His gears are really spinning.
The mayor of Como, Italy, has banned bicycles in the city, denouncing them as “beasts” — after he got hit with an electric one as he was leaving work.
Alessandro Rapinese will put a screeching halt on both e-bikes and pedal bikes on 30 streets in the popular lakeside city beginning next month.
Critics contend he’s speeding up the process because he himself was personally affected — which he admits.
“They accused me of adopting this measure because I was hit by an electric bike — and certainly, that was the case,” he told the Italian news agency Ansa.
“People act based on their own experiences, and I know what it’s like to be run over by those beasts … What if it had been a child or an elderly lady in my place?”
Rapinese, 50, recounted the harrowing experience, which occurred in July when he was leaving Palazzo Cernezzi, Como’s city hall, in the rain.
While he was walking, he suddenly heard a hissing sound, which turned out to be an e-bike going at full speed that “mowed him down,” he said on his channel RapiNews24.
The mayor then did a “360-degree somersault” and fell, resulting in a bruised and cut-up arm, which he showed in the clip.
His new ruling calls for cyclists to dismount and walk with their bikes on the aforementioned roads, many of which are wider ones favored by delivery drivers.
Critics say the ban strips residents of a low-cost, eco-friendly transportation option — and that by hitting delivery drivers, it will hurt local businesses too.
They also believe the government should be focusing on the reckless driving of bikes instead of banning them altogether.
Nova Como, a local civic association, has already pushed back by organizing a protest bike ride to city hall on Sept. 12.
But Rapinese, an Independent elected in 2022 whose term ends next year, is standing his ground.
“We are convinced that this is the right decision,” he told Ansa.
“Just as the 2022 move to ban electric scooter rentals — ahead of other European cities — was.”
