In my experience bikes with Bosch/Bafang motors/batteries will be more reliable and easier to find service for. There are many brands/options/price points with that constraint.
Your point #1 was the case for our family as well. E-bikes allowed us to go from two cars to one car which has been amazing. So many of these conversations get caught up in ban bikes vs. ban cars and it is exhausting.
Lots of info from NHTSA [1]. Like many complex things, it's tricky. "While the presence of a red light camera system has reflected increased numbers of lower impact rear end crashes at intersections where the systems are installed resulting from drivers stopping for the red light, research has also found a reduction in more dangerous offset and right angle crashes at intersections with red light cameras".
In general it seems like a win to me but if you get into technicalities then yes, some research has shown more low-impact rear end collisions. They go on to say "Additional studies may provide greater insight into whether or not such crashes persist where the technology is in place for longer periods of time. The effect of warning signs, public education, and familiarity with the presence of the system in the fullness of time is not clear."
Income based fines are used elsewhere [1] to try and counter some of these issues. Not sure of the barriers for this type of approach in the US but I think it would be more effective than flat fines with leniency for lower-income offenders which seem to be the approach often taken.
For the CA bill: "People who meet certain income or housing criteria can also receive deductions of these fines anywhere from 50 to 80%." [2] This seems much less effective than something that is based on income.
There are some potential constitutional barriers to income based fines in the US such as the excessive fines clause: “Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.”
Of course we don’t know how courts will rule on this since it hasn’t been tried.
I struggled with the same search and ended up getting the AirGradient DIY Pro Kit Pre-Soldered. Not quite plug and play but the steps to get it up and running are fairly straightforward. Just plug parts in, drop some firmware on, and go. Curious what other suggestions are out there because I would still like something simpler!
At least in the US gas taxes and usage fees don't come close to covering the cost of roads [1,2]. In the US all of us pay for roads through other taxes because the use fees and taxes don't cover the cost of the infrastructure.
The citation provided further down in the article is [1]. Dr. Olive is thorough in attempting to remove sources of bias and conducts a set of fully double blind listening tests in order to come to the conclusion: "The results provide evidence that trained listeners preferred the headphones perceived to have the most neutral, spectral balance".
> A good test for intermodulation distortion (the big white elephant in the audio room) will REALLY give you a hint of which headphone will be least annoying to the ear when listening to loud complex music like classical music, vocal music, etc.
I second this recommendation. Chapter Two of Dr. Toole's book is titled "Preserving the Art" and directly addresses the concerns you're raising. He uses a great quote at the end of this chapter:
"Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted".
- Einstein
Dr. Toole then spends 500 pages addressing how you can correlate objective and subjective evaluation of loudspeakers. It's a great read.
> Can you really quantify nonlinearities from a sin sweep of any sort? Not that I'd expect a decent set of headphones to have material nonlinearities unless seriously overdriven.
You can using a properly structured log sine sweep but not with a linear sine sweep. This is why the paper mentions "Log sine sweeps rather than linear sine sweeps were employed to allow verification that non-linear distortion components were virtually absent."
