Fatbikes as a threat to civilisation
...at least to Dutch civilisation.
If ‘A Clockwork Orange’ was set in Amersfoort or Bergen op Zoom in 2024, Alex and his droogs would ride Fatbikes. They would slouch moodily on the seats as they zipped between pedestrians, playing Beethoven on their mobile phones and scowling at anything that smelled of authority.
There’s admittedly nothing new about indolent, aggressive youths finding another way to annoy or menace society. But for the Netherlands the Fatbike is a different type of menace, and one that threatens to destroy Dutch civilisation. No, really. Fatbikes could mean the end of the Netherlands. I’ll explain.
Back when I was at school we had genuine skinheads who spent every breaktime nipping to the back of the sports hall for a crafty cigarette and a bit of moody sneering at each other. Earlier British generations had to contend with teddy boys or mods and rockers, each sorry lot in turn covering up their teenage zits with confected attitude and an adolescent’s intention to shock. In the Netherlands, this same demographic has found a way to zoot around at insane speeds, toking on a joint and igniting a furious debate about how to stop the menace.
For those who have never had to dodge them on a Dutch street, a Fatbike is a type of e-bike that resembles a child’s drawing of a motorbike. It has grotesquely swollen tyres, a long seat, and is usually ridden by a wannabe hooligan. While other e-bikes have a motor to back up the pedals, a Fatbike has pedals so it can pretend it is not a full-blown electric scooter. Although they have speed limiters, these are easily over-ridden, allowing them to reach crazy speeds. Many are imported illegally from China.
The first way they are a menace is obvious. They are dangerous, and generally ridden by people that you would not trust with a sharpened spoon. Recent figures from just 17% of Dutch hospital emergency rooms showed that 115 people were treated in the first months of this year after a Fatbike accident. Half were aged 12 to 15. 15% of those hospitalised were hit by one of these idiot machines. As Fatbikes proliferate more and more people will be hospitalised by high speed collisions with feckless riders.
There’s been an understandable outcry. VeiligheidNL, the road safety organisation, wants the minimum age for Fatbike use to be raised to 16 (the same as for a moped), and for helmets to be made compulsory. Members of all three current coalition parties have echoed these calls. One PVV MP said the Netherlands ‘was screaming for measures to stop souped up fatbikes… We can’t go on like this.’
And this gets to the heart of the second, more existential reason why Fatbikes are a menace.
The Netherlands is a fragile place, a miraculous country that has been built by the hard work of generations who have battled nature and arm-wrestled water. What was once marsh and swamp has been drained and forged into a terrific little country. The engineering to do this - whether dykes, windmills or extraordinary estuarine barriers - has been backed up by a sociopolitical set-up called the polder system.
At its heart, the polder system is a way of making sure that everyone puts their shoulders to the wheel to keep the water out. Everyone has a voice, everyone is heard, everyone has a responsibility. There is a resolute fairness that underpins Dutch society, and nothing quite exemplifies this as much as its cycling culture.
Famously, the Dutch royal family is a ‘cycling monarchy’, meaning that even the royals never get ideas above their station. Former prime minister Mark Rutte used to turn up to work every day on his bike, clutching a briefcase full of critical matters of state. Cycling isn’t just fun, convenient, and environmentally friendly: it unites the nation, makes them feel that they’re all equal, and in doing so helps to keep the water out.
The Fatbike menace spits in the face of this, and not just because of the latent hooliganism of its riders, often on cycle lanes where others are simply going about their business. Attempts to muzzle the menace inadvertently undermine the foundations of egalitarian Dutch cycling culture, not least because politicians are finding it hard to define exactly what a Fatbike is. For instance a decision that you need a helmet to ride any form of e-motorised bike would be impractical and - to many Dutch - illegitimate. Mandatory insurance would affect normal cyclists but be ignored by those who are causing the problems.
Lying at the bottom of this murky pond is also an unspoken truth that a large proportion of Fatbikes are ridden by youths from ethnic minorities. This is immediately evident on a walk through any Dutch town or city. It is the obvious undertone to discussions about the menace, and yet it is almost never explicitly remarked upon. If the Fatbike menace ends up eroding Dutch cycling culture, this will necessarily impinge upon questions of integration and immigration, as well as law and order.
If cycling fails, if Dutch society divides, if a pillar of equality is lost, then the social foundations of all those efforts to keep out the water will also be undermined. This, at a time when the seas are rising and the great rivers that cut through this flat, low land are swollen with flood waters. The Fatbike menace could destroy Dutch civilisation and see this great country washed into the North Sea.* I’m not kidding.
* This is in essence a rather simplified Fatbike version of one of the main arguments of my book, ‘Orange sky, rising water’. I’m nearly finished writing the first draft!