Georgia GOP lawmakers propose bill to require licensing and registration of bicycles

[TheMightyFavog]

http://www.cbsatlanta.com/story/23624775/house-bill-could-soon-require-license-plates-for-bicyles

Georgia House Bill 689 would require anyone in Georgia who intends to ride a bicycle on the street to register that bike with the state.

State Rep. Carl Rogers, R-Gainesville, said he wanted to get the attention of cyclists.

The bill reads, in part:

"To amend Title 40 of the Official Code of Georgia Annotated, relating to motor vehicles and traffic, so as to provide for registration and licensing of bicycles; to revise a definition; to provide for the acquisition of a license plate prior to the operation of a bicycle on streets with motor vehicle traffic; to provide for the design of license plates for bicycles; to provide for the option of a one-time bicycle registration fee in lieu of annual registration; to prescribe fees for annual and one-time registration of bicycles; to provide for requirements for the operation of bicycles upon a roadway; to authorize the establishment of rules and regulations; to provide for enforcement; to provide for related matters; to repeal conflicting laws; and for other purposes."

The bill is sponsored by Rogers, Lee Hawkins, R-Gainesville, and Emory Dunahoo, R-Gainesville.

[Newsjock]

1. Bill is dead after public hearing tonight

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023805151

[Laelth]

10. Useful information. Thanks for the post. n/t

-Laelth

[Recursion]

2. DC theoretically does that

It's mostly a way for cops to confiscate bikes of people who piss them off, since nobody actually registers them.

[B Calm]

3. but I thought republicans are against new taxes

[Nuclear Unicorn]

4. I thought we were for making people pay for the public services they utilize

Cyclists use the public roads, they should pay in.

[B Calm]

5. I don't have a problem with it, just

a little surprised that republicans are introducing this.

[Fumesucker]

6. The damage a vehicle causes to roadway varies by roughly the fourth power of weight

In other words a vehicle that weighs ten times as much causes 10^4 or 10,000 times as much wear and tear on the roads.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gross_axle_weight_rating

Average bike and rider probably less than 250 lbs with about 1/10 to 1/5 horsepower, a Mini, one of the smallest cars on the road weighs 2,850 lbs without a driver. So a bicycle would have to do about ten thousand miles to equal the damage to roadways caused by a Mini driving one mile.

Bicycle riding is a social good, saves energy, promotes aerobic fitness, raises environmental awareness and vastly lowers maintenance costs on the road system.

[Nuclear Unicorn]

11. It's not just about vehicle weight

Cyclists require better maintained roads, whereas cars can deal with potholes, lanes have to be widened, additional safety controls, etc. If you use it, you should pay for it. Guess why I don't pay turnpike tolls.

[Fumesucker]

14. Evidently you do not believe the poor should get a subsidy

How do you feel about subsidies for the poor in the ACA? Should those subsidies be eliminated because if you use medical care you should pay for it?

I ride around potholes every day, it's much easier to dodge hazards on two inline wheels at 15 mph than on four widely spaced ones at 50 mph. I can easily go places on a bicycle that you couldn't possibly drive a car.

The same lanes can carry far more bicycles than cars, it's not bicycles filling up the roadways.

[Nuclear Unicorn]

16. "How do you feel about subsidies for the poor in the ACA?"

The non-sequitor that ate Sheboygan.

If you have a car, motorcycle and/or RV and/or multiples of any of them you will pay for use of public roads for each one, regardless of income and you do so without subsidy. The hoopdie pays the same as the late model Lexus.

I ride ... every day

There it is! You got your free ride, screw everyone else. That illuminates your point from your previous post --

Bicycle riding is a social good, saves energy, promotes aerobic fitness, raises environmental awareness and vastly lowers maintenance costs on the road system.

Who needs the bicycle for aerobic fitness when you spend so much time patting yourself on the back? But hey, you're doing us a public service so I guess we owe you, huh?

[Fumesucker]

17. Transportation is about as much a necessity as medical care

Indeed, if you want medical care these days you require transportation, the days of doctors doing house calls are long since gone by.

So, how do you feel about people using something and not paying for it, like the subsidized poor with health care?

The hooptie does not pay the same as a Lexus, or at least not in my state, it may be different where you live.

Interesting that you descended to personal insults, a sign of someone losing an argument on the merits of their case.

[Nuclear Unicorn]

18. You're really wedded to this non-sequitor.

Nobody gets subsidized license plates. People that use public roads get license plates for their vehicles to help fund road maintenance.

Indeed, if you want medical care these days you require transportation, the days of doctors doing house calls are long since gone by.

So they should ride a bicycle to the ER, maternity ward or oncologist?



Very peculiar.

[Jim Warren]

8. Cyclists who own and operate cars

take taxis or use public transportation do pay in and my guess is that would include the majority of adult cyclists.

[Nuclear Unicorn]

12. If you operate a car, motorcycle and/or RV on the roads you pay for each individually.

[Jim Warren]

24. Sure

and you pay for roads with all at the pump.

[rrneck]

19. While it's true that

bicyclists are getting a free ride (rim shot), the good that is done by promoting the use of bicycles far outweighs whatever good any equitable scheme of taxation may contribute. I tend to think of it in terms of a Keynesian benefit.

[HereSince1628]

7. As a kid in the Chicago suburbs, I had to have registration tag on my JC Higgins 20" bike

It was one of those 'we must register you to protect you' wink wink we want to raise a buck per bike sorts of thing...

It lasted a couple of years. I think the original stamped license plates and book-keeping cost more than the program generated. It made a brief comeback/last stand with foil stickers, then the program died its natural death.

[Jim Warren]

9. I'd be okay with that

if dedicated bike lanes were on every public road, street and thoroughfare.

[TransitJohn]

13. I predicted this years ago. Next step: mandatory insurance.

It's coming.

[Fumesucker]

15. And after that mandatory pedestrian licensing and insurance

After all, if you walk on the public thoroughfare you are "using" it and should pay for that.

[markpkessinger]

20. Seems like an odd thing for Republicans to push

My brother, a small business owner and a moderate Republican, is forever complaining about state licensing and registration fees. He is also an avid hunter, who owns a fair number of firearmd of various types. One of his chief arguments against gun registration is that once the fees become a revenue stream for the state, it becomes all to easy to continually hike those fees. So this strikes me as a very strange thing for Republicans to be advocating.

[Orsino]

21. Creeping fascism.

The gummint wants a database of law-abiding bicycle owners so that the UN can seize our bikes in Obama's New World Order.

[NightWatcher]

22. where's that "smaller government" thing?

Do Big Wheels and tricycles need a tag too?

[datasuspect]

23. good idea

from the front end and back end - state can apply those funds to buy paint for fucked up bike lanes, cyclists must have mandatory organ donor status when they register their vehicle.

[trackfan]

25. Easy way around the law: design a bike that functions as a gun! n/t

[doc03]

26. Being an avid bike rider I wouldn't be too opposed to it if the money

was used strictly for bike facilities.
bike trail construction and/or maintenance of trails
bike parking racks
bike shareing
bike lanes