By David Reevely, The Ottawa Citizen January 13, 2012

OTTAWA — Licensing bicycles is too expensive and cumbersome and
provides negligible benefits anywhere it’s been tried, says a new
report from Ottawa’s city staff.

Orléans Councillor Bob Monette asked city officials to look into the
idea at the beginning of the summer, when the segregated bike lanes on
Laurier Avenue were opening and the rights of cyclists versus
pedestrians and motorists were in the news. He suggested that
licensing bikes would provide a way to connect misbehaviour on the
roads and paths to bikes’ owners, the way car licence plates help the
police track down bad motorists.

Also, a formal registry of bicycles would help the police return
stolen and recovered bikes to their owners.

Maybe, says the report the city has produced, but at a
disproportionate cost. Several earlier looks at the idea of licensing
bikes in Ottawa have concluded that the system would cost about
$100,000 a year and would recover, at best, $40,000 in fees from
cyclists. Worse, it would impose a barrier on would-be cyclists, who’d
have to go through an extra layer of bureaucracy before they could
legally ride — when the city actually wants people to take to their
bikes because they don’t significantly contribute to traffic
congestion and put less wear and tear on roads.

Enforcing the rules would be extra complicated because Gatineau
cyclists mix with Ottawans and it’d be difficult to put a licensing
requirement on them, and the city would also have to find a way to
make the licensing regime work with services like the National Capital
Commission’s Bixi bike-rentals.

“Given the foregoing limited benefits and significant challenges, and
primarily based on the fact that bicycle licensing would act as a
significant barrier to cycling, it is recommended that bicycle
licensing not be implemented in the City of Ottawa,” the report
concludes, though it notes that there might be some value in a
voluntary registration system for recovering lost and stolen bikes.

Some cities, including Ottawa, have had bike-licensing systems in the
distant past, but no city of any size does now. Regina has such a
bylaw on the books, but in practice it’s not enforced; the system has
been handed off to a community association, which operates it like a
voluntary registry.

Besides Monette’s inquiry, there was virtually no political will for a
licensing system at the city council table. Mayor Jim Watson said at
the time that he’d oppose any effort to pass one.

dreevely@ottawacitizen.com

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