News & Discussion: Roads & Traffic

[rubberman]

It is at this point I have most sympathy for politicians. The endless parade of people demanding stuff, and then when those making the demands are asked to pay even a small amount, the politicians get a torrent of ill mannered and ill informed abuse.

Who's actually asked cyclists to pay any money? Other than a bunch of over excited AdelaideNow commenters I've not heard anything - I'm not aware any political party in Australia has ever floated the idea. Presumably because it's been proven time and time again that introducing a rego (or whatever you want to call this payment) scheme for cyclists will cost far more to administer than it would receive in revenue - as well as the knock on effects to our economy by taking cyclists off of the road and putting them into yet more single-occupant cars sitting stationary at intersections. Why would any politician support such a backward idea other than to appease the (albeit rather vocal) anti-bike minority?

Thankfully, younger generations seem a little more savvy with regards to sustainable transport solutions so with the passing of a generation or two the argument should be put well and truly to bed. Hopefully by which time most developed countries (Australia included) will boast magnificent networks of free-to-use cycling infrastructure to support the much larger number of people choosing this method of transportation over private vehicles.

A few things here. There's nothing free. If you want a magnificent cycling infrastructure, you are going to pay for it in some way. If it makes you happier, we can all pretend it's free while we shake our heads because some other totally unrelated tax has just gone up.

As for the cost of collecting any charges. I'm sure that the younger generation you talk about know that doing it electronically is dirt cheap. I mean, who fills out income tax forms in paper these days?

But anyway, it's always been the case that if you don't want to pay for something, it's going to be a struggle to get it. Bikes have been round for over 100 years, and it's only recently cyclists have made any progress. Maybe, just maybe if cyclists hadn't been so cheap over the years, they'd have gotten a whole lot more and a whole lot sooner.

[realstretts]

A few things here. There's nothing free. If you want a magnificent cycling infrastructure, you are going to pay for it in some way. If it makes you happier, we can all pretend it's free while we shake our heads because some other totally unrelated tax has just gone up.

As for the cost of collecting any charges. I'm sure that the younger generation you talk about know that doing it electronically is dirt cheap. I mean, who fills out income tax forms in paper these days?

But anyway, it's always been the case that if you don't want to pay for something, it's going to be a struggle to get it. Bikes have been round for over 100 years, and it's only recently cyclists have made any progress. Maybe, just maybe if cyclists hadn't been so cheap over the years, they'd have gotten a whole lot more and a whole lot sooner.

I'm just gonna quote myself again so you hopefully see this - cyclists do pay toward the system by the very virtue of their economic benefits to society. Cars cost the system money and therefore must pay to offset this economic burden:

Some statistical data for you sir,

"This means that, for each person who cycles 20 minutes to work and back, our economy benefits by
$14.30; and for each person who walks 20 minutes to work and back benefits our economy by $8.48."

"Traffic congestion is estimated to cost $20.4 billion by 2020"

Simple comparison between cycling and driving from this report: ]Australian Government 2013, Walking Riding and Access to Public Transport, quoting Qld Dept of Transport and Main Roads 2010, Benefits of inclusion of active transport in infrastructure projects, by SKM and PWC

There is a reason cars have to pay and bicycles do not and SHOULD NOT: their burden on the economy, the road system, the chronic health issues of EVERYBODY, their pollution, their injury and fatality rates, their insurance costs, their contribution to excessive congestion on the roads...I could go on, cars cost society a considerable amount of money - bicycle riders do not cost society, in fact, they provide a net economic benefit to society.

Whilst cars suck money out of the system, it is clear that bicycles contribute money back to the system in economic benefit - therefore, cyclists ALREADY PAY money to the system, yet receive inadequate funding for infrastructure despite this.

[Llessur2002]

A few things here. There's nothing free. If you want a magnificent cycling infrastructure, you are going to pay for it in some way. If it makes you happier, we can all pretend it's free while we shake our heads because some other totally unrelated tax has just gone up.

As for the cost of collecting any charges. I'm sure that the younger generation you talk about know that doing it electronically is dirt cheap. I mean, who fills out income tax forms in paper these days?

But anyway, it's always been the case that if you don't want to pay for something, it's going to be a struggle to get it. Bikes have been round for over 100 years, and it's only recently cyclists have made any progress. Maybe, just maybe if cyclists hadn't been so cheap over the years, they'd have gotten a whole lot more and a whole lot sooner.

No, hang on - you can't just band around accusations of 'cyclists being cheap'. That's as bad as that trashy "article" by Jess Leo.

So:

Who's actually ever asked cyclists to pay any money?
Any political party have that in their manifesto? Even the Motoring Enthusiast Party?
Anyone? Other than you, Rev and the AdelaideNow community?

