There is a vehicle on California's streets that looks vaguely like a bicycle, runs silently on electric power, and is being sold in shops as an e-bike. It is not an e-bike. It can reach 65 kilometres per hour, lacks functional pedals, and in many cases is being ridden by children who have no licence, no registration, and sometimes no helmet. Getting that distinction into law is now the stated goal of a fresh wave of California legislation, and the consequences of how the state resolves it will ripple well beyond its borders.
State Senator Catherine Blakespear has introduced Senate Bill 1167, legislation aimed at tightening California's oversight of electric mopeds and other higher-speed electrically powered two-wheelers that fall into grey areas of existing law. The bill's central mechanism is disarmingly simple: it would make it illegal to advertise, sell, offer for sale, or label non-electric bicycles, including motor-driven cycles and high-power electric versions, as "electric bicycles," with violations treated as false advertising under California's Business and Professions Code.
The vehicles at issue, reaching 40 to 50 miles per hour, come from manufacturers including Sur Ron, Talaria, and others, and are effectively light off-road motorcycles that often masquerade as electric bicycles due to their silent operation and small size. Under California's existing vehicle code, a legal e-bike must carry operable pedals and a motor rated at no more than 750 watts. These electric off-highway motorcycles are often inaccurately referred to as electric bicycles and have frequently been sold and advertised by retailers as such. The result is a regulatory gap that has allowed thousands of these machines to circulate on shared paths and bike lanes, often operated by teenagers who are legally too young to hold a driver's licence.
Senator Blakespear, in introducing the bill, said it would "close important gaps in California law that have allowed these fast motorized vehicles to proliferate and be inappropriately used by underaged and unlicensed operators." Her office has framed this not as a crackdown on cycling culture but as a defence of it: by drawing a clear boundary around what an e-bike actually is, legitimate low-speed electric bicycles would be protected from the regulatory backlash that high-powered machines have provoked in communities across the state.
That backlash is real. The swift rise in the popularity of e-bikes has led to an equally swift reaction, with local leaders conflating legal e-bikes with illegal e-motorcycles improperly sold as e-bikes, and in some cases imposing e-bike restrictions after incidents that had nothing to do with compliant electric bicycles. The distinction matters fiscally and practically: genuine e-bikes require no registration, insurance, or licence, making them affordable transport for families, commuters, and low-income riders. Treating them as quasi-motorcycles would extinguish much of that value.
The bill has drawn notable support from groups that have been historically cautious about over-regulation. SB 1167 is co-sponsored by CalBike, PeopleForBikes, Streets For All, and Streets Are For Everyone. Their support signals that many in the cycling community see this proposal as protective of legitimate e-bikes rather than punitive toward them. CalBike Executive Director Kendra Ramsey described the bill as "commonsense legislation which preserves access to legal e-bikes while providing a path toward legal use for faster devices which exist in a dangerous grey area."
Not all proposed solutions have attracted such consensus. A separate proposal, California Assembly Bill 1942, has sparked significant pushback for potentially sweeping more broadly and requiring licensing for already street-legal, modest-speed electric bicycles. Critics have warned that mandatory plates or registration requirements could unintentionally burden everyday commuters and families using standard e-bikes, while doing little to address the specific high-powered vehicles involved in the most serious incidents. This is a legitimate tension: the desire to fix a genuine problem should not create a heavier regulatory burden on people doing nothing wrong.
Crucially, SB 1167 does not require licence plates, registration, or new insurance mandates for legal Class 1, 2, or 3 e-bikes. That is a meaningful and deliberate restraint. California's three-class system already draws graduated distinctions based on speed and motor type. Class 1 e-bikes provide pedal-assist up to 20 miles per hour. Class 3 e-bikes assist up to 28 miles per hour and carry the strictest existing rules, including a minimum rider age of 16 and mandatory helmets. The e-motos that concern Blakespear blow past all of those limits without being subject to any of them.
Local communities have already been improvising their own responses. Local pilot programmes are now underway under AB 1778 in Marin County and AB 2234 in San Diego County, where cities are testing stricter age and helmet requirements to reduce youth injuries. Assembly Bill 2234, signed into law in September 2024, allows local authorities within San Diego County to adopt ordinances prohibiting riders under 12 from operating Class 1 or Class 2 e-bikes, and cities including Chula Vista and Coronado have already opted in. These are sensible pilots, but patchwork local rules are no substitute for a coherent state framework.
The California legislature's struggles to define what an e-bike actually is may seem parochial, but the state has a well-documented tendency to set standards that others adopt. California's e-bike market is massive, and its policies often set the tone nationally. As high-powered electric two-wheelers become more common, the state faces a balancing act: preserving access to affordable, low-speed e-bikes that support climate and mobility goals, while addressing safety concerns tied to faster, more motorcycle-like machines. Australian cities, which are grappling with exactly the same classification problems on shared paths and in school zones, would do well to watch how California's legislative session resolves this fight. The Australian Department of Infrastructure regulates power-assisted pedal cycles under different rules again, and the definitional blur between a legal e-bike and a moped-class machine is no less acute here than it is in Sacramento.
The reasonable outcome, when the legislative dust settles, is something like what SB 1167 proposes: a firm, enforceable definition of what an e-bike is, meaningful penalties for retailers who sell motor vehicles under a bicycle label, and targeted age and safety requirements aimed at genuinely high-risk vehicles rather than the family commuting on a sensible Class 1 machine. That approach protects both public safety and individual liberty. Regulatory clarity, in this case, is not a burden on the market; it is the condition under which the market can function honestly. The e-moto manufacturers who have benefited from the grey zone will push back. They should be heard, and then outvoted.