Martin Underwood wrote:
- compulsory third-party insurance for all cyclists (to cover injury to
pedestrians and damage to cars who have to swerve to avoid them when the
cyclists go through red lights or whose cars they scrape as they overtake
illegally on the left coming up to a junction)

- mandatory registration plates at the front and back of all bikes, with the
front number plate parallel with the handlebars (rather than parallel with
the wheel as for motorbikes at present) so it can be read from in front

Brilliant idea. Now what about scooters (not the motorised kind)? And
skateboards? What about roller skaters? Perhaps anyone whos running
fast should have insurance and wear a license plate too? After all, if
some 20 stone bodybuilder is legging it down the street at 15mph and
runs into you you'll know about it far more than if you're hit by some
8
stone girl on a bike doing the same speed.

And lets not forget the pratical problem of inforcement. Lets assume
your
dumb idea comes to fruition and license plates are required. Will
children
require them? Does little 2 year old Tommy have to wait until dad gets
him insurance and plates so he can ride his little tricycle out the
front?
No? Oh , we'll wait until they're 14 or so? So one day they find they
can't
legally go out on their bike anymore because their parents can't
afford
the insurance. Think they'll care? Think plod will care given they have
their hands full as it it? And how do expect a policeman to catch a
cyclist with no plates? Chase him on foot? Well that won't work. Call
in the panda car? Great - until the cyclist heads off down an alley
or up some stairs away from the road. No wait , we can call in the
police chopper, yeah that'll do it.

Wake up mate.

B2003

Boltar ) gurgled happily, sounding much like they
were saying :

And lets not forget the pratical problem of inforcement. Lets assume
your dumb idea comes to fruition and license plates are required. Will
children require them? Does little 2 year old Tommy have to wait until
dad gets him insurance and plates so he can ride his little tricycle out
the front?
No? Oh , we'll wait until they're 14 or so? So one day they find they
can't legally go out on their bike anymore because their parents can't
afford the insurance. Think they'll care? Think plod will care given they
have their hands full as it it? And how do expect a policeman to catch
a cyclist with no plates? Chase him on foot? Well that won't work.
Call in the panda car? Great - until the cyclist heads off down an
alley or up some stairs away from the road. No wait , we can call in
the police chopper, yeah that'll do it.

Mmm. Some good points. Perhaps we just ought to get rid of
plates/licences/insurance for all road users, since it's all so unworkable.

On 12 Jan 2006 02:05:22 -0800, "Neil Williams"
wrote:

Phil Clark wrote:

Cycling's too efficient, it takes all the hard work out and is
therefore not an excellent form of exercise. Walking and running are
much better...

It is, however, a more useful mode of transport as the range of a
runner is rather more limited. Thus exercise can more feasibly be
gained as part of the daily routine rather than as a separate activity.

I agree it's a better form of transport, although to be honest I've
never seen the attraction of dicing with London traffic on a pushbike.

I fit a half hour walk from Waterloo to Green Park into my schedule
(and back again in the evening). I reckon I get an hour's exercise a
day for the net expenditure of around half that - I have to allow 20
minutes on the way home for the tube; walking, 35 minutes gets me
there easily.

Mmm. Some good points. Perhaps we just ought to get rid of
plates/licences/insurance for all road users, since it's all so unworkable.

When was the last time you heard of a bicycle having a blowout at 70mph
and causing a pileup?

When was the last time you heard of a bicycle being tuned badly and
causing unnecessasy pollution?

When was the last time you heard of a bicycle causing damage to the
road surface due to badly set up suspension?

When was the last time you heard of a bicycle aquaplaning due to bald
tyres and going off into a hedge?

When was the last time you heard of a bicycle being responsible for
a 6 figure insurance payout in a major accident?

When was the last time you saw little kids playing in the back garden
in
a car or truck?

And you think plates for bikes is workable? Ok....

When was the last time you heard of a bicyle being boxed in by police
cars so the cyclist couldn't escape?

When was the last time you heard of a police car that could go
everywhere
a bicycle can go?

When was the last time you heard of a policeman who could run at 25mph
so he could catch a bike?

And just a minor point , how do you propose to persuade people to
register
and pay for insurance and plates for probably 20 million bicycles, half
of
which are probably sitting at the back of a garage? And where
do you think the money will come from to process them all? You plan on
having little kids arrested in the street if they don't have
registration?

Idiot.

B2003

Boltar ) gurgled happily, sounding much like they
were saying :

When was the last time you heard of a police car that could go
everywhere a bicycle can go?

When was the last time you heard of a policeman who could run at 25mph
so he could catch a bike?

Umm, the police use bicycles too...

On 14 Jan 2006 11:34:08 -0800, "Boltar"
wrote:

And lets not forget the pratical problem of inforcement. Lets assume
your
dumb idea comes to fruition and license plates are required. Will
children
require them? Does little 2 year old Tommy have to wait until dad gets
him insurance and plates so he can ride his little tricycle out the
front?
No? Oh , we'll wait until they're 14 or so? So one day they find they
can't
legally go out on their bike anymore because their parents can't
afford
the insurance. Think they'll care? Think plod will care given they have
their hands full as it it? And how do expect a policeman to catch a
cyclist with no plates? Chase him on foot? Well that won't work. Call
in the panda car? Great - until the cyclist heads off down an alley
or up some stairs away from the road. No wait , we can call in the
police chopper, yeah that'll do it.

"Enforcement", that should be.

Why do all those reasons not apply equally to cars and motorcycles?

Walter Briscoe wrote:
In message .com of
Fri, 13 Jan 2006 20:20:21 in uk.transport.london, Chris!
writes

[snip]

I know... about as bad as the bus I just got back off which sailed
through seven sets of red lights (mostly on Piccadilly)

What did YOU do about it?

I did nothing at all. The bus red light jumping combined with less
traffic reduced my journey time from 2 hours to 30mins. My post was
just trying to show that it isn't only cyclists who jump red lights.

Adrian wrote:

Mmm. Some good points. Perhaps we just ought to get rid of
plates/licences/insurance for all road users, since it's all so unworkable.

Having a discussion in work on Friday a country was mentioned where the
basic third-party mandatory insurance for road vehicles was provided by
the state. We then went on to suggest the idea of having this here,
with the charge for insurance being on the price of petrol, thus making
it impossible to drive without insurance.

It wouldn't do anything about cyclists, of course[1], but it would make
*that* system much more workable.

[1] Or would it? A tax could be placed on the sale of bicycles to pay
for it, perhaps?

Neil

Neil Williams ) gurgled happily, sounding much like
they were saying :

Having a discussion in work on Friday a country was mentioned where
the basic third-party mandatory insurance for road vehicles was
provided by the state. We then went on to suggest the idea of having
this here, with the charge for insurance being on the price of petrol,
thus making it impossible to drive without insurance.

I think Aus and NZ do that - amongst others. It's a part of the annual
registration charge - akin to our tax disk, but the plates themselves are
issued by the authorities, and replaced every year, closer to the model of
the States.

On 15 Jan 2006 01:54:05 -0800, "Neil Williams"
wrote:

Having a discussion in work on Friday a country was mentioned where the
basic third-party mandatory insurance for road vehicles was provided by
the state. We then went on to suggest the idea of having this here,
with the charge for insurance being on the price of petrol, thus making
it impossible to drive without insurance.

It wouldn't do anything about cyclists, of course[1], but it would make
*that* system much more workable.

Doesn't Australia do this?

The insurance companies would fight it tooth-and-nail of course. And
the chattering classes would object to subsidising high-risk drivers.
Though I suspect the economies from the simplicity of the system would
more than compensate.