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NYC's e-bike speed limit to launch just before election, Mayor Adams says
By
Ramsey Khalifeh
Published Sep 24, 2025
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Leonardo Munoz/VIEWpress via Getty Images
By
Ramsey Khalifeh
Published Sep 24, 2025
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Mayor Eric Adams on Wednesday announced the city’s new 15 mph speed limit for electric bikes and scooters will go into effect Oct. 24, the day before early voting begins for the mayoral election.
Adams' office announced the proposed rule change in June, saying it would improve street safety. He said the new rule is in line with speed limits imposed on e-bikes in bike lanes throughout some European countries. The regulations were announced as the NYPD launched an enforcement blitz against conventional cyclists who break traffic laws.
Citi Bike lowered the 18 mph speed restriction on its e-bikes to 15 mph in June after First Deputy Mayor Randy Mastro wrote in a letter to the company that its e-bikes posed “an emergency threat to life and property.”
Adams has made long-standing concerns over e-bikes one of his key issues this year as he runs for re-election as an independent. E-bikes across the five boroughs have grown more controversial in recent years as more delivery workers ride the battery-powered two-wheelers.
“As more New Yorkers turn to e-bikes and e-scooters to get around our city, New Yorkers have asked us to set clear, consistent rules to address this issue and protect everyone,” Adams wrote in a statement Wednesday.
The mayor this summer threw himself into the center of a transportation fight in South Williamsburg by removing a parking-protected bike lane in a part of the neighborhood where he’s long curried political support from Orthodox Jewish voters. Adams is trailing far behind in polls for the November election, ranking fourth in most surveys after Democratic nominee Zohran Mamdani, Cuomo and Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa.
Regular bikes are not subject to the speed limit change and can continue traveling at 25 mph because “they are lighter devices compared to e-bikes, which are heavier due to their motor and battery, according to the adopted rule.
Adams in the city’s most recent budget instituted a new “Department of Sustainable Delivery” focused on traffic and vehicle safety as well as holding "delivery app companies accountable for public safety.”
Regulations on those delivery companies have become a central issue in the mayor’s race. DoorDash earlier this year donated $1 million to the Fix the City political action committee that’s backed former Gov. Andrew Cuomo mayoral bid.
Jon Orcutt, advocacy director for the nonprofit Bike New York and former policy director at the city transportation department, said the new rules won’t change the way the streets will look because it’ll be difficult to enforce the speed limit.
“Are we getting citywide signs that say 15 mph for e-bikes?” he said. “That’s how speed limits have traditionally worked. You have to tell people about them.”
Tagged
Politics
eric adams
new york city
public safety
transportation
Ramsey Khalifeh
Ramsey Khalifeh is a transportation reporter on the NYC Accountability desk covering the largest transit system in the country. He was previously a general assignment reporter at Gothamist and worked on the Boston Globe's metro and copy desk. Got a tip? Email [email protected]
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