D.C. pumps the brakes on e-bike speeds to fight crime

D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser said she advocated for lower speeds on electric bikes after the shareable rides were linked to crime throughout the city.

Ms. Bowser said her administration had been noticing the e-bike connection in some types of theft, prompting her team to approach e-bike providers Lime and Veo about the issue. 

“Anecdotally, we have some concerns about some of the shared transportation equipment being used to commit crimes,” the mayor said Wednesday at a press event on the Metropolitan Branch Trail in Northeast. “I read a lot of police reports, and I know there is some misuse of the bikes.”

Police have noted that e-bikes help muggers strike quickly on the street.

Metropolitan Police said two people riding on a single e-bike carried out a snatch-style robbery on Oct. 29 in Foggy Bottom.

Earlier that month, police said four suspects on e-bikes attacked and robbed a victim in the 1000 block of Georgia Avenue Northwest.

And a September robbery near Union Market involved an e-bike rider stealing a moped at gunpoint.   

Lime and Veo said in separate statements that the District Department of Transportation contacted the companies about reducing their maximum speeds. Lime lowered its e-bike speeds from 20 to 18 mph, with Veo going from 18 to 15 mph. 

DDOT Director Sharon Kershbaum said the city also created temporary slow zones, including at U Street Corridor, Navy Yard, Chinatown and The Wharf, where the electric bikes will go only 8 mph.

All of those neighborhoods are or were juvenile curfew zones, forbidding unaccompanied minors in the area after 6 p.m. 

Those are on top of citywide juvenile curfew, which went back into effect following a chaotic Halloween night melee in Navy Yard that saw National Guard troops separating feuding youngsters. The curfew kicks in each night at 11.

The District’s move to lower e-bike speeds follows a study published last month revealing a potential link between electric scooters and higher crime rates.

The study found that as neighborhoods begin seeing more electric scooters, the number of car break-ins and snatch-and-grab thefts of purses, jewelry and other grabbable items increases.

Other cities, such as Cincinnati, went further than the District by closing bikeshare and e-scooter stations downtown to curb a rash of summertime break-ins at parking garages.