Without trying to come across as full Luddite, I'm with Andy on this. I DO think that ebikes significantly lower the barrier to entry (cost aside) associated with mountain biking. They DO make climbing easier. They DO make it easier for riders of all skill and fitness levels to cover more ground than they otherwise would be able to, in a given timeframe. And this DOES impact trail systems. On one hand, ebike adoption increases the potential user base - encourages more people to get out and ride. That is a hypothetical, but it is being borne out in many areas. On the other hand, ebikes enable a given number of users to hit more laps, or access longer rides. This is absolutely happening. The impact that this has on regional trail systems near urban centers that are already faced with a high number of users is being felt.
That impact can be measured in the usual ways; trail degradation and user conflicts. Both of these barometers get skewed when the number of new users increases, and those new users have little to no understanding of what came before, nor any real context to enact considerate trail etiquette. Without getting into any NIMBY stuff or good/bad posturing, we are going to have to find some way to mitigate these impacts in order to maintain access to trails in areas where these impacts are most being felt. Can't exactly put this horse back in the barn.
My own take - as a dirt bike rider, mountain biker, hiker - is that there is no one size fits all solution. There are plenty of underpopulated places where all user groups can coexist easily. There are also plenty of more urban, heavily impacted trail systems where sacrifices will inevitably be made. What may be alarming is that in those heavily impacted trail systems, it won't be just ebikes getting regulated. And it would be naive to assume that there wasn't already plenty of animus against mountain bikers in those places, regardless of whether there is an assist or not.
Sept. 13, 2023, 11:29 a.m. - Mike Ferrentino
Without trying to come across as full Luddite, I'm with Andy on this. I DO think that ebikes significantly lower the barrier to entry (cost aside) associated with mountain biking. They DO make climbing easier. They DO make it easier for riders of all skill and fitness levels to cover more ground than they otherwise would be able to, in a given timeframe. And this DOES impact trail systems. On one hand, ebike adoption increases the potential user base - encourages more people to get out and ride. That is a hypothetical, but it is being borne out in many areas. On the other hand, ebikes enable a given number of users to hit more laps, or access longer rides. This is absolutely happening. The impact that this has on regional trail systems near urban centers that are already faced with a high number of users is being felt. That impact can be measured in the usual ways; trail degradation and user conflicts. Both of these barometers get skewed when the number of new users increases, and those new users have little to no understanding of what came before, nor any real context to enact considerate trail etiquette. Without getting into any NIMBY stuff or good/bad posturing, we are going to have to find some way to mitigate these impacts in order to maintain access to trails in areas where these impacts are most being felt. Can't exactly put this horse back in the barn. My own take - as a dirt bike rider, mountain biker, hiker - is that there is no one size fits all solution. There are plenty of underpopulated places where all user groups can coexist easily. There are also plenty of more urban, heavily impacted trail systems where sacrifices will inevitably be made. What may be alarming is that in those heavily impacted trail systems, it won't be just ebikes getting regulated. And it would be naive to assume that there wasn't already plenty of animus against mountain bikers in those places, regardless of whether there is an assist or not.