otacon451

My question is, do any other school campuses have comparable policies?

This is at the university of arkansas, fayetteville btw

:::::;

Bicycles parked on campus must be registered with the Transit and Parking Department and must display a valid UA bicycle permit. The decal must be permanently affixed by the manufacturer’s adhesive to the front of the vertical seat tube, below the horizontal bar. Bicycle permits cost $15 and are valid for as long as the permit holder owns the bicycle. One third of the permit fee will be used to fund the bicycle permit program, one third to install and maintain bicycle racks on campus, and one third to help fund the Razorbikes program.
Unregistered bicycles will be tagged, and the owner will have two weeks to register the bicycle. Bicycles remaining unregistered two weeks after being tagged will be impounded or immobilized. Bicycles remaining immobilized for one week will be impounded.

Bicycles are subject to all state and local motor vehicle laws pertaining to street travel. Bicycles must be parked only at bicycle racks and must be secured with a commercially available lock to prevent theft. Unsecured bicycles will be immobilized or impounded.
Bicycles secured to handrails, trees, or any location other than designated bicycle racks are subject to being impounded or mobilized. Bicycle security devices may be removed by whatever means necessary to impound the bicycle. The university will not be held liable to the owner of this device for the cost of repair or replacement of such device. Bicycles may not be parked, stored, or left standing in the lobby, hallway, or room of any building except in designated bicycle rooms in residence halls. Bicycles parked improperly will be cited for Parking in an area not designated as a parking area, currently a $20 fine.

Impounded bicycles will be held for 60 calendar days before they are added to the Razorbikes fleet or turned over Surplus Property for sale. Transit and Parking will contact the owner of a registered impounded bicycle at the address, phone and e-mail on the bicycle registration record within two working days of impoundment.
Bicycles will be identified as abandoned if the bicycle is not registered and is missing a major component such as pedals, handlebars, or chain and/or has flat tires. Once identified as abandoned, the owner will have two weeks to register the bike and make it operable or the bike is subject to being impounded.

Claiming an impounded bicycle requires registering the bicycle, providing proof of ownership (a sales receipt will suffice) or providing make, model, color, and location at the time of impoundment; providing the owner's name and ID and sign a statement of receipt as well as payment of all citations and fees on the bicycle. There will be a $10 charge for the return of an impounded bicycle or the removal of an immobilization device.

A list of impounded bicycles shall be posted on the Transit and Parking webpage at: https://parking.uark.edu for a minimum of 60 days.

Transit and Parking will have u-locks available for sale at cost to owners of registered bicycles. One lock will be sold per registered bicycle.

uke

Looks like micromanagement. What's the car policy like?

Camilo

I don't see the problem.

UmneyDurak

Meh. My campus is centered around the park. There is inner ring road, kind of narrow, which circles the park, then there are building, outer ring road, and more buildings. Bikes are prohibited on the outer ring road, but not golf carts, unicycles, and segways (you heard me). You can only ride them on inner ring road that has these narrow "bike" lanes and usually clogged with students, while much wider outer ring road is usually less traveled.

Chris516

Also discrimination towards cyclists. The cost to maintain the parking lots on the campus, far exceed, any cost incurred as a result of a bike.

Their policy is hostile towards cyclists.

StrangeWill

Yeah, but typically fees for a car are $40+ a semester, this is $15 for as long as you have your bike.


Stop complaining, chip into the fact that bike infrastructure costs money.

Zillon

Overall, it looks pretty reasonable to me.

My only qualm would be with the mandatory bicycle permit sticker. The decals are usually impossible to remove at a later date once affixed to the frame, and they're usually rather ugly. That's just me though, I hate stickers on my bike frames.

alpacalypse

That does seem a little strict, but not completely unreasonable. Certainly, requiring bikes to be parked in appropriate places only is to be expected-- there are liability issues, for example, if a bike is locked to a railing on a wheelchair ramp.

The requirement that bikes be registered is a little draconian-- at my university, it's an opt-in thing. Registration puts your bike in a database that can be referred to later in the case of theft. Also, if they do remove your improperly locked bike, they have your contact info and can tell you about it. $15 for lifetime registration doesn't seem too horrible.

takern

just keep it in your room. then you dont have to pay and it is not subject to theft/weather. and you can piss your roommate off by leaving dirt tracks from the door to under your bed

genec

Back when I graduated, San Diego State had an even worse policy. No bikes on campus.

They have since realized the error of their ways, but for a while there... it was a bike free campus... with overcrowded parking structures.

chainstrainer

My son never bothered to bring his bike to campus in southern California because bikes there are only allowed to be ridden on the perimeter road around the 385 acre campus. You are forced to walk your bike anywhere else or face a stiff fine.

Galls

Ah ****, I go there to.

Well chances of this being enforced are slim to none, I still see scooters parked at racks all the time. My only issue is the sticker, why do I want to ruin nice paint job with a damn sticker and why can't I just place it on my u-lock?

Bacana

Looks pretty good to me, except for the part about ruining the paint.

