wish list - with changes in the law

And the other side. Wish list about changes in the law.

Again, try and be concrete, and try and think of new things, even
really small ones.

Some ideas:


Licence age: in europe you can get a moped at 15, so by the time you
have a car, you have a couple of years on the road already. We should
do similar. Minimum experience level required to drive large dangerous
vehicles eg 4WD, large pickups.

Mandate mirror setups on all vehicles (retrospective) so that the driver
can see bikes - convex mirrors, mirrors both sides.

Licence type: increase the size and usefulness of a bike you can ride on
a full car licence. Give people with say 5 years on the road the
ability to ride a 125 auto scooter as a commuter.

the ACT/NSW "LAM" idea should be expanded to all states.

Should be a rego option to run more than one vehicle on your insurance.
So if you own a bike and car, or two bikes, then only need one plate/CTP
if using only one at a time. So if I have 3 bikes, should pay only one
set of fees, can only ride one at a time.

Set the CTP on the person, not the vehicle. It's the people who cause
the crashes, the vehicle's just along for the ride.

Make licence classes and cost of rego/insurance based on the *damage the
vehicle can do to others*. So big cars and 4WDs are more expensive and
need a different class of licence to small cars or bikes. a licence
that's harder to get and needs a higher skill level to reflect the
damage they can do. Compared to bikes which can do bugger all to
someone else, so should have low rego/CTp costs.

Heavily penalise those at fault in crashes caused by carelessness.
High penalty for "didn't see you". Which should be an admission of
liability. Opening car doors into people is also an automatic black
mark, no defence.

Require all new or renovated commercial buildings to have a set number
of bike parking spaces for every so many car spaces, to a standard of
approachability and size. Ditto shopping centres, making sure the bike
areas are close and convenient, and set so cars can't park there.
Should also provide helmet and wetgear storage - can be open mesh if
worried about bombs.... Should also be provided at all train and bus
stations.

Law on helmets in service stations should be cleared up - servo
proprietors should be forced to provide decent protection for employees
rather than relying on no helmet signs.

Legalise splitting of stopped traffic, with provision for bikes at the
lights so there's somewhere safe for serveral bikes to go. Perhaps more
use of marked areas beside median strips to and kerbs to make a
motorcycle lane to make it easy for bikes to get to the front quickly
rather than threading through mirrors and being stopped by wide trucks.

Bikes to be able to use all special purpose lanes - all bus lanes, all
transit ways.

Bikes to be able to use the breakdown lanes on freeways as a
lanesplitting device.

Legalise splitting slowmoving traffic. require a test of ability to get
bike licence.

Vic already has recreational licencing for offroad bikes, needs to be
expanded to other states.

GST removed from protective clothing.

National labelling laws of protective clothing to give people a good
idea of how protective and which of a list of "good practices" aboout
things like panels, and stitching, and armour and fastenings an item uses.

Any ticket parking areas to exempt bikes from having to display tickets.

Bikes allowed to park several to one car space.

So, got any more?

Zebee

 

Bikes to be able to use the breakdown lanes on freeways as a
lanesplitting device.

*With a max speed of x*

My 1.5 cents worth!

Stan

 

Parking on footpaths so long as pedestrian traffic is not impeded.

<SNIP>

 

Licence type: increase the size and usefulness of a bike you can ride on

Only after a training course. The last thing the motorcycle movement needs
is a whole stack of people who don't have any training at all getting killed
on the way to work pushing up our fatality numbers.

 

Ok,

Much bigger penalties for any at fault accident. Including minimum license
loss for anything at all. Length of license loss to be determined by
severity of the accident, and other factors.

Big penalties for unlicensed/unregistered drivers. Jail time for a second
offence.

Random roadworthy checks for all vehicles. Like they do for trucks. A very
simple one would do. (Tyre wear, all lights, horn, not leaking large amounts
of any fluid, off you go.)

Much bigger penalties for the hard to enforce offences. (Mobile phone, using
highbeam when innapropriate, failure to indicate, etc etc and to have these
policed. I would even go so far as to have police dedicated to them.)

Good driving awards. - A few unmarked cop cars drive around. When they
observe someone driving very well (giving way as appropriate, being
courteous, leaving appropriate gap, etc etc) follow for a minimum of, say,
5-10 minutes, and then, if the person has been doing a brilliant driving
job, pull them over, give them a "ticket".

The ticket is then valid for some sort of bonus. (Free fuel, meal at family
restraunt chain, etc etc). Something of some significant value though, at
least $100. To make people actually WANT to get it. Legislate that insurance
companies must offer a discount to anyone who has received one of these.

Changes to Insurance legislation to crack down on the people who insure
their car in their parents name. (I know heaps of people who do that, and it
pushes my premiums up.)

Higher speed limits where appropriate. In fact, a full review of all speed
limits. Including getting rid of anything with an odd number as the second
digit from the right. (Ie, only 40, 60, 80, 100, 120, and so on.)

Minimum sentence for first offence low range drink driving to be 12 months
license loss. Minimum sentence for any other drink driving charge to be jail
time.

Get rid of fixed speed cameras, and replace them with police on the beat.
Ask police to enforce ALL trafic violations, not just speeding, and with no
particular emphasis on speeding.

Umm. That's it for now. I will probably think of more later though.

 

I stopped reading after your myopic view of large dangerous......sometimes you make sense, sometimes you don't


smack
large 4WD
small 4cyl car
large 2WD car
small 60cc bike
smaller 50cc bike
snaller 25cc bike
smaller 10 cc bike

and a fucking HR licence


beer?

