Wednesday, May 5, 2010
The politics of biking
Posted by Kevin Allman on Wed, May 5, 2010 at 6:29 PM
At the new New Orleans City Council's first regular meeting tomorrow, they'll be taking up the issue of bike licensing -- specifically, a $15 fee for "non-commercial" bicycles and $75 for commercial bikes. (Bikes worth less than $100 would be exempt.) The ordinance was originally proposed by former councilman James Carter, who was replaced as District C councilperson on Monday by Kristin Gisleson Palmer:
CAL. NO. 27,907 – BY: COUNCILMEMBER CARTER (BY REQUEST) Brief:An Ordinance to amend and reordain Sections 154-1403 through 154-1406 of the Code of the City of New Orleans to amend fees and procedures for bicycle registration, and otherwise to provide with respect thereto.
For all the details, you can check Alex Woodward's story, "License to Ride," from this week's news section -- but here's the passage that sums it up:
Three days after they take office, the new City Council will be voting on a bike-registration ordinance proposed by none of them — an ordinance that doesn't specify the difference between a commercial and a non-commercial bike and is equally unclear as to how the city intends to measure the worth of a bicycle to determine whether it even needs a license. Moreover, the ordinance says nothing about how the city would use the fees it would collect.
Is $15 fair for the privilege of biking in New Orleans? For those who might want to ride on down and check out the debate, it begins at 10 am in council chambers in New Orleans City Hall.
Speaking of...
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Cynthia Hedge-Morrell releases statement regarding City Council absence
Hedge-Morrell: " ... an ongoing and implicit disregard for debate and discussion that has left me feeling as though I've been marginalized."
- May 22, 2012
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Landrieu's 2012 State of the City address
Liveblogging Landrieu this afternoon.
- May 22, 2012
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City Council standoff: The emails are flying
It's she-said she-said she-said he-said this afternoon in New Orleans City Councilmember statements. And the beat goes on ... even if city government does not.
- May 16, 2012
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Comments (10)
Showing 1-10 of 10
Let's just license walking while we're at it. Let's encourage people to drive as much as possible!
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Yeah, reading that article in the Gambit really pissed me off. If they were proposing that the money collected be put towards more bike paths and infrastructure that would be one thing, but from what I understood from the article the fees just go to maintaining the database of registered bikes. I'm all for increasing bicycle ridership in this city, but I think this has the potential to have the exact opposite effect.
"the registration fee would have to be $15 to set the program back up." How about $0 to not set the program back up? Works for me!
ditto angelo. Ridiculous. Woodward's full article, linked above, is a good one... well-researched and very much worth reading... except the online formatting of it is all messed up. Can somebody fix this? The article begins repeating paragraphs halfway through. fuck nopd, fuck city council, fuck laws and fuck being told to register anything. the idea of NOPD working to return stolen bikes is roughly as plausible as the idea of NOPD officers passing drug tests.
Thanks, D-Bloc. Kevin just brought to my attention that this item on tomorrow's council agenda may be deferred again to a later date. I'll update y'all when I get more info.
Narrow streets, all of four blocks of bike path (near the D Day museum - and there on the wrong side of the road) and potholes everywhere. How exactly is riding your bicycle through New Orleans a "privilege"?
the article speaks of a digital petition gathering 359 signatures as of press time, yet there is no address listed to find this petition. can someone offer insight?
