Now Legal E-Bikes Hit NYC Bike-Share: Patch Tests Them

NEW YORK, NY — The citywide crackdown on electric bikes may have made some New Yorkers hesitant to ride them. But now that some are officially legal, the city is giving cyclists a chance to ride with some extra help.

JUMP Bikes rolled out 100 "pedal-assist" e-bikes on Staten Island last week as part of the Department of Transportation's dockless bike-share program, and another 200 are set to launch in the Bronx this week. JUMP is one of four companies currently participating in the pilot program bringing bike-sharing to all five boroughs.

While riding a faster throttle-powered e-bike can still get cyclists slapped with a fine, a Department of Transportation rule took effect Saturday making clear that the pedal-assist variety is legal, so long as the motor turns on only when the rider is pedaling and turns off when the speed hits 20 MPH.

Patch took one of JUMP's pedal-assist bikes for a spin with industrial designer Michael Steiner near the company's Brooklyn Navy Yard space. Also along for the ride was Danielle Filson, a spokeswoman for ride-sharing giant Uber, which recently acquired the Dumbo-based company.

Riding is a lot like using a regular bike, just with less work. The motor gives a good kick almost instantly after you start pedaling. The harder you pedal, the stronger the kick — up to a point.

"Once you get on one, it's very easy and you just adapt quickly," Filson said. "It's not a game-changer, it's a life-changer."

New Yorkers living in JUMP's pilot zones can reserve one of the bright red bikes through the company's smartphone app, or check one out right on the street if it's not reserved. Rides cost $2 per 30 minutes and 7 cents for each additional minute.

The bikes look like the familiar blue Citi Bikes, but with a hefty contraption on the back that includes a built-in lock. Once you enter your assigned JUMP PIN number with the keypad on that contraption — along with your account number if you haven't reserved the bike — and take out the U-shaped lock bar, the bike is good to go.

Steiner, Filson and this Patch reporter took a quick summer afternoon jaunt to a bike rack in the Navy Yard, where we secured the bike with the U-lock as one would with any other cycle. As with the other dockless bikes, there's no need to seek out a specific docking station for parking purposes.

The ride ends once the lock is in place, but cyclists can pay to keep the bike on hold while they grab a coffee or run errands, Steiner said. That feature's helpful because e-bikes allow for further trips to "less convenient" locations, he said.

"If you get up to the top of the hill or wherever you are, three, four, five miles away, and then all of a sudden your bike isn't there anymore, you're stranding yourself further," Steiner said. "So the idea of having holds was so that you could actually make a significant trip."

JUMP tracks all the bikes' locations, meaning very few of them get stolen, Steiner said. It also means the app will warn riders who stray outside the pilot zones on Staten Island's North Shore and in the Central Bronx, Filson said.

There's a price to pay for flouting the rules. Ending a rental outside the pilot zone will get you a $25 fee, as will locking the bike to itself instead of a fixed object, Filson said. The penalty for losing the U-lock is $75.

Founded in 2010, JUMP has electric bike-shares in cities such as San Francisco and Austin but has just recently gotten to put its bikes on the road in its birthplace.

The company has a "Boost Plan" membership for certain low-income New Yorkers that offers 60 minutes of daily ride time for $5 a month for the first year, Filson said. Programs are also being explored with Uber Eats couriers, she said. E-bikes are often used by delivery workers, who have reportedly expressed concerns about the city's crackdown.

The dockless program has launched in Staten Island and the Rockaways, with launches scheduled for Monday in the Bronx and later this year in Coney Island — all areas the popular Citi Bike program has not previously reached. Another company, Lime, also has pedal-assist bikes in its dockless fleet.

JUMP isn't the only firm in the program related to a ride-sharing giant. Lyft recently acquired parts of Motivate, the parent company of Citi Bike, which will also provide dockless bikes in the Bronx.

Citi Bike took over in the Bronx for ofo, a Chinese bike-share company that withdrew from the dockless program earlier this month amid reports that it would shut down most of its U.S. operations.

Uber has integrated JUMP into its ride-hailing app in an effort to help commuters get around as quickly and efficiently as possible, Filson said. She called the merger a "perfect synergy" for Uber — which the City Council is looking to regulate more strictly because of concerns about how ride-sharing has exploded in the city.

"We're just trying to help people get from point A to point B, and sometimes that requires a bike to a train station to an Uber home," Filson said.

(Lead image: A JUMP Bike sits in the Brooklyn Navy Yard. Photo by Noah Manskar/Patch; Video by Danielle Filson)