Literally the only criticism I have about my longtail cargo ebike is that the bike shop culture is still dreadful about them. Many flat scoff and tell you they refuse to do ANY kind of work on any ebike that they didn't themselves sell. It's so ridiculous. I went to my local shop after accidentally popping a piston out and did a surprise full bleed during a brake pad change and asked if they could just top of me off or loan me a funnel, and they went on a whole rant about "insurance" because of the battery (which is removable you dumbasses) and how "specialty mechanics" tools were needed for that kind of thing. Nope, it was just a $20 kit from Amazon and some mineral oil.

Other than that it is a dream. Fits four fullly-loaded grocery bags in the panniers and could easily be expanded with a front/tail basket, cargo net, passenger/child seats, etc.. Easily takes me around town, typically with shorter trips than driving thanks to it being uncongestable and my full comfort with the Idaho stop. I also don't need to find and pay for parking, aside from the occasional place that makes it remarkably hard to lock up your bike through unintentional hostile design choices.

Anecdote aside, I can basically do all necessary service work on it myself, in the climate controlled living room. And the good eBike brands have very responsive customer support, in my experience.

For $2 grand all in, I have a vehicle that serves me better than the car rotting in my driveway. I often go months between cranking the ignition on it. I'd even be able to get lumber on the ebike if I got a cargo trailer if not for the fact that you have to take sidewalks for much of that route because it's on an insane stroad.

I need about 100,000 people in my city to get these and saturate the streets before I get one because thats about how many it'll take before the bike thieves get their fill and they become less stolen. I'd give that about 5 minutes, locked up at a bike rack, before someone came by with tools and took it.

They are cool, though!

Unfortunately, I live on the second floor and winters over here have a lot of snow and such. I need my car.

Fortunately, I chose to live somewhere where I'm comfortable doing groceries by foot. So I can avoid using my car as often as possible.

Once I have my own garage, or my city comes up with some king of cargo bike share thing, and I get rid of my car, then I'll definitely use this super often.

I was a very happy bicyclist for 3 years that had a carriage. Of course my only problem was that the carriage wasn't big enough for big purchases.

But knowing that I got to shop and put groceries and stuff in the carriage, riding around car-insurance free, gas-free and the only repairs I had to worry about didn't amount to an arm and a leg like it would a car. My only other problem is that I picked the wrong bike type which was a one-speed so there was struggle.

Either way, I'd love to have that again.

Study finds that once people use ~~cargo~~ bikes, they like their cars much less.

In my experience, the joy of just riding a bike makes people like their cars much less. You simply can't enjoy the outdoors, your city, or your commute while stuck in a car.

Bike oriented Germany my ass.

This has been my experience. I was surprised by how much I prefer biking, especially for the feeling of freedom.

Also, it's surprising what you can carry on a cargo bike. I carried our Christmas tree on a cargo bike this year. Also do all my shopping, including big costco trips. People are too quick to imagine limits that don't exist in practice.

If ever I live in a city with adequate bike infrastructure and in an apartment with proper bike parking/storage, I'm immediately going to buy a cargo bike. They seem like so much fun to ride, and I'd love to push the limits of what one can carry by bike.

I really have no need for a cargo bike though, to be honest. My front + rear racks with a cheap set of rear panniers and some bungie cords have rarely failed to meet my needs.

This is the way.