I think it's kind of nuts that you let your child go that far, it's kind of cool though, like the 80s. I am in my 30s and wasn't allowed to go past my street until 3rd or 4th grade. My kids are 1st and 3rd grade and they are only allowed to go to the apartments around us to play with friends, within "dinners ready" yelling distance. no going to the parking lot or street due to the cars. But I'm in a decently urban area.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That all sounds incredibly dangerous.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/11/30/magazine/e-bikes-accidents-safety-legislation-california.html

Gift link, please - thanks!

"...e-bike injuries were far more serious than those sustained on conventional bikes. Maa says they were more like what’s seen in motorcycle crashes. A pelvic fracture, for example, was uncommon on a pedal bicycle — only about 6 percent of conventional cycling injuries. For e-bike crashes, though, it was 25 percent.

The most alarming difference was the fatality rate. “On a pedal bike, the chance of dying from an injury is about three-tenths of 1 percent,” Alfrey says. On an e-bike, the data indicated, it was 11 percent.

These findings signaled what was unfolding around the country. During the same four-year period when nationwide sales quadrupled, e-bike injuries increased by a factor of 10, to 23,493 from 2,215, according to the National Electronic Injury Surveillance System. A study by the University of California, San Francisco, found that from 2017 to 2022, head injuries from e-bike accidents increased 49-fold."

Its a motorized bicycle. A motorcycle.

Its like a 50cc scooter, potentially with higher torque and acceleration!

We should require a license, no younger than 15… maybe 14.

Anonymous wrote:In our area, middle school boys ride e-bikes. As the parent of a 5th grader, I can’t imagine giving a 7 year old an e-bike to ride. SO dangerous.

You have to be out of your mind to give an e-bike to a middle school kid.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That all sounds incredibly dangerous.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/11/30/magazine/e-bikes-accidents-safety-legislation-california.html

Gift link, please - thanks!

Anonymous wrote:In our area, middle school boys ride e-bikes. As the parent of a 5th grader, I can’t imagine giving a 7 year old an e-bike to ride. SO dangerous.

+1!
And our area seems pretty ebike forward. Most get theirs at 13/14, though many of their friends still have regular bikes at those ages

In our area, middle school boys ride e-bikes. As the parent of a 5th grader, I can’t imagine giving a 7 year old an e-bike to ride. SO dangerous.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Pfft. We would not allow 16 year old on an e-bike. Good way to get killed.

+1.

We don't play "keep up with the Jonses". We do "arrive alive".

Preach!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Are these kids his age? Just want to say yikes - that is not safe for kids or healthy. They should be doing this stuff for exercise. They're not an adult trying to commute to work.

Yes! They are all 7-8 (2nd grade). There’s two main roads that are busier in the neighborhood and then various quiet loops. We live on a main road so he’s allowed around our loop but not allowed to cross the main road and explorer outside the loop with various culdesacs etc.

It sounds like we live in the same neighborhood! A second grader with an e-bike is insane. A couple of the boys in the “e-bike group” are a hot mess in school too.