Bike License

[Eden]

I do the National Bike Registry thing, and every time I go down the the Bay Area and go by their "headquarters" I feel a warm glow in my heart.

I don't know if Seattle even does bike licenses.

Seattle used to, but no longer. In fact its a big controversy in the bike community at the moment, as there have been some rumblings about bringing it back - but not for the purpose of registering bikes in case they are stolen, but so that it is easier to ticket cyclists and the promotors of this think that cyclists don't pay their share of road maintenance - they don't understand much about how our tax structure works, gas taxes and car tabs don't pay for our city streets, that's mostly paid for by property taxes... they also don't get it that Seattle cops have better things to do than ticket cyclists - heck they don't even pay attention to most people who run lights and stop signs and speed in their cars, why should licensing bikes make their enforcement any stricter. You can already give a cyclist a ticket anyway.

[singletrackmind]

It's gotten harder to find towns that will register a bike. Mine doesn't so I went to the next one over and they dusted off their stickers for me-after they located them. Theirs is a paper file and only one of the officers remembered where it was kept, only a couple of them knew they even registered bikes.

[jesvetmed]

Knot: Thanks for mentioning the National Registry. I didn't know it existed. I live in an area whose police and sheriffs are not listed as working with them, but I think I'll do it anyways, as a bike stolen here could end up in Seattle in a heartbeat!

They also had great information on locking your bike up in order to make it harder to steal. I have to admit I often don't ride to an event because of fear of having my bike stolen while I'm off somewhere enjoying myself... silly, but I LOVE my bike and don't want to have to replace it!

http://www.nationalbikeregistry.com/proplock.html

Jes

[sundial]

A bike license......I don't think I've had the pleasure of having one.

Around here a 4 wheeler or jon boat is more likely to get stolen than a bike.

[PscyclePath]

Crimes against property are a low priority here in the Little Rock metro area, so I went with the National Bike Registry for my fleet. $20 gets four registered, so I have a spare slot for the upcoming new Orbea...

I also took pictures of each bike, posted them and listed the serial numbers in my BikeJournal.com profile for good measure and a backup should I need that some day...

[Deborajen]

Good to know there is a National Bike Registry. I hadn't heard of it before.

We registered our bikes with the city when we bought them. The bike shop carried the forms and turned them in to the city office for us. Cost was $7.50 per bike. Don't know if it really helps but it's worth a try - they're already in the system for the police dept. should the need arise.

Bike registration fees used to go into a fund to help maintain bike paths, but now they just go into a general fund. It's too bad that changed - it was a good incentive. Now a lot of people don't bother registering bikes. A license is supposed to be mandatory for any bike used within the city limits, but it's never checked.--

Deb