As you already know, I’m previous and out of it, so I used to be shocked to study right this moment that there are apparently nonetheless bicycle messengers…

…they usually’re using pennyfarthings now???

What a world.

I imply certain, there are tons and plenty of folks delivering stuff on e-bikes and motor scooters in New York, but it surely’s largely meals supply, which isn’t very attractive, or else stuff like this, which is even much less attractive:

I don’t know if meals supply folks and e-cargo bike supply folks have their very own world championships, but when they do their lack of vogue sense most likely wouldn’t make for extremely compelling video.

Talking of meals supply the NYPD is outwardly cracking down on unlicensed motor scooters within the bike path:

I don’t like unlicensed motor scooters within the bike path so the vindictive facet of me is like, “Good, take the rattling scooters!” Nevertheless, the pragmatic facet of me is aware of that whether or not it’s motor scooters within the bike lane, or bicyclists or working pink lights, or motorists speaking on the cellphone whereas driving, or folks ripping across the metropolis on ATVs and filth bikes, regardless of the tabloid-fodder-nuisance-of-the-moment could also be at any given time, what occurs is the NYPD does a giant well-publicized crackdown in sure places for awhile, then they transfer on, then all of the idiots get again to no matter they have been doing–me included:

That in fact is the notorious Tan Tenovo ticket:

Since getting that ticket 5 years in the past I now make a degree of working that mild each single time with the intention to get my cash’s price, which leads me to query the effectiveness of crackdowns in the long term:

Additionally, I used to be using dwelling from Brooklyn yesterday night, and whereas they could have been cracking down over on the Williamsburg Bridge you’d by no means have recognized it on the Hudson River Greenway, the place the contraptions have been coming at me quick and livid. It appears to me that with this kind of factor you want constant enforcement in every single place, not simply in a couple of spots at sure occasions–which is in fact the reasoning behind pace cameras, that are totally ineffective for implementing folks using unlicensed motorbikes on bike paths anyway. So relating to cracking down on unregistered motor scooters within the bike lane, it’s like how they let you know to maintain killing noticed lantern flies…

…despite the fact that it doesn’t do shit:

Besides increase “public consciousness:”

So principally it’s entomological advantage signaling.

However whereas I agree that there’s most likely a greater method to coping with this drawback (or at the least a more practical one with which to reinforce the old school bespoke artisanal enforcement), I’d cease wanting suggesting that the folks using them are “not conscious of the principles:”

The standard tactic is to deal with them as victims of the meals supply apps, which is already a little bit of a stretch (partly as a result of not everybody on a motor scooter is delivering for an app), however portray them as hapless simpletons on prime of that simply appears patronizing:

By the best way, I used to be unfamiliar with Brightside and the Equitable Commute Challenge, so I checked out their web sites. The story says Brightside is an “city mobility firm,” which made me surprise if Massive Scooter is behind all this, however they don’t seem like an city mobility firm a lot as a PR firm:

Albeit one with a concentrate on “sustainability:”

In the meantime the Equitable Commute Challenge promotes e-bike use within the metropolis:

And even offers folks with subsidies and loans to buy e-bikes:

To this finish they’ve partnered with a financial institution, in addition to with sure retailers:

I used to be curious the place their funding comes from, and it feels like at the least a few of it comes from the state:

Connecting folks with e-bikes appears good, although I can’t assist lamenting that we appear to be shedding sight of how low cost and out there common bikes are and all the time have been, and but right here we’re creating a complete new ecosystem of loans and grants and subsidies and start-ups to interchange them with costlier bikes which have tiny motors in them–to not point out sensors to gather knowledge:

I’m not saying it’s dangerous, I’m simply questioning if it’s essential:

I although it was imagined to be about one much less automotive, however on this case it’s one much less pedestrian.