As St. Louis continues to be smothered by an avalanche of technology-driven problems like computer-assisted carjackings and energy-guzzling data centers, there’s only one problem we can all agree is worse than all of these things combined: people riding e-bikes.
An e-bike is like a regular bicycle, only with an electric motor. These bikes come in all shapes and sizes, with some of them large enough to be indistinguishable from a motorcycle. Giant idiots can often be seen barreling them down busy streets, bike lanes, and sidewalks, putting everyone in their general vicinity at risk of being momentarily inconvenienced and/or killed.
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So what should we do about these dumb things? Well, I’ve devised multiple solutions for how we can deal with this problem so we can get back to focusing on all our other other road-related quagmires like traffic calming run amok and stadium-sized sinkholes.
Here’s my modest proposal for five ways we can take care of our e-bike problem:
- Bully these fools relentlessly. So your neighbor got an e-bike, huh? Well instead of telling him it looks cool and you wish you had one, be honest and tell him what you actually think. Tell him that e-bikes are stupid, and that he looks really stupid riding one. Or maybe tell him he could probably use the exercise pedaling a regular bike, and then just silently stare at him with a thinly concealed look of disgust. Is this a fair solution for every type of e-bike out there? No. Do I care? No.
- Allow the police to turn a blind eye while I become an e-bike vigilante. Look, every man in his twenties and thirties thinks he could plausibly be Batman, and I am not an exception there. But instead of fighting psychotic clowns and sexy plant ladies, I’ll solely fight e-bike crime. I’ll go to Walmart and buy whatever overpriced Halloween Batman costume they have, even if it’s the pajama-y Adam West version, and I will rain vengeance down on every e-bike I see. I’ll probably need my own e-bike to do this, which will be fine, because I will be above the law.
- Impose an age limit. We all know the real problem with these bikes are the young people driving them around without regard to any other person around them, so what we could do is impose an age limit in an effort to keep these machines out of their dopey little hands. In order for this law to be as effective as possible, the absolute youngest age that someone should be to ride one of these things is 95 years old. If you don’t look anywhere close to that age and are caught even looking at one of these machines, then you go to jail. Forever.
- We could just ban them. Why does anyone need one of these bikes to begin with? Unless you’re one of the very few people who literally cannot use a bicycle otherwise, there’s no reason for these things to exist. Just get a regular bike. We can’t be worried about machines replacing us in the workforce while at the same time being totally cool outsourcing the use of our legs to an electric bike. We have to start drawing the line somewhere. You could also probably use the exercise!
- Common sense regulation. This is by far the most boring option, but it’s probably what we’ll have to go with unless the city gives me the go-ahead to be Batman (which is unlikely, considering what happened last time). Illinois just passed legislation that might also be a good fit here. Basically the law requires any bike that can motor itself over 28 mph to be registered and titled, and require a driver’s license to operate. It’d be better if the threshold was a whole lot lower (like, say, 1 mph), but it’s a start. A law like that would at least prevent a portion of the more powerful versions of these bikes from being so prevalent. And if people keep breaking the law and riding them around on Grant’s Trail anyway, well, it sounds like there’s an experimental drone program that could be put to use for this very purpose, following these “cyclists” around until their bikes run out of batteries and they can be seized.
Come to think of it, this would also be an ideal solution for the dirt bikes and ATVs that are running unchecked across the city. The drone people could even team up with Walmart and drop off my new Batman costume at my house on their way to chasing these guys down, because honestly I’ve thought about the Batman thing for far too long to not go through with it at this point. I’m the hero St. Louis deserves, if not the one it needs right now.
