Thread by @JessieSingerNYC

I've been surprised to hear from a few of you who ride regular bikes who are support e-bike licensing.

This is a bad idea -- for you, personally, as cyclists.

(Even if you're white or rich or don't care about delivery workers. I promise.)

Let me explain. Reason number one...

1. E-bike licensing will not solve the problem.

Anyone who has ever called 311 for a car in the bike lane or gotten a "bike bell" ticket knows the NYPD does not care about safety. They are not going to respond. Unless...

...they can use the fact the someone is on a bike as an excuse for a pretextual stop or to meet their ticket quotas.

So, we will see an increase in sporadic stops of people of color and random "checkpoints" devoid from safety.

Which leads me to reason number two:

2. E-bike licensing will reduce the number of cyclists is New York City.

Even leaving aside how the time and effort required to register will deter people from cycling, fear of police harassment will cause fewer people to ride bikes.

Maybe you're thinking: Fine! Good riddance!

You shouldn't.

Because the number of bikes on the road directly correlates with the number of cyclists hit by cars. Data shows the more bikes on the road, the fewer cyclists killed and injured.

Which leads me to reason number three:

3. E-bike licensing will make NYC streets less safe.

Fewer people cycling will reduce safety in numbers.

Many of those people who stop biking will start driving, and if they're delivery workers, subject to the same pace of work but now driving dangerously in a car.

And many of those e-bikers will just switch to regular bikes. But their work demands will be the same -- so they will be able to make fewer deliveries and thus less money, and will still bike in unsafe ways.

Which leads me to reason number four...

4. E-bike licensing will lead to regular bike licensing.

Look, scapegoats are easily transferable.

It's e-bikers today, but it'll be all bikers next.

In the past 10-12 years, I've seen something like five or six separate attempts to license regular bikes.

Once the infrastructure is in place to license e-bikes, it will be easily transferable to regular bikes. (Because, you should know, the people behind this hate you, too.)

And that will further suppress cycling rates, which will bolster the case against building more bike lanes, and so on, back to reason number one, in an endless cycle until all the progress we've made to reclaim New York City's streets is lost.

We need e-bike regulations at the point of sale and laws that hold app companies to account for dangerous working conditions that cause unsafe riding -- but we can't fight for any of that if the bike community is divided.

Right now, we need ALL PEOPLE WHO BIKE to be in solidarity with people who ride e-bikes.

If aggrieved drivers -- and make no mistake, that is who is behind Bob Holden's bike licensing bill --- have divided us into "e-bikers" and "bikers" then we have already lost.

If you're ready to show solidarity, here's what you can do:

1. Call your Council Member and tell them you're opposed to bike licensing. Ask them to come to the table with smarter legislation that targets the systemic problems.

2. Show how powerful we are when we ride together.