In the latest incident, in early August, a 5-year-old girl and a 36-year-old woman died after the battery of an electric moped - also referred to as scooters - exploded inside an apartment in Harlem. The proposal, announced in July, is meant to address a serious problem: the rising number of building fires linked to lithium-ion batteries. Most recently, the New York City Housing Authority has proposed banning the loosely defined category of “e-bikes” from public-housing apartments, where many delivery workers live. Yet in New York City, this burgeoning group of e-bike users has encountered hurdles, ones that raise complicated questions about who can access electrified transportation and how.
Here's Howĭelivery workers represent a significant share of the micromobility movement that’s taking hold worldwide as cities work to curb tailpipe emissions and reduce reliance on cars. To support our nonprofit environmental journalism, please consider disabling your ad-blocker to allow ads on Grist. Like Ajche, the vast majority of couriers rely on two-wheeled transportation - and, increasingly, battery power - to perform their gig work.
Some 65,000 people now ferry food, medications, bottles of wine, and clothing through the city’s crowded streets. These e-bikes make it a lot easier for us.”Ījche is the founder of Los Deliveristas Unidos, a collective of app delivery workers who advocate for better working conditions. “Using a regular bike before was really, really hard. “Sometimes for a delivery, you have to travel 30 blocks away, 50 blocks away,” Ajche says on a rainy afternoon in late August, during a pause between orders for the delivery apps DoorDash and Grubhub. The extra juice enables him to cover more ground in a job that is only growing more physically demanding as home deliveries surge. Riding a sturdy bicycle with fat tires, he zips beneath Manhattan’s soaring buildings, propelled by his two feet and the lithium-ion battery attached to the bike’s frame. On Gustavo Ajche’s busiest shifts, he can deliver takeout dinners and groceries to two dozen doorsteps across New York City. This story was originally published by Canary Media.
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