 

In aus.motorcycles on Tue, 13 Jul 2004 18:41:28 +1000

That's what they said about mopeds. I remember the howls, the certainty
that there'd be splattered moped riders everywhere.

Didn't happen.

What is it about a 125cc auto scooter that a driver with a full licence and
several years traffic experience can't handle?

Zebee

 

Why anyone would _want_ to ride in the lane where all the bits of broken
glass, plastic and metal accumulate is quite beyond me.

Nev..
'03 ZX12R

 

This is not (yet) uniform across the EU; here in the Netherlands it's 16, with
talk of a moped license so that (quote from the Transport Minister) "they won't
be on the road before 16.5". The license will be mandatory and can be revoked
for assholish behaviour. Given the antics of a good bunch of moped riders this
will, in theory, not be a bad thing, but how much enforcement can and will be
applied remains to be seen. Especially in view of the number of road (speeding,
use of bicycle lanes) and vehicle (power boosting, 'cool' but totally
ineffective lighting) rule violations that already remain unpunished today.

I don't think that would be a very desireable modification over here. It would
surely lead to car drivers feeling entitled to do so too (especially nearish
turnouts; I've seen cars split onto the breakdown lane over 2km away from the
turnout AND NOT LOOKING WHETHER THERE'S SOMEONE APPROACHING ALREADY), and there
have been accident cases between cars doing so and broken down vehicles too. The
'totally free lane' will probably incite higher speeds than a designated 'path'
between lanes will, causing additional risk because of the greater speed
differences.

The 'split between fastest lane and next one in' seems to work well here (if
only the turkeys on goldwings who slow to a crawl whenever their remaining gap
is less than a meter each side would only BLOODY MOVE OVER so that I can get
past). Car drivers can be held liable for accidents if they change lanes without
looking, just as they would in normal moving traffic.

--
// Rik Steenwinkel '85 R80ST Skippy bike
// Enschede, Netherlands '91 R100GS/PD The Great Unwashed
// N 52.2158 E 6.88589 '90 K75C Kommutabike
// "Far away is only far away '81 MZ TS250/1+LSW Badkuip
// if you don't go there" '79 Honda XL250S TBD

 

In aus.motorcycles on Tue, 13 Jul 2004 11:23:27 GMT

I'm curious - how much of this is required of Gold Licence holders who
go straight to a full licence in NSW?

How much is given to learner riders that is not already known by
experienced car drivers?

Don't need a licence for a pushie. Should you? And what would the
training and test be?

If they rode it like a car, yes.

Try it some time. Put yourself in the same place on the road as you
would be if you were in a car driver's seat. IN other words, the right
hand wheeltrack more or less. Pilot it exactly as if it were a car.

I think someone with reasonable traffic experience wouldn't have much of
a problem.

The most they'd need is a booklet giving lane position and road surface
basics.

Why am I so sure?

Because when I got my bike licence, you didn't get training. I had a
car licence, so had a clue about traffic, which was 95% of staying
alive.

Zebee

 

I'm curious - how much of this is required of Gold Licence holders who

Gold License holders still have to do the training course, however. And it's
not _quite_ a full license. They are still restricted from taking passengers
for 12 months.

I was a car driver before I was a bike rider. In my car driving I was
(incorrectly) taught that in an emergency braking situation, you jam on the
brakes as hard as you can. This is fine in my (ABS Equiped) car, but on the
bike, if I did that, I would have gone down in a heap in my first week of
riding. The rider training course taught me not to do that.

But, a 125 autoscooter isn't going to get to 110 anywhere near as quickly as
a car. That time lag is going to cause people frustration, and that
frustration will cause accidents.

But, Zebee, when you got your license, no-one got pre license training. Now
everyone does, and the L & P fatality results have dropped significantly as
a result.

 

James Mayfield wrote:

Errr, excuse me......

While what you say here is true, I think that you are looking at it the
wrong way round.

If the time lag in getting to 110 causes "people" to be frustrated and
cause accidents, it is the "people" that are wrong, at fault, and need
to be taken off the road.

It may come as a surprise to many of you, but, on a freeway with a 110
limit, that is actually the maximum allowed speed. Not minimum!

It is perfectly legal for people to drive/ride at well under the 110
limit....in fact some (Learners) are required to do so.

regards,
CrazyCam

 

\Shhhhh Smack, that¹s Zebee you is talking at. He is a top bloke and don¹t
do nothing but good.

Hammo

 

harsh week still?

 

Errr, excuse me......

Yes, but, reality and "ideal world" are two VERY different places.

Just because something is illegal (driving over 110) doesn't stop people
doing it, nor does something being legal (driving under 110) mean that
people aren't going to be frustrated.

It's legal for me to drive at 50 in a 110 zone, but that doesn't mean I'm
not likely to get shot.

 

In aus.motorcycles on Thu, 15 Jul 2004 13:36:32 +0700

Not sure how it's possible to change attitudes with training.

At least so it sticks.

It has to start earlier I think.

Zebee

 

Stop excusing others (or your own) bad behaviour.

I'm not. I'm not saying it's right, or good, or anything like that. I'm
saying it happens.

Murder is inexcusable. It still happens.

Rape is inexcusable. It still happens.

Road rage is inexcusable. __ _____ ______. See if you can fill in the
blanks.

 

.... go heaps quicker?
.... up yours grandpa!
.... no volvo passing?

-----sharks

 

Of course it is... just watch politicians with an election approaching....

Nev..
'03 ZX12R

 

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Clem