Last year, after a growing number of complaints about delivery workers using electric bikes, as well as a story on WNYC, Mayor de Blasio said he'd take action. He directed the NYPD to issue more $500 summonses to individuals for riding them, and he called for a crackdown on the businesses that employ e-bike delivery workers.
And he seems to be making good on his promise.
Since January 1 to April 1 of this year, the NYPD has issued 459 moving summonses for riding e-bikes and seized 320 e-bikes. And according to the Office of Administrative Trial and Hearings (OATH), more than 70 businesses have been ticketed for employing electric bike delivery workers. That's outpacing 2017, when the NYPD issued nearly 1,800 tickets to individuals and virtually none to businesses.
But workers, many of whom are from immigrant communities, said they're feeling targeted by police, and that New York — a sanctuary city — is not protecting its most vulnerable citizens.
One of those individuals ticketed was Jiang Wen. The 53-year-old has been a delivery worker for the past two decades. Recently he got four tickets. Jiang and a dozen other e-bike delivery workers recently gathered at the Chinese Mutual Group Inc., a community center for Fujianese immigrants in Manhattan's Chinatown. Speaking in Mandarin, he said he feels singled out.
"I was just walking, I was not running a red light. I was walking with a delivery," he said. "The police officer often sees me, he's from the 17th Precinct. When he saw me he said 'Do you remember me?' He acted in a way as if we Chinese are easy targets."
“The police are too strict. Under such circumstances we cannot continue this type of work,” Zhang Yucai, 51, another e-bike delivery worker, told WNYC. He estimates he's racked up as much as $5,000 in fines and had his e-bike confiscated twice, in the past two years.
De Quan Lu is the head of the Chinese Mutual Group Inc. He helps workers pay their fines, or fight them in court. He's also met with representatives at City Hall about the crackdown.
"Our appeal is, such unreasonable practices should be stopped," he told the delivery workers at a recent community meeting. "We demand that electric bikes should be legalized. If electric bikes are not legalized, thousands of delivery workers will protest. We all must stand up to take actions."
He has an ally in City Council member Margaret Chin.
"We need to to get the electric bikes legalized," she said. "People can register them, get a license, buy insurance, and also invest in training programs to educate small business and the delivery workers on street safety. All these can be a comprehensive way to make the city safer and better."
Part of the anger and frustration for these workers is the seeming arbitrariness of the enforcement. Ticketing is up to the discretion of each police precinct.
"A summons is given based on the observation of a traffic violation and in no way based on the race or status of an individual," NYPD Lieutenant John Grimpel wrote in a statement.
But according to OATH, about half of the 194 summons processed so far this year were given to people with likely Hispanic names; 15 percent were given to people with likely Chinese names.
Meanwhile, the laws surrounding e-bikes remain murky: e-bikes with a throttle are illegal and can issue a $500 fine. But e-bikes known with pedal assist are legal — but that's not well publicized or widely understood. Both bikes have battery packs, and from a distance are difficult to tell apart.
“The City is constantly trying to strike the right balance when it comes to enforcement on e-bikes," Seth Stein, a spokesman for the mayor, wrote in a statement.
The mayor did recently issue guidelines reminding the public that pedal assist bikes are legal. But many delivery workers have already purchased e-bikes with throttles and aren't about to switch over. And restaurants expect the workers to make multiple deliveries to locations that can be many miles away from the actual restaurant.
As far as legalizing e-bikes, only the state can do that, and there is legislation pending in Albany that, if passed, would clarify their status. But similar legislation was proposed for the previous four years. It went nowhere.
For more on New York City's war on e-bikes and the delivery workers who use them, visit the newly re-launched Gothamist.