The policies look like they're aimed at reducing reckless riding, which I think is a great idea. I tell you, it's bad enough that drivers and pedestrians don't look out for cyclists, but when other cyclists don't, it's infuriating and mind-boggling. I think such policies are great. In the end, the more bikes are registered and protected and the more cyclists are educated, the better.

Galls

It costs this school $12,000 to build parking spaces and students pay transit fees even though the buses are free to anyone to use. Now I gotta ruin my paint job.

And why is it funding razorbikes? Have not all of those been trashed or stolen by now? I saw a few last semester but this semester they are all gone.

cudak888 

^
This would make far more sense. Essentially allows one to hang the decal off a tag fitted from the handlebar stem binder.

For that matter, need I mention that it is conceivable that an extremely active commuter might run out of headtube before he/she runs out of permit decals that are supposedly "required" to be placed on it? Consider the following hypothetical situation:

Campus permit,
Bus permit for transit agency in one county,
Light rail permit (trams, elevated commuter rail, or underground),
Rail permit (full-scale passenger rail),
Bus permit for a second country transit agency,
Permit for parking in business building where student works.

Six permits, all of which are required to be affixed to your headtube. How about if you own more then one bicycle? Screwed.

Come to think of it - has the university also provided non-decal bike parking for cycle commuters visiting the campus? I doubt it.

Incidentally, I've made it a point to use a piece of styrene affixed to a Cat-Eye quick-release taillight mount for the local rail transit agency - not only is it transferable between machines, it doesn't damage anything in the least bit. Granted, it isn't secure enough for long-term parking, but it works for when you're with the bike at most times:



That said though, I've never seen the point in bicycle permits for transit agencies (I don't need a permit to bring my sorry @$$ onboard, only a ticket showing that I've paid my fare. Why should a bicycle be subjected to it?), except for the usual fact that it gives them yet another method to harass you with.

-Kurt

P.S.: I have the same beef with window/bumper stickers for vehicles on such campuses. I'd like to meet the person who came up with what is, essentially, mandating bumper stickers on your vehicle. It is as if rear-view mirror hang tags never existed.

Geordi Laforge

stickers are easier to be spotted than mirror hangers for officers.

decals can be easily removed with goo-gone, a hairdryer, and a credit card. if you're careful, there will not be any scratches.

I would be ok with this policy since it [supposedly] will fund more bike racks. The university that I attended had a similar policy - it was not a hassle.

Galls

It is not equitable. The parking fees sure as hell do not pay for the parking decks they have built, at 12,000 per spot. So why are we to give them money for a piece of bent steel and a bike sharing program no one with a bike will use? I mean they charge $50 a month for parking and each parking spot is $12,000 that means it will take 20 years for a spot to pay off! Why don't us cyclists get to pay 1/20th of the cost?

cudak888 

Let them put some effort into their work, and require back-in parking.

That way, you'll eliminate lazy bums from the payroll, and simultaneously force drivers to learn how to park correctly.

Which will no doubt be sloppily bolted to the ground or the wall, as opposed to being bolted and cemented over.

Murphy is always hard at work.

-Kurt

dougmc

The University of Texas at Austin had a very similar policy 12-22 years ago while I was there. The only significant difference is that registration was free. (Though personally, $15 doesn't seem so bad, especially since all the money is supposed to go to supporting cycling on campus.)

In any event, seems reasonable enough to me. Hopefully the enforcement is lax enough that if a bicycle is a bit different (like being a 'bent) they won't freak out that the sticker isn't in the designated place (because it doesn't exist.) At least at UT, the main purpose of the registration was to help return stolen bikes. (The conspiracy theorists said it was to be able to ID you if you refused to provide ID when being stopped, but I doubt that. UTPD was generally pretty good, though they were nazis about (car) parking.)

(Also, UT stamped your drivers license number into your bottom bracket. I don't recall if they let you opt out of this or not.)

As for the locks they sell, I'd suggest skipping them, or using it as a supplementary lock. Or buy it, and trade it with a friend a few thousand miles away. They're not going to get the best locks available to keep the cost down, and if half the bikes on campus have identical locks then the thieves will get plenty of experience breaking those exact locks and will be carrying exactly the right tools.

cudak888 

Hell, fine with me - IF they would do the same on the hood of the Bentley belonging to the president of the University.

-Kurt

Geordi Laforge

mirror hangers can also be transfered to friends. stickers cannot.

"hey im going to drive to over to campus. can I borrow your parking thing?"

"sure bro. it's hanging in my car."

Zillon

Agreed.

My apartment complex mandates a sticker in the rear window. Problem? My car has tinted rear windows... sorry, but I'm not damaging my tint to park where I live.

Solution? I mounted the sticker on a hang tag and always back into my spot. No problems yet.

kuan

"Sorry I'm late to class, but there wasn't a bike to be found at the bikeshare rack."

EatMyA**

Guess they need money

SlimAgainSoon

Sticker and the "lock or lose" policy might cut down on bike thefts, which are common on most college campuses.

This doesn't sound like an onerous policy. I would, however, find some way to keep that sticker off my bicycle. Some of those are super-sticky and hard to remove.

Make you a mount of some kind, and stick it to that.