ad18

Recently read an article that a major city near where I live, Toronto, is contemplating making cyclist have a license and insurance to ride in the city. I can understand, but basically think the license is a money grab. If the monies collected where strictly used to create or support existing bike lanes great. Plus if I was to want to ride in the city for a weekend get away what type of license/permit would be required and how/where would you get it. Insurance is another kettle of fish. Would you require a plan similar to your car? It just seems that to implement both requirements the financial impact on the rider could be rather harsh and may cause some riders to abandon their bikes and head back to cars/transit. Does your local area have such requirements and how does it work for you. Thanks.

General Geoff

There's not a whole lot of damage one can do on a bicycle, so requiring liability insurance like with a car doesn't make a lot of sense.

I'm probably in a tiny minority but I don't think a license should be required to drive a car, let alone ride a bicycle.

indyfabz

Where did you see that re: L.A.? There was a local ordinance requiring a license but it seems to have been repealed in 2009.

indyfabz

The Milwaukee law seems to apply only to residents of the city. I would bet the other laws apply only to residents.

ad18

As long as both pieces were kept to a very low price it may be a non issue. However, being mandated by local government and including premium loving insurance companies one has to expect the worse, say $20 a year for a license and $100 a year for insurance would not surprise anyone. Enforcing the law would indeed be rather difficult by the sheer magnitude of people riding bikes versus extremely low numbers of bike riding police.

San Rensho 

So according to their logic, we should license and require insurance for pedestrians.

They are bunch of freeloaders that use our sidewalks and streets and don't pay anything for it.

and they run in front of my car and when I splatter them on the windshield they don't pay for the damage to my car.

Pedestrians are the problem not car drivers.

CliffordK

Looking at the A&S subforum, there have been at least 2 recent accident caused by bonehead moves by cyclists.

Broken grill, bent hood and broken windshield, I could imagine repairs could run in excess of $5000. Probably not a huge sum, but not insignificant.

The bigger issue might be personal health care bills that could be far more expensive.

CliffordK

As far as licensing.

License riders?
License bikes?

Two different issues.

Are you going to license 3 yr olds? Make sure they know the rules of the road before taking their push bikes out on the street? Or is it the push bike that needs to be registered?

Maybe have a rider safety class and registration for 14 yr olds (pre driver's license)? Actually, that would be a good thing to do as a mandatory class in school. Also bike maintenance.

Does one differentiate between the riders that ride < 100 miles a year, vs those that ride > 5000 miles a year?

My old bike was stickered twice.


The local PD sticker was voluntary. They registered the serial number (actually, we stamped a number onto the frame since it had none).

I believe the college campus also required registration. I apparently didn't register it when I was in private on-campus housing, but it appears as if I registered it when I shifted to off-campus housing. I hope they've kept the records, otherwise that registration is useless. 30 years for the college campus, and probably 35 years for the local PD.

I suppose doing a one-time minimal fee registration isn't bad when one has a single bike. But, it could be a bit of a pain for multiple bikes.

It might help a bit with bicycle theft tracking and recovery, but would need to be fairly widespread across the country to be effective. Getting bikes sold and not re-registered could be a pain problematic.

Ideally it would be a self-supporting program, with administration and fees being equal, but I could imagine high administration costs, and a slippery slope for increasing fees as governments look for more tax revenue.

As it is, I'd rather see the governments encouraging as many cyclists to get on the road as possible, which means making it as easy to get on the bikes as possible. I.E. no added fees.

Gresp15C

Insurance? Make my day.

Let's assume it's like car insurance, i.e., a basic liability policy. The cheapest way for most of us to buy it, would be as an add-on to our car insurance. Riding a bike instead of a car reduces our liability exposure, so our rates would become cheaper as insurance companies compete for our business.

Go ahead and let car drivers subsidize me.

CliffordK

Of course it is the car-free riders that probably would benefit the most from insurance. DUI riders?

