(Radio Iowa) – The executive director of the Iowa Bicycle Coalition says there needs to be more regulation on one of the hottest new type of bikes rolling around Iowa. Luke Hoffman says electric bikes and gravel road riding are the top two trends in the industry. “I do know that like probably the majority of bikes being sold right now are E makes and that’s something that presents both a challenge and an opportunity, right? Because E bikes can go really, really fast, and they tend to be heavier, so it’s important that we, you know, think about safety and how we regulate these things moving forward,” he says. E bikes are pedaled, but you can get an assist from the electric motor. Hoffman says there’s a problem as some of the models are E bikes in name only, and riders are causing problems by speeding past regular riders.

“Some of these E bikes that are the worst offenders. I would say in my experience and what I’ve been seeing, because I hear these stories all the time, is that they’re not necessarily E bikes per se, but they’re motorcycles disguised as E bikes by probably a manufacturer that’s not selling in good faith, probably direct to consumer on social media targeting young adults,” Hoffman says. Hoffman says some of them don’t even have working pedals. He says the riders of these fake E bikes can give the riders of the real thing a bad name. “So I would just caution that you know, it’s not always the E bikes that are the worst offenders,” he says, ” It’s really motorcycles that are sold as E bikes that we need to better regulate and kind of close the loophole is the way I see it.”

Hoffman says we’re all subject to the same rules of the road, and we all have a mutually important obligation to that for safety purposes.