new today. Be safe.”
Told him we had our route planned out to avoid the high traffic roads already, that we always followed the rules of the road for cars and bicycles. I’m sure it didn’t hurt that we were both wearing full face helmets and armored jackets.
Rad. Thanks.
One cop literally drove onto the sidewalk so his car was half on the sidewalk and half on the road to cut me off and started screaming at me about CCs and horsepower.
When I explained it was an electric bike, he seemed very confused and then repeated the 50cc maximum and drove away.
Make sure you actually print these to paper. I’d done that, but didn’t have them with me on my encounter. I would not do this today, but on that day so many years ago, I let the cop take my phone back to his car with him.
Print them to paper.
Okay that’s a good point.
I was just going to use my phone because I didn’t even think of that.