I-Like-To-Bike

Still waiting on the familiar rant about little 5YO Susie on her tricycle being pushed around by low life b-crats, that this type of post about a vague unreferenced sky is falling proposal elicits.

atitagain

Just say no .

Daniel4

Yes, and compare that to the amount of motor vehicle collisions and injuries caused in that same time-frame.

If it's Toronto looking at licensing again, all one has to do is go into the city of Toronto website and read about the history of trying to license cycling. I would remind our own City Councillors to do the same.

northtexasbiker

The other day I forgot my wallet and I was like oh crap how am I going to drive, but I turned the key and my truck started right up and it operated as if my license was in there with me. This is Texas though so things may be different else where. I hope no one else catches on or else we will have a lot of unlicensed / uninsured drivers down here. I don't even want to imagine.

CliffordK

Oh, when will the Prius keyless fob be incorporated into the Driver's Licenses?

No license, and no driving

I-Like-To-Bike

When? Never, unless people are required to have a different driver's license for each car driven to include rental, borrowed or work cars; or one driver's license that will be good for starting every car.

CliffordK

It could come sooner than one thinks. Contactless RFID keyless card entry is already common for many commercial applications.

Bank machines are now recognizing cardless access with cell phones (apparently, I haven't tried it), and other countries have been using smart phones for credit card access for quite some time now.

It is common to program new vehicles to recognize garage door codes. So, a card or phone could be similarly paired with the vehicle. And, perhaps managed. Add a code into your kid's car that it shuts off at midnight, or with an auto-driver, has an automatic return home at midnight, with or without the kid. They'll learn.

Of course, the Prius has a key override, but that may eventually be replaced with software. It is hard to say in the future whether one might turn to key cards, or phones for similar access.

I suppose I'm digressing a bit from licensing. Bike access has other issues than car access. There are, however, electronic keyless locks for bikes too. However, it is a lot harder to restrict a person from hopping on a bike and riding.

Restricted bike parking? To park in certain areas of the city, one would need to buy a bike parking permit? Don't park there, and no permit needed.

Bmach

If a bike is considered a vehicle and I have a drivers license, why should I need another license? I might buy into a bike license if you did not have a drivers license. Now what do they about people that are not old enough to have a license?

rydabent

Why do you hate little Susie?

rydabent

Yes-----------it is little more than a money grab by greedy politicians.

Sy Reene

Since one is not required to have a drivers license, I assume the purpose of a bike license is for the police to know who they're ticketing so they're more likely to get their money. I'm still trying to figure out if my dog license allows him to ride a bike

FlMTNdude

Normally I wouldn't be for it, but here in Gainesville Floriduh the case is for a 'drivers' license. 2/3 of the adults here on bicycles are reckless to say the least. Go on the west side away from the university, with no bike lane and a MUP, see how many idiots are salmoning and weaving down the road. And few with any visibility either. And it happens all over. There was one morning coming in crossing town at 5 am. Some idiot riding down the road (2 lanes each way) in the middle of the lane facing traffic, no lights whatsoever on an unlit street.
So a bicycle drivers license - YES! And hopefully the cops enforce it and the laws of the road, as it would give a better means of ability to ticket offenders.

RichSPK

The insurance, in particular, would really suck for people who ride because they can't afford a car.

f4rrest

If it includes theft coverage, it might not be a bad deal.

Daniel4

There's already a history of bicycle licence studies all over major North American cities.

So I wouldn't mind bicycle licenses provided all of the following are offered:

1) Optional;

2) paid by motorists during drivers licence and plate renewals;
3) no fault- all fault automatically attributed to the nearest motorist(s);
4) municipal, provincial and federal tax breaks;
5) perks offered by merchants and hotels on top of other promotions and membership prices you already are entitled.
6) Mandatory road test every two years for motorists;
7) install separated bike lanes wherever motor vehicles are legally allowed to drive;
8) bike racks at all public and commercial places.