19th Precinct cracks down on e-bikes

By Madeleine Thompson

The NYPD’s 19th Precinct on the Upper East Side has recently stepped up their enforcement on electric bicycles, or e-bikes, which have long been a source of resident complaints. Several Twitter posts since the New Year show approximately 50 confiscated e-bikes at the 19th Precinct, as well as two trucks loaded with e-bikes being carted away.

Regular bicycles can be easily converted into e-bikes with the help of kits available for a few hundred dollars online. They are a favorite of bike messengers and delivery people, as they enable faster transportation. The kits themselves are legal, but e-bikes are not. According to state motor vehicle law, an electric bike “doesn’t qualify for a registration as a motorcycle, moped or ATV and doesn’t have the same equipment.” Since it can’t be registered, it’s against the law.

Valerie Mason, president of the East 72nd Street Neighborhood Association, is one of many Upper East Siders who feel their community is plagued by e-bikes. Mason’s organization put together a report card in December ranking restaurants by their messengers’ adherence to cycling law that nearly half of the restaurants failed. Restaurants who delivery people were seen using e-bikes got an automatic F.

“[The 19th Precinct] knows all about what we’ve been doing on the survey,” Mason said. “But they have been, independent of anything that we’ve been doing, picking up a lot of e-bikes within the area. Even without our survey the police have been working really hard to address the problem.” The neighborhood association hasn’t had any formal conversations with the 19th Precinct, she said, since they are in the process of finalizing the report. Councilmen Ben Kallos and Dan Garodnick have assisted them, and are hosting a workshop on commercial bike safety at the end of the month that the neighborhood association will sponsor.

Mason would like for the focus on ebike enforcement to be permanent, but understands that the police have other priorities. “Commercial cycling and electric bike use isn’t considered one of the seven major crimes,” she said. “They’ve got a lot on their plate.”

Madeleine Thompson can be reached at newsreporter@strausnews.com