How can you accuse a group of people of 'refusing to pay' when the question's never been asked?

And what about previous comments about cyclists actually returning money to the economy? $14 per trip? If that's true then that's a bigger economic benefit that any rego scheme could return...

[Nathan]

But anyway, it's always been the case that if you don't want to pay for something, it's going to be a struggle to get it. Bikes have been round for over 100 years, and it's only recently cyclists have made any progress. Maybe, just maybe if cyclists hadn't been so cheap over the years, they'd have gotten a whole lot more and a whole lot sooner.

Yeah, it's not like cyclist lobbies worked to get roads sealed 100 odd years ago.

Oh wait, they did.

[mshagg]

Who's actually ever asked cyclists to pay any money?
Any political party have that in their manifesto? Even the Motoring Enthusiast Party?

Duncan Gay, NSW roads minister, has a hard on for a bike registration scheme. The problem being that every report which is commissioned turns out the same answer - it's not viable. I imagine as soon as he finds the 'right' expert he'll pursue the idea. Mandating that adult riders carry photo ID is seemingly the closest to a registration scheme as he could get. Ripping up dedicated infrastructure in Sydney seems to just be something he does for fun.

"If you don't want to pay for something, it's going to be a struggle to get it"

What most cyclists want is to not be killed whilst undertaking a lawful and healthy activity. Dedicated infrastructure is a workaround to dangerous attitudes which are prevalent on Australian roads and which put vulnerable road users at risk.

There's also a chicken-and-egg paradox - the best thing you can do for cyclists is get more of them on the road to normalise the activity and improve motorist awareness/competency (this is the key argument against mandatory helmet laws - overnight MHL took 50% of cyclists off the road and participation has never recovered). However with the prevalent attitude of Australian motorists, people don't feel safe riding on the road and want dedicated infrastructure.

[rubberman]

A few things here. There's nothing free. If you want a magnificent cycling infrastructure, you are going to pay for it in some way. If it makes you happier, we can all pretend it's free while we shake our heads because some other totally unrelated tax has just gone up.

As for the cost of collecting any charges. I'm sure that the younger generation you talk about know that doing it electronically is dirt cheap. I mean, who fills out income tax forms in paper these days?

But anyway, it's always been the case that if you don't want to pay for something, it's going to be a struggle to get it. Bikes have been round for over 100 years, and it's only recently cyclists have made any progress. Maybe, just maybe if cyclists hadn't been so cheap over the years, they'd have gotten a whole lot more and a whole lot sooner.

No, hang on - you can't just band around accusations of 'cyclists being cheap'. That's as bad as that trashy "article" by Jess Leo.

So:

(Snip)

How can you accuse a group of people of 'refusing to pay' when the question's never been asked?

And what about previous comments about cyclists actually returning money to the economy? $14 per trip? If that's true then that's a bigger economic benefit that any rego scheme could return...

You mean like someone using words like "overexcited" "backward" and talking patronisingly about others' arguments? Those in glass houses and all....

Those figures quoted are benefits. They ignore the costs. That's why we have cost:benefit analyses.

If people don't get the reality of the present financial situation governments are in, and that money for one thing means less money for something else, there's no helping them then. For example, money has been cut from dental services, and people have to wait a year if they can't afford a private dentist.

Maybe the benefit of shortening dental waiting times exceeds the benefit of bike lanes. So, as an example, government would logically cut money from bike lanes if that were the case.

Or with Holdens closing maybe support to sackec workers is a higher priority? Point is, that if you're not paying, you get no seat at these economic discussions.

[rhino]

Those figures quoted are benefits. They ignore the costs. That's why we have cost:benefit analyses.

If people don't get the reality of the present financial situation governments are in, and that money for one thing means less money for something else, there's no helping them then. For example, money has been cut from dental services, and people have to wait a year if they can't afford a private dentist.

Maybe the benefit of shortening dental waiting times exceeds the benefit of bike lanes. So, as an example, government would logically cut money from bike lanes if that were the case.

Or with Holdens closing maybe support to sackec workers is a higher priority? Point is, that if you're not paying, you get no seat at these economic discussions.

So, if we don't ignore the cost, and try to work out what that cost is, we have a starting point - i.e. the benefit. It X users use the cycling lanes, and the benefit of that is $(X x Y), then so long as the cost is less than the benefit, we are ahead. So work out the cost, and whether the cyclists should pay. Probably not.

[Westside]

A few things here. There's nothing free. If you want a magnificent cycling infrastructure, you are going to pay for it in some way. If it makes you happier, we can all pretend it's free while we shake our heads because some other totally unrelated tax has just gone up.

