Not bad, but these sorts of things always require you to buy the bike from a local shop, which exclude direct-to-consumer brands like Lectric and Rad Power Bikes that tend to be cheaper even without the subsidy than LBS-bought bikes are with it. As such, I consider these programs to be more about local economic development than they are about meaningfully increasing the number of e-bikes on the streets.
It’s good policy to keep tax money in the local economy, but there’s another reason to prefer subsidizing local bike shops: support.
Every bike requires maintenance to keep running, but most people don’t know how to take care of them. Things I’ve seen regular people do:
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They’ll oil the chain to keep it smooth rolling, which is good! But they never degrease the chain, creating artisanal grinding paste. A thousand kilometers/miles later they’ll get an expensive lesson when learning they need a new chain, cassette, and chainring. A lesson I just barely avoided with my cousin after I checked his chain wear (he’s on hot dip and drip wax now).
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They don’t understand brakes. It’s easy to glaze brakes in hilly areas, and doubly so with heavier ebikes. It’s common for new brakes to fall out of adjustment. It’s common for new mechanical brakes to have cable stretch. All of it results in squeaky, weak, or totally failed brakes in just a few weeks. Sometimes it’s just a worry with new riders, knowing that their brakes are the most important part of a bike. A friend got a class 3 ebike and was wondering if he needed to take it in for the brakes during a ride we took together. They were totally fine and my recommendation was to ride a few hundred more miles before taking it in for a tune-up.
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They don’t know you have to pump up your tires. Seriously. I ran into a young adult on the train with a pinch flat. He didn’t know you had to keep the tire pressures up and within a reasonable range. The best I could help was giving some pointers on tire pressures and some pump recommendations (he had space limitations).
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They don’t know when their fork is backwards. I helped another cousin’s car-less friend who got a great deal on a used bike, but it didn’t ride too great. Surprise, the fork was backwards. A quick adjustment of the stem, and some brake work too because of course those were also in poor condition, got her in a much more comfortable situation and back on the road.
The purpose of these programs is to get people onto ebikes. For many this is their first bike since childhood. They are interested and engaged, but they need help. That’s why these buy-local policies are important. A local bike shop will stand behind their work. Every LBS around me offers a free check and tune-up for a new bike. That’s the level of support required to keep a new rider on a bike for years.
You’re not wrong about that, but it’s just unfortunate that the subsidy isn’t large enough to actually make the up-front price for the LBS bike cheaper than the mail-order bike. If people were already struggling to afford something like a Rad or Lectric before, a subsidy for a bike that, at the end of the day, still ends up costing more than that doesn’t actually help them.
I agree the $300 level doesn’t land quite as hard with LBS compared to mail-order bikes. This is seen in the earlier program’s data:
“84 percent of applicants awarded $1,200 towards an e-bike purchase redeemed them, while just 24 percent of the applicants awarded a $300 rebate redeemed theirs. Expenditures on rebates during this pilot were $2.58 million out of an available $4.2 million.”
Still, a 24% voucher conversion rate isn’t nothing! And it did lift ebike sales, even if the voucher didn’t apply:
“The UW also found rebate offers substantially increased e-bike purchases: 92 percent of purchases in the income-qualified group and 70 percent in the non-income-qualified group were induced by the rebate, leading to an estimated 2,490 induced purchases overall. These results demonstrate that rebates are an effective tool for sparking new e-bike sales, particularly among lower-income households where larger incentives are needed.”
I’d consider that a successful program!
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Seems a bit odd to encourage only ebikes too. Should I get a tiny useless motor in my next bike just because it gets a discount on it? I wonder if you could set a dynamo to also run as a motor to give a useless amount of propulsion
E-bike motors are far from useless. They flatten hills (especially for heavy cargo bikes), help prevent you from showing up to work sweaty when commuting, make it easier to not pick the car on those days when you’re feeling lazy, speed up utility cycling trips, etc.
I take my kids to school every day on a cargo e-bike. Having tried it with my ‘acoustic’ bike and a trailer back when they were smaller, I can state for absolute fact that if my bike didn’t have a motor in it, they’d be getting driven in a car instead.
Also, just a friendly reminder: you’re entitled to your opinion, but misinformation is considered uncivil and therefore a violation of Rule 1. You can say that you don’t like e-bikes, or that you consider them “cheating” or whatever, but the notion that the motor is too small to make a difference is a false statement of fact.
I don’t think you understood the point I was trying to make. I didn’t say ebikes are useless or that I don’t like them. I don’t like that this only applies to ebikes and not regular bikes, then suggest adding a comically useless motor to a regular bike so it’s technically an ebike to get a massive discount on the price of the bike.
Ah, yeah, I read your initial comment as claiming that existing e-bikes actually being sold have uselessly-small motors, not hypothetically suggesting it as a way to game the subsidy.
I’m not sure such a scheme would work because even a comically under-spec’d system would add enough cost to mostly cancel out the subsidy.
I’m sympathetic to the rhetorical point that ‘acoustic’ bikes are worth subsidizing too, just as a matter of good public policy. But to be fair, it’s not necessary like it is for e-bikes because there are enough of those available used that you can afford one no matter how poor you are. For example, my ‘daily driver’ ‘acoustic’ bike, which I don’t use as much now that I have the cargo e-bike but nevertheless has served me faithfully for well over a decade at this point, I got for free from a co-op back when I was a poor college student.
I suppose if it gets more bikes on the road overall its an improvement. Here we have a cycle to work scheme but its mostly for execs to get big tax cuts on expensive bikes while regular workers get much smaller discounts. Also wish we had more classifications of ebike too, there is only 1 and it must be limited to 15mph 250w pedal assist. Next step up is comparable to a 50cc scooter and is a licensed/insured/registered vehicle.