Electric Oldies

The number of e-cyclists in the Netherlands has reached one million in 2012. Ten percent of all cycling kilometres (which total 1.3 billion km per year) are done by pedelec. Of all people in The Netherlands of over 60, 10% now own a pedelec. One fourth of all cycling kilometres made by this age group are on a pedelec. This also applies to women of 46-60 years. Pedelec ownership is even somewhat higher for this group than for the seniors, namely 13%. The number of cycling kilometres ridden by those aged 60 and above has risen remarkably in recent years, and this is particularly the case for women. Women in this age group cycled 50% more kilometres in 2010 than they did in 2000. This was not only because there were more people aged 60 and above, but also because of the advent of the pedelec. Each pedelec was found to be used for an average of 31km per week. This is significantly more than the 18 kilometre average for regular bikes. While the number of kilometres cycled on a normal bike decreases with advancing age, the number of kilometres cycled on a pedelec remains unchanged as the cyclist gets older. The Cycling Council also investigated how fast people cycle on a pedelec. The average is 18.7 km/hr (a bit slower for those aged 60 and above). That is certainly not very fast. Read more here.