I Wanted To Love EV Motorcycles. We Need Better Infrastructure

I feel like this article needs to come with several caveats, so you fully understand where I'm coming from. The first: I like EV motorcycles, how they ride, how they sound, and what they represent. So far, I've found things to enjoy about every one that I've ridden. I think there's a lot of potential there, as long as you're not expecting them to be like gas bikes.

I also like gas bikes. These are two different flavors of thing, and you can, in fact, like them both. Expecting one to be like the other, and making constant comparisons between the two is where I think we go wrong a lot of the time. Gas bikes can make extremely happy noises; I have been and will continue to be on record talking about the extremely happy triple noises that my Triumph Street Triple R makes. Love them!

But similarly, the extreme quiet and then light-speeder whooshing noises that a Zero SR/F can make when you really get on it are also extremely delightful; just in a different way. To me, it's a bit of a silly argument, like saying you can only eat one specific food for the rest of your life. Sometimes you're in the mood for noodles, and sometimes you're in the mood for chicken. And sometimes, you want noodles and chicken together, and that's when you get a Ninja 7 Hybrid (or not). I digress.

Now that we've established my position on these things, I'll also refer you to a long-term review series I did a few years back, when I had a Zero SR/F that I tried using for both city commuting and weekend spirited riding. For commuting, it was absolutely fantastic, and as Dork in the Road notes in his 2026 video with the DSR/X, that frunk holds more than you think it will. It also practically sips electrons as you meander at low speeds in traffic, and frequent stops at either stop signs or stop lights make your battery status bar look like you haven't even left wherever you parked.

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Even though, of course, you know that you have, and you can tell by how long you've been sitting in traffic.

For the weekend spirited riding portion of the assignment, we took it on some of our usual 150-ish mile routes, out into corn country and away from densely populated areas. Well, areas densely populated by humans; I'm sure there were plenty of cows and horses and chickens where we were. But you get the idea. While Illinois isn't known for having lots of elevation changes, you can find some nice, curvy, sweeping roads if you know where to look (which we do).

Big sweepers with very few humans usually equals faster speeds than you're going to hit in stop-and-go traffic. Sustained amounts of faster speeds will drain EV batteries much more quickly, as well. This necessitates having a workable plan to stop for charging while you're out; while I was very aware that I needed Level 2 charging to really make a fun ride practical, there were precious few places where I could look for it.

And like Dork in the Road here in 2026, I headed back to more populated areas to find that charging. More populated areas equals more public chargers, but of course that also means that there are potentially more other EVs out and about that might also want to use those public chargers just as much as you do. Also, some EV chargers may either not be working at all, or otherwise be inaccessible due to dumb modern-problems type of reasons (like DitR found with the Tesla app completely not seeing an entire bank of chargers in this video).

I know this isn't an apples-to-apples comparison. I was riding on roads; DitR did mixed trail and road riding. Chicago and the surrounding area aren't Eugene, Oregon, and the surrounding area. 2023 is not 2026, but that's honestly the reason I wanted to write about this video.

It's been three years since I did that long-term test of that Zero SR/F, but it doesn't seem like much has really changed in terms of making using EV motorcycles for fun (not just commuting) more enticing. Because the existing infrastructure (which may have improved somewhat, but not enough) is the way that it is, you either have to live with an incredible amount of anxiety about whether all the variables will work out in your favor, and you'll make it safely back home ...

... or you have to live with the fact that either you or a friend might have to come rescue your EV motorcycle with their big ol' truck, which may often be drinking copious amounts of either gas or diesel to get there. Your sentiments on why you're choosing electric or gas or diesel vehicles aside, there is no getting around the simple fact that both gas and diesel are quite expensive right now. Unless you're independently wealthy, those considerations matter.

I want these bikes to be able to stand on their own, and for people to be able to go out and ride them however they want. They're fun as heck, and I think more people need to give them a shot. Commuting is fine, because it usually drains the battery a lot less, and you're already planning to be parked for hours at either end of the journey, where you can hopefully plug in and slow charge (which is better for the battery than fast charging anyway).

But the practical, lived-experience limits on what you can do as a fun ride seem to still be a problem. And it's one that makes motorcycles like these a harder sell than I suspect they might be otherwise, simply on the merits of their riding qualities. It's not an insurmountable problem, but there needs to be sufficient will and action working in tandem if anything is going to improve.

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