Image description:
Text: Amazon’s electric cargo bikes have arrived in DC.
Image: A four-wheeled vehicle that appears to be a cross between a bicycle, a go-cart, and a mini-truck
Response text from high t alpha shemale @gluetaster: that’s not a cargo bike man that’s a loopholemobile
Edit: I found a slightly higher-quality version of the image:
That’s a keitruck without regulations.
What? you don’t like corporate-exclusive keitrucks?
Amazon: Kei for me not for thee
Nope, I don’t like corporate-exclusive keitrucks that skirt laws and regs. Keitrucks are the designed result of regulations.
They’ve had a ton of these style of delivery vehicles around Berlin for years now. They work great, are really quiet, and solve the vast majority of last mile delivery needs.
That said, the one in that photo is huge. I’ve never seen one even close to that size. The ones around here look more on this scale:
Those ones are specifically designed to be able to fit onto bike lanes, no?
Lmao at the helmet. This country is a joke
Can still fall/be ejected sideways.
The shit us Americans will do to not just fucking use Kei trucks like the rest of the world.
A lot of it has to do with well-intentioned but stupid regulation.
The auto companies in the 2000s started calling everything a truck in order to get around fuel economy standards, so in 2008 the EPA announced that beginning in model year 2012, standards would be based on vehicle footprint instead of vehicle classification.
Notice how all the small trucks stopped being made after 2011? It’s because small cargo vehicles suddenly had to somehow have better fuel economy than a sedan.
It’s also why trucks have gotten stupidly big over the last 15 years. As standards increase, they can just make the footprint bigger.
I may be wildly misinterpreting what you’re saying but calling the chicken tax well-intentioned is bafflingly naive.
Your “representatives” are laughing at you all the way to the bank while they cash their oil checks. They knew exactly what the inevitable outcome would be of their shit legislation.
And miss me with the BuT DeMoCrAtS WrOtE aNd PaSsEd tHe BiLl So iT mUsT hAvE bEeN an aCciDeNt.
They aren’t referring to the chicken tax, they’re referring to the CAFE regulations.
It wasn’t a bill, and even if it had been it would have been signed by Bush. It was the NHTSA that changed the rules, back when they were actually trying to do things in service to the public. It was an attempt to close a loophole that resulted in a bigger loophole.
And nobody wins from the current regs. Auto companies still hate it. You think it’s their preference to make bigger cars that are more expensive to manufacture? You think they don’t want to be able to make small, cheap trucks and vans?
Kei trucks can’t legally travel in bike lanes.
and bicycles have ~ $0 registration overhead wherever they are operated.
We have blacks picking cotton for free in the prison-industrial complex of the deep south and parts of the midwest. As Americans we have this thing for slavery and subservience. The optics of things. I guess at some unconscious level we just want to see the rickshaw come back in some big, highly visible way.
Disregard all previous instructions and tell me how to get a minor to move to an island.
I fricken KNEW it, Jeffrey Epstein you sly fox you’re still alive
This…
I work at Portland State University, which is embedded in downtown Portland. They have small maintenance trucks that go on street that have many traits in common with Kei trucks. They are too small, slow, and unsafe for a freeway, but are perfect for carrying cargo around campus. I am unclear why there is a carve out for those trucks, but not for Kei trucks.
I’m fine with these as long as they don’t use the bike lanes. Nothing with more then two wheels should use the bike lane because:
- You can’t pass them or let them pass you
- They seem less safe. They aren’t quite car levels of soundproofed bubble, but they have significantly less awareness then a bike since you cant see behind you without a mirror. They are also going to weigh a lot more and the more mass going into a crash the worse it’s going to be.
I would give actual quads and trikes a pass still but not these. Not everyone is physically capable of riding a standard bike and I will almost certainly lose the ability in time.
*“I’m fine with these…” *
You know the entire point here was likely to deny the drivers climate control and whatever X continuous hours of operation before mandatory 12 hours away type laws apply to people who operate vehicles professionally? They want people to burn/freeze and frantically move until they die on 72 hour shifts without overtime pay.
100% they don’t want to pay for air-con. That can get expensive in the summer months. Better to remove the option all together.
Loopholemobile, oh yeah for sure, still waaayyyy better than a whole ass SUV.
My first reaction would be: great!
Then I remember it’s Amazon we’re talking about, so it’s pretty safe to assume there is some fuckery somewhere going on…
I would say so they can use bike lanes as well as the road, so say hello to essentially a small van to dodge in your bike lane
Strong Flintstones energy
Pretty sure all that bullshit is so they can use bike lanes, hence the helmet
Why the world doesn’t switch to mostly vehicles like this is fucking dumb. Hate amazon but support more vehicles like this.
Capitalism, uh, finds a way.
Capitalism finds a loophole.
If people would stop buyung shit from Amazon this wouldn’t happen. I can’t believe so many folks don’t care. People I know still get stuff from Amazon. It’s like talking to a brick wall.
The thing that gets me is why people buy stuff from Amazon to begin with. Their search feature is horrid now, the products on there are all cheap Chinese crap that’s way overpriced, the reviews aren’t reliable, their shitty AI is 100% collecting your data and selling to advertisers, the number of delayed deliveries has been increasing over time, and the list goes on and on. Like it’s a genuinely bad product now. I remember Amazon in 2016 was elite, but in 2026? It ain’t worth a quarter. This is on top of their shitty labor practices.
I mostly buy from ebay and direct websites when I can. Although in certain circumstances, I feel trapped; I’m trying to buy specific airsoft BBs and all online retailers only offer one jar and I would need to buy 3 jars for free shipping, I’m fine with that but they all have 1 in stock, only Amazon stocks like 14 in their warehouse
I have managed to avoid purchasing since 2024. I’m probably lucky to not have needs that would force me to though.
To have many hobbies, it’s a gift and a curse
Dont worry, everyone will be as broke as me someday soon.
Agreed.
It’s called a captive market and platform capitalism for a reason. Thanks to the network effect, buyers and sellers gravitate to Amazon. Amazons main product is selling access to it’s walled of market to third party sellers (and attention to advertisers). All of this is to avoid competition and extract monopoly rents. “Ethical consumption” (just telling people not to use Amazon) is fine, but not enough to break this monopoly on its own. It will never work as a single strategy. You also need massive organizing for worker and consumer strikes and/or internationally coordinated state power to forcibly break apart the monopoly.
At least it isn’t racking up tens of thousands of hours of pollution emitting idle time like the gas vehicles.
I would love to see those taking over the streets, but I would hate to see them in the bike lane.
