They allow revelers simultaneously to drink and tour a city’s sights on wheels, but a German court has issued a clampdown on so-called “beer bikes,” branding them dangerous and a nuisance to other road users.
The bizarre contraptions hail from the Netherlands, but are a particular hit in Germany, where they are offered to tourists in 34 different cities. Beer bikes, also known as “pedal pubs” or “mobile conference tables,” allow up to 16 drinkers to sit around a beer-barrel table, help themselves to on-tap beer and listen to music while pedaling around the city. They are steered by a non-drinker employed by the operator. More than half of those who rent them are on bachelor parties.
The court in Dusseldorf issued the ban on Wednesday after complaints from other drivers about rowdiness. Complainants maintain that the bikes caused traffic jams, which intensified the longer a beer bike journey lasted — in effect, the more the revelers drank, the more their pedal power tended to be reduced.
The ruling means operators need to apply for special permission to use the bikes, which they are unlikely to get.
The operator, BierBike, said it would fight the ruling, which manager Udo Klemt said would destroy a “pure success story.”
The bikes have been rented no fewer than 150,000 times this year.
Klemt, who started the firm with a former Olympic water polo player after finding a Dutch manufacturer for the bikes, insisted they had never been involved in accidents in Germany and that those who steered them were vetted in advance.
The bikes are rented out for a minimum of two hours for 280 euros (US$390). Groups of riders are restricted to a maximum of 10 liters of beer an hour, with regular toilet breaks built into tours. Anyone who relieves him or herself in a public place is threatened with a 250 euros fine.
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