Some building owners, mainly in New York City, are clamping down on
electric bicycles after a recent spate of damaging and deadly battery
fires.

E-bike advocates link the problems to batteries that are poorly
made, refurbished or improperly charged.
New York has seen "an exponential increase" in battery fires this
year, Daniel Flynn, chief fire marshal at the New York City Fire
Department (FDNY), said at a recent news conference.

Driving the news: A terrifying fire in an apartment building on
Manhattan's East 52nd Street this month sent 43 people to the hospital
and forced firefighters to rescue a woman dangling from a 20th-floor
window. The cause: An e-bike residents left charging by their front
door overnight.

In response, at least one large NYC landlord — Glenwood
Management, which runs 26 luxury high-rises — told tenants to
permanently remove any e-bikes.
"Our leases are also being amended to state that residents and/or
their guests are prohibited from having an e-bike in their apartment,"
Glenwood's notice to tenants said. "Additionally, we will not store or
maintain them anywhere else on the premises."
E-bikes and e-scooters are already banned from FDNY buildings.
Other cities have their own rules — in London, for instance, they're
barred from buses, subways and the Palace of Westminster, where
Parliament meets.

By the numbers: New York City has seen 200 lithium-ion battery fires
and six related deaths so far in 2022, the FDNY said. (There have been
76 overall fire-related deaths across the five boroughs so far this
year, per the New York Post.)

E-bike fires have caused "more deaths and injuries already this
year than in the past three years combined," Flynn said at the news
conference, per the Associated Press.

Backstory: The New York Public Housing Authority pledged to ban
e-bikes over the summer. However, it reversed itself after an outcry
over the city's army of 65,000 app delivery workers, or
"deliveristas," many of whom depend on e-bikes to do their jobs.

https://www.axios.com/2022/11/14/apartment-building-ban-e-bikes-battery-fire-micromobility-scooter