It’s important to consider cost/value holistically instead of just the upfront dollar amount. $1500~ for a cargo ebike is an intimidating number that I wouldn’t have imagined paying for a bike five years ago. It’s replacing a car which costs me $1500~ per year in registration and insurance premiums. My yearly fuel costs on the bike are less than refueling my car once, and I was doing that biweekly. Any repair on my bike is a few hundred dollars at most, doable at home without expensive tools, while repairing the fender on my car cost $2000 and spiked the insurance rate. I never need to take a taxi or use our inefficient public transit, and the time I spend on it is really fun because the motor cuts out all the shitty parts of biking. It’s inexpensive in the larger sense that it makes travel time rewarding instead of passive or punishing, on top of the boots theory of poverty where my cheap car becomes expensive when I have to actually use it and then replace all the shit on it. My ebike is inexpensive because it makes the rest of my life inexpensive and gives me my time back.
I can’t afford the upfront amount either so I just paid in installments, the monthly payments being cheaper than my car insurance. My upfront cost was like $100, the cost of taking an uber three times.
Which has all the ongoing expenses and limitations of a road vehicle. The point of ditching a car is to get rid of the debt trap, infrastructure, and experience of using it. My coworker’s moped might be more powerful than my bike, but I can ride anywhere more or less silently while she’s stuck in traffic breathing exhaust fumes as the smallest thing on the road.
Anyone and their dog can keep a Honda running. You spend 3USD replacing the oil every 1500 km or so, 2 on brake shoes, <50USD tires if you want the good one. It gets 170 mpg. 10 years operating expenses still doesn’t touch $1500.
silently
Electrics exist, center-engine, chain drive ones can be quite nice, if a bit boring.
stuck in traffic
Filter to the front at lights, split if traffic permits.
It’s important to consider cost/value holistically instead of just the upfront dollar amount. $1500~ for a cargo ebike is an intimidating number that I wouldn’t have imagined paying for a bike five years ago. It’s replacing a car which costs me $1500~ per year in registration and insurance premiums. My yearly fuel costs on the bike are less than refueling my car once, and I was doing that biweekly. Any repair on my bike is a few hundred dollars at most, doable at home without expensive tools, while repairing the fender on my car cost $2000 and spiked the insurance rate. I never need to take a taxi or use our inefficient public transit, and the time I spend on it is really fun because the motor cuts out all the shitty parts of biking. It’s inexpensive in the larger sense that it makes travel time rewarding instead of passive or punishing, on top of the boots theory of poverty where my cheap car becomes expensive when I have to actually use it and then replace all the shit on it. My ebike is inexpensive because it makes the rest of my life inexpensive and gives me my time back.
That’s great and all - but only for those who can afford the upfront amount, isn’t it?
I can’t afford the upfront amount either so I just paid in installments, the monthly payments being cheaper than my car insurance. My upfront cost was like $100, the cost of taking an uber three times.
You can get a new 125cc motorbike for that.
Which has all the ongoing expenses and limitations of a road vehicle. The point of ditching a car is to get rid of the debt trap, infrastructure, and experience of using it. My coworker’s moped might be more powerful than my bike, but I can ride anywhere more or less silently while she’s stuck in traffic breathing exhaust fumes as the smallest thing on the road.
Anyone and their dog can keep a Honda running. You spend 3USD replacing the oil every 1500 km or so, 2 on brake shoes, <50USD tires if you want the good one. It gets 170 mpg. 10 years operating expenses still doesn’t touch $1500.
Electrics exist, center-engine, chain drive ones can be quite nice, if a bit boring.
Filter to the front at lights, split if traffic permits.