Pulled by police on ebike

[kingsknight]

So cycling completely legally by the side of the road yesterday I was pulled over by traffic police to see if my bike was legal. Hampshire police need some training on e-bikes as the offer seemed a bit confused with what I was saying to him. They were very professional and friendly at all times but one of the officers believed e-bikes needed to be road registered (with tax/mot/insurance) and I needed a moped licence (which I have as I have a full motorcycle licence)

After a nice chat about how amazing ebikes are and a short check on the radio I was on my way.

Been driving for 20 years and this is the first time I've ever been pulled over and it happened to be on my Crossfuse haha!

Turned out that that we have a electric scooter misuse issue around here and the officer believed the same laws applied to ebikes as well as electric scooters. We do have a lot of electric scooters with seats on the road at the moment.

Another one of them strange things that has happened to me since owning an ebike lol

 

[sjpt]

I've been pulled over a few times in a car (never on a bike) on minor details. My favourite in a rental car; I was still doing things like working the wipers instead of the indicators in the first mile or so and was pulled over. I thought, well, I'm not driving perfectly but I'm sure I've not done anything that bad. Very red faced policeman came up; 'Sorry, sir, I didn't mean to flag you down, I'm in a new car and pressed the wrong button.'

 

[Fishy]

 

[vfr400]

How did they know it was an electric bike? It only goes when you pedal and it looks like a normal bike from both the front and the back, and even if they saw it from the side, an untrained person probably still wouldn't recognise it as electric. I don't ride very fast, I'm always looking to see if bikes are electric and I know what an electric bike looks like, but many times, in the time that I get to see a bike, I can't tell whether it's electric or not.

 

[anotherkiwi]

Last week I got pulled over in the Spanish Basque Country on my trike (un-powered). They were worried because I didn't have a large flag destroying my aerodynamics. I told them I didn't believe that a flag made me more visible at intersections which they grudgingly accepted.

<sexist remark alert> The female member of the duo was one of the cutest policewomen I have seen in quite a while. There is something about a woman in uniform...