I notice you are not a "Donating Member" of this forum, so, by your logic, you shouldn't be able to use this forum until you pay up. People who have never paid income tax in their life still receive health care. Conversely, people living in rural SA may never have been to Adelaide Oval, but they still contributed to paying for it.

Economics today is far more complex than user pays therefore user gets. Governments receive income from a number of ways and they use that on many forms of expenditure - both capital and in operating costs. As has been described in numerous studies around the world, that taxing, or enforcing licences for cyclists, just doesn't work. No city, no state, no country in the world has implemented it. So I'm not sure why the vocal and ignorant minority continue to spout this rubbish about cyclists not contributing to the cost of roads. It has been proven time and time again that if only a small percentage of drivers swapped to cycling, the cost of road infrastructure and maintenance would significantly drop. So paying people to ride instead of drive would make more economic sense than your proposal.

So go away, do some research, and if you find anything that supports your proposal, then please enlighten us. Because until then, the rest of the world has spoken and we're showing you the door.

[rubberman]

A few things here. There's nothing free. If you want a magnificent cycling infrastructure, you are going to pay for it in some way. If it makes you happier, we can all pretend it's free while we shake our heads because some other totally unrelated tax has just gone up.

I notice you are not a "Donating Member" of this forum, so, by your logic, you shouldn't be able to use this forum until you pay up. People who have never paid income tax in their life still receive health care. Conversely, people living in rural SA may never have been to Adelaide Oval, but they still contributed to paying for it.

Economics today is far more complex than user pays therefore user gets. Governments receive income from a number of ways and they use that on many forms of expenditure - both capital and in operating costs. As has been described in numerous studies around the world, that taxing, or enforcing licences for cyclists, just doesn't work. No city, no state, no country in the world has implemented it. So I'm not sure why the vocal and ignorant minority continue to spout this rubbish about cyclists not contributing to the cost of roads. It has been proven time and time again that if only a small percentage of drivers swapped to cycling, the cost of road infrastructure and maintenance would significantly drop. So paying people to ride instead of drive would make more economic sense than your proposal.

So go away, do some research, and if you find anything that supports your proposal, then please enlighten us. Because until then, the rest of the world has spoken and we're showing you the door.

Just because you don't agree with someone is no reason to be ill mannered. You are entitled to your opinion. However, you aren't entitled to misrepresent mine. Your vote is worth exactly the same as mine, so if you think your approach will get more for cyclists, have at it.

You aren't showing anyone the door, lol!

[Llessur2002]

(Snip)

That's convenient.

Point is, that if you're not paying, you get no seat at these economic discussions.

Except that, as has been explained time and time again, everyone is paying.

do some research, and if you find anything that supports your proposal, then please enlighten us.

^This. I've yet to see anything suggesting a registration fee for cyclists would have any financial benefit. Start showing me the numbers and maybe I'll change my opinion. I'm a reasonable kinda guy.

[realstretts]

Those figures quoted are benefits. They ignore the costs. That's why we have cost:benefit analyses.

Nope. If you read the report the analysis took into account costs as well as benefits, hence why i state that cycling returns a NET economic benefit.

Please, keep digging yourself a deeper hole by all means.

[mshagg]

^This. I've yet to see anything suggesting a registration fee for cyclists would have any financial benefit. Start showing me the numbers and maybe I'll change my opinion. I'm a reasonable kinda guy.

Similar to the increasing fines (and in some states, introduction of additional legal obligations on cyclists) there are no practical benefits. People offer the suggestion that it would allow them to report law-breaking cyclists (if I reported every traffic offence I see commissioned by motorists my phone battery would be flat before I got to work every morning) but the reality is they like the idea of additional hassle and expense being applied to a group of road users they have an irrational dislike for. These are ideas grounded in schadenfreude which are trotted out as having a practical benefit.

A registration scheme is largely a break-even proposition which covers the administrative overheads (it's important to specify here that the registration cost in South Australia is very modest, the majority of the payment goes towards third party bodily insurance premiums). Given the propensity of motor vehicles to cause significant property and bodily damage when misused, a registration scheme is clearly worthwhile. Somebody's feelings getting hurt because they saw a cyclist pass through a red light doesn't come anywhere near that threshold of importance.

The user-pays argument is perhaps the most truly baffling one, given the massive amounts of road infrastructure which are provided without any explicit charge to any category of road user (toll roads being the exception I guess). The "pay for a seat at the discussion table" argument is completely unfounded. Even the excise levied on fuel is only ostensibly directed towards road funding - and that's at a federal level, which says nothing of state or LGA funded roads.

