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this post was submitted on 02 Oct 2023
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We don't want the same rights. We don't want to be allowed on highways. Cyclists take up much less space when parking, too, so parking in an incorrect spot is not such an issue.
Also I don't mind paying $10 in road tax if motorists pay their fair share too:
Whenever there's any sort of bike vs car debate, the "don't pay road tax" argument always comes up. It's such a strange argument. While I'm sure they exist, I don't know any cyclists who don't also have a car / driver's license.
When I commute to work on the bike, there's a car sitting in the garage that I'm paying road taxes for that is not creating more traffic/pollution. It is not taking up a parking space in the city.
I'm also lucky enough to live in a city where I have a dedicated bike lane for all but the first and last few hundred meters of my commute. So I don't buy the 'traffic jams' argument either. I'm actually faster than cars in the CBD, they slow me down.
Wild that chart doesn’t include a motorbike of some sort honestly.
Easy enough to calculate yourself. A quick Google says that an average motorbike might be as much as 700 pounds, and if we use the same "fat man" as the bike (300 lb), that's a total of 1000 lb. The formula for comparative damage is (W~1~/W~2~)^4^, so plug that in and we get (1000/350)^4^, or motorbikes doing 66× the damage of the bike, or 0.00396.
If a cyclist had to pay a $10 fee, as @ChaoticNeutralCzech@feddit.de suggests, motorbikes would pay $660, while the average car driver pays a whopping $1,100,000, if you were trying to accurately account for damage done.
Firstly, you’re an Aussie, I’m an Aussie and we’re on an Aussie instance, the heck are you using pounds for? Secondly, there’s not a chance in hell the average motorbike weighs 317 kilograms! A Honda Goldwing, notoriously one of the chonkiest, plushest experiences in motorcycling, is only 390kg, and they have an 1800cc flat-six engine. I used to ride a 500cc twin and at 192kg it was heavier than a lot of 1000cc 4cyl that have more expensive, lighter materials. These days, I have a Postie Bike and that’s exactly 100kg lighter than my 500 was. It’s the equivalent of carrying a slightly overweight dude on my shoulders.
I only used pounds because the table the user above shared was in pounds. And comparative damage is just that: comparative. It's the fourth power of the ratio between the two. So keeping to the same units was easiest.
Regarding the rest of it, remember we're comparing it to a "freakishly heavy bicycle". The table the other user shared implies a fat man + bike is 350 lb. My assumption was that's 300 lb person + 50 lb bike. That would be a 23 kg bike. That's crazy heavy. It's more than double most bikes' weight, and triple the weight of a racing bike. So if the motorbike weight I used is an overestimate, that's basically just evening the playing field. (While both will still end up looking worse compared to a car than they should—which just highlights how much better both are than cars.)
Anyway, I got the figure by just Googling "motorbike weight", which turned up this page, which says:
I'm not interested in being precise enough to delve into those different factors, so going with the quoted "average" sounded good to me.
It's actually not that crazy. E-bikes tend to be at least that heavy. Mine is 30kg. In our example of a fat man riding a bicycle, he's probably more likely to be riding an electric bike anyway.
Lol my ebike is 35 kg, and I'm American weighing in at 155 kg, so about 200kg fully loaded on my bike. But I live in an area with pretty fantastic bike trails that have speed limits near 25-30kph.
There’s not a snowflakes chance in hell the average is anywhere near that high in Australia, or most of the world. I’d put money on it being a US-only figure, considering their obsession with large cruisers. If you include motorised scooters, which I was, then I’d say the average would be about 200kg. Considering the rate increases exponentially, I think that’s important.
Same deal as fat man really, my 300cc was like 150kg
We wouldn't have to if we had bike paths -_-
You know that most of the urban population can get by without using cars on 95% of their days even in Australia’s limited public transport infrastructure, and there’s something you need to face:
Eventually, you’ll have to. Cars are unsustainable.
So the sooner bike-friendly infrastructure that allows cyclists to get around without illegal shit or inconveniencing others hets built, the better. They'll get safer journeys and motorists will feel the drop in traffic even if your roads get narrower. Cars are those that need extra red tape – I would suggest taxes based on car weight for the urban population (farmers in the outback is somewhat justified for owning trucks).
TL;DR: The cunts here are people driving increasingly big cars.
I’m sorry, are we living in the same country? Like, Australia’s PT isn’t great by any means. Interstate rail services are completely dismal. But I think it’s a bit of a stretch to call it limited? The capital cities have fairly decent train services, as well as extensive bus lines. Fares are also heavily subsidised by the government here compared to elsewhere in the world. You can get anywhere in Victoria now for less than $10.
On top of that, there are major PT infrastructure works going on in most cities. Melbourne has the Metro Tunnel, Sydney has the City & Southwest Metro, Brisbane is building Cross River Rail.
Like, bike’s can absolutely be an important part of a multi-modal journey. But to imply that they’ll be the only option because of “limited” public transport is dishonest at best.
No, I’m Czech, as per the username. My Sydney aunt came to Prague last month and says that it’s night and day.
Where we would run tram routes, you have buses that don't even have next station displays/announcements so taking a journey requires considerably more knowledge and planning.
She is happy about the bike paths, though.
Melbourne is the exact opposite when it comes to trams. In fact, it has the largest network in the world by route miles.
Edit: Actually, people visit here from Sydney and freak out about driving around them. We didn’t trash our network in the 50s like they did.
You sound like someone who drives an American “truck”.
Cyclists are freeing up the roads from extra traffic by them not adding another car onto the road. They benefit us far more than they will ever hinder us.