Originally posted by Rowan
Our old State Bike Advisory Committee did a bit of research on bike registrations at the behest of the motoring community who used that old and discredited argument that cyclists don't pay to use the roads. On a space pro-rata basis (ie, bikes take up such a fraction of space compared with motor vehicles), the revenue would fall far short of the admin costs. And what would you do with the revenue? I think some would say spend it on bike paths... which sort of defeats the purpose of a road registration system for bikes. Anyway, our car owners pay something like a AUD$45-a-year motor vehicle tax, plus another AUD$50 for registration. That doesn't buy much road space in my book.
Nor does it cover their subsidised fuel, but I digress.
This is a tired old argument that's been run so many times it's just a joke. As I've said many times before, I'd be happy to pay on a pro-rata basis for the space my bike takes up on the road and the pressure it puts on the maintenance of that road. However, if this amount was pro-rata'd against what cars pay for the same thing, any bicycle registration system would almost certainly run at a loss. The question is whether the general public would be prepared to pay for such a loss - my feeling is that they would not.
Originally posted by Rowan
However, I have spoken to Swiss people who visit, and some seem to like the idea of the rego system they have back home. You get a sticker to go on the bike's chainstay. I don't know what the motivation for the scheme is, though.
I imagine such a sticker could be easily be removed by a professional thief - or even a not so professional one, so I don't know that it would really help all that much.
Originally posted by Rowan
If following up after theft is an issue, then really, the owner should have the registration numbers of his/her bikes recorded anyway to pass on to the authorities. If you don't know your bike has been stolen there might be a problem somewhere...
I recorded the serial # of my bike when I purchased it a couple of weeks ago (to replace the stolen one). However, it was a pretty pointless action. After all, if this one
does get stolen, it's unlikely to even turn up in this state, so I don't see how I'm going to find it.