And that is before you even tackle the idea that cycling is good for traffic/health/the economy/whatever and, as such, should be the beneficiary of bias in legislative and taxation arrangements.

[Wayno]

From InDaily

"We haven't seen lycra-wearing cyclists doing 40km/h on footpaths": SAPOL

Police commissioner Grant Stevens has moved to curb driver dissatisfaction with new cycling laws, arguing officers have issued more expiations to bike-riders than motorists “during the initial stages of this new legislation”, and had not seen an influx of “lycra-wearing cyclists” hooning down public walkways.

The changes were phased in late last year, with drivers subject to fines for encroaching within a metre of cyclists in 60km/h zones, but allowed to cross double lines to overtake.

Contentiously, bicyclists are also allowed to ride on footpaths.

Stevens told a parliamentary inquiry yesterday the early experience of SAPOL officers was that “more expiations were issued to cyclists than they were to car drivers”.

“So I would like to say that is a suggestion that the police have a balanced view on this, and ‘what’s good for the goose is good for the gander’ is the prevailing situation,” he said.

Stevens said he was aware of high-profile complaints about cyclists riding between idling cars and violating the metre rule – a distance the onus is on motorists to honour – but emphasised that “as with anything, we expect our police officers to apply a degree of reasonableness to their assessment of the circumstances and act in accordance with what is reasonable”.

“There are limitations to what a vehicle driver can do if a cyclist is going to encroach on that one-metre point, and that is an issue that would dictate whether or not we, firstly, intervene at all,” he said.

“I think the greatest criticism we get is when police officers act strictly to the letter of the law and issue expiations for things that might be seen as a technical breach of the regulations or road rules.”

Asked about the issue of cyclists riding on footpaths, Stevens noted the issue was one that “attracts significant public debate”.

“Anecdotally, we are not hearing instances of people who are reverting to footpaths and riding bicycles in a manner that would create significant risk to the public,” he said.

“The principles around riding on the footpath are to ensure that young people and people who may be less confident on a bicycle or who are simply commuting to and from local areas are able to do so safely. We haven’t seen any big trends of lycra-wearing cyclists jumping on the footpaths and travelling at 30 or 40km/h.”

In response, committee member and Xenophon-aligned crossbencher John Darley noted that he had been “nearly run over by a bike in front of Parliament House on North Terrace this morning”.

The RAA’s road safety manager Charles Mountain told InDaily the commissioner’s comments reflected the motoring body’s own feedback, as well as the experience in Queensland, where similar changes were enacted in 2014.

“The cyclists who choose to ride on the footpath are generally not comfortable riding on the road anyway, so they tend to be happy riding at a slower speed,” he said.

“It also highlights too the ongoing need about effectively sharing the road between motorists and cyclists, ensuring both do the right thing and abide by the rules.”

He said while the RAA had received feedback from motorists unhappy with the changes, “a lot of that has come about because people don’t fully understand how the rules work and the rationale behind them”.

“Once we’ve explained how the rules work, most people are reasonably comfortable with them,” he said.

[rev]

A few things here. There's nothing free. If you want a magnificent cycling infrastructure, you are going to pay for it in some way. If it makes you happier, we can all pretend it's free while we shake our heads because some other totally unrelated tax has just gone up.

People who have never paid income tax in their life still receive health care.

Health care is a universal RIGHT, it is one of our basic human rights, and is in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted after WW2

Riding your bike on the road is a privilege not a right, as is driving your car.
If you want to keep using that privilege, you should be prepared to pay for that privileged. Just like I and all other motorists have to keep paying every year for the privilege of using our roads in our private motor vehicles or commercial/business vehicles.

Economics today is far more complex than user pays therefore user gets. Governments receive income from a number of ways and they use that on many forms of expenditure - both capital and in operating costs. As has been described in numerous studies around the world, that taxing, or enforcing licences for cyclists, just doesn't work. No city, no state, no country in the world has implemented it. So I'm not sure why the vocal and ignorant minority continue to spout this rubbish about cyclists not contributing to the cost of roads. It has been proven time and time again that if only a small percentage of drivers swapped to cycling, the cost of road infrastructure and maintenance would significantly drop. So paying people to ride instead of drive would make more economic sense than your proposal.

And before New Zealand allowed women the right to vote 1893, no other country had.
Before South Australia allowed women to vote in 1894, no other state in Australia had.

Maybe they shouldn't have, since nobody else had yet done it back then..Great logic.

So go away, do some research, and if you find anything that supports your proposal, then please enlighten us. Because until then, the rest of the world has spoken and we're showing you the door.

When were you elected the worlds spokesperson? And when's the next election, because you stink at it.

[Llessur2002]