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Tiered licenses

Because the accident, injury and insurance data all supported the case for tiered licensing.

Yes lots of inexperienced riders crash harder and die more frequently because their first bike was too much for them. Go talk to medics in a trauma unit.

I want to agree with you, but can not :) Legal speeds (event +10-20mph) can be achieved on any street legal bike, pretty much. If you doing 160mph on streets and expect a good outcome, than it looks more like a Darwin's award than issue with bike power.

Having a proper training and testing that what will change things for better, imho, and it should be done for cars as well. Want a bigger bike spend few weeks in training before trying it, you'll pay more upfront but it would be a good barrier for school kids. Have a proper exam, not just parking lot drills. Do 1-1 sessions with instructor on different roads, so they can evaluate your abilities, and so on. It just simple stupid to get any license now.

Another thing people should understand that any vechile is a "object of higher danger", I want people to treat those as "lethal weapon" before even trying to get a license.
 
In California we already have tiered licensing. It has been neutered for convenience reasons, but small changes could bring it back to something useful.

The really great thing about our tiered licensing is that it is totally voluntary.

The right to travel is already regulated with regards to motor vehicles. You have to pass a test to get a number of different licenses. Currently there are A, B, C, M1, and M2 classes. No one is screaming about these limitations to their rights. And no one screamed about the M2 prior to its neutering.

When the M1 and M2 were legislated the M1 covered all bikes. The M2 covered all non-freeway legal bikes. When the MSF was created the wording was vague enough that they decided to solve the issue by changing the M2. This was totally done out of convenience. Sadly.

If the M2 were put back to its proper design, and the CMSP was setup to provide an M2 with the first class, and an M1 with a couple more, we would still have voluntarily tiered licensing. So there is no restrictions on anyone's rights.

Yes there would be more costs to getting the M1 if you took the training, but you could always spend essentially no money, and go do the lolly pop, because this program (with a small exception of young people) is totally voluntary.

With regards to the freeway. Those that will argue against this will say that the freeway is safer. These people argue based on incidence rather than severity. Yes there are fewer incidents on the freeway, but most of them tend to be catastrophic--people die. The only real defense a rider has to dealing with the freeway is by developing the skills to read the traffic. These skills can be learned off the freeway with significantly less risk of death.

The solution is out there, and it would only take a small amount of change to engage. The first thing to do however is to get our community behind it. Then we would have some political capital. The thing is, if something like this doesn't happen our sport is likely to continue on with its slow fade. Sales of new bikes will continue to drop. A program like this would help to reinvigorate this industry.

We are already seeing the manufactures introduce smaller bikes. They know they need to do this to develop their clientele. They already have the bikes to provide a wide selection of non-freeway legal bikes that they could bring to the States. All of the solutions are there. The data and science backs up these ideas. The people involved with training back up these ideas. The officers in the CHP that I have spoken with are in agreement with these ideas.
 
British MC sales are down for (blah blah blah) months in a row now, and many Brit Riders are blaming tiered licensing for that because of all the hoops people have to jump through to get accredited for bigger bikes. So who knows what effect a tiered licensing system would have on the US. If it's just implemented in CA, every one will bitch about nanny state etc. but ....... 'busa.
 
Spent the month of September in Switzerland. Rented a BMW RT for a week and a week later rented a BMW 118i for 5 days. ALL of our licensing needs to be address auto and motorcycle. We have a lot of people driving that should not be. The Germans and Swiss drive so much better than us it is embarrassing. Drove on the autobahn two lane section like I-5 to LA. Trucks never moved out of the right lane. No one stayed in the left lane unless they were actively passing. Yes it costs a lot more to get a license there and it should here. Felt safer driving 190 kph in Germany than 70 on I-5.
 
...Don't let the geriatric "motorcycle safety" cult tell us who they deem acceptable to join our sport and what they will be allowed to ride.

By all measures I'm a geriatric. Don't blame this crap idea on us old folk. My motorcycle licensing test was to ride around the block and not come back bloody :ride. If the current licensing testing does not identify who is safe to ride, then that is a problem with the testing not the bike they are riding. I'm a firm believer that the size of the bike is not the contributing factor, geeze Joey Dunlop died riding a 125 for crying out loud, and his brother on a 250. And you can't argue they didn't know how to ride.
 
I believe tiered licenses for both motos and vehicles would be a good idea. Sticking an R1 in the hands of a kid with no experience is not a good idea. It also blows me away that a driver with very little experience can hook a 36 foot travel trailer to his dad's 4 door pickup and drive it in the snow legally.
 
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If your boss was around in 1979 (to pick a particularly bloody year), 233 TEENAGERS died in California on streetbikes that weren't very powerful by today's standards. And an additional 263 died ages 20-24.

In 2016 (according to the new NHTSA database), 15 California teenagers died on motorcycles along with another 80 ages 20-24.

The OMFG THE KIDS ARE ALL GONNA DIE ON THOSE BULLET BIKES problem is actually not problem, or at least not a very big one.

Most people who take up motorcycling are sensible about it and advance at their own pace. Don't let the geriatric "motorcycle safety" cult tell us who they deem acceptable to join our sport and what they will be allowed to ride.

Wouldn't helmet laws have been a major factor in the reduction of fatalities too?
 
Germany has it right when it comes to tiered vehicle licensing.

They don't let just any Hans Schmoe on the autobahn.
 
There are lots of folks like that... and kids that got their parents to only get them a 600 because it is not a 1000.

We have discussed in our MotoSafety committee and for now there is not a tier for cars and putting one in place for moto's would be difficult because of it not being fair to different vehicle types.

Trucking has some precedent for specials licensing requirements.
The Moto industry would likely fight it.. maybe one day.
only in regards to hauling hazmat, pulling doubles or tankers(non hazmat)tanks just requires the additional endorsement wich is fairly easy to get,:cool
 
Tiered licensing + serious mandated training + very rigorous testing is pretty much everywhere except the US. It works, no question.

Its shockingly easy to get an unrestricted Moto license in the US.

The way it works here is that we resist any level of reasonable restriction, until the consequences of ignoring reasonable restrictions result in an outright ban.
murica
 
Spent the month of September in Switzerland. Rented a BMW RT for a week and a week later rented a BMW 118i for 5 days. ALL of our licensing needs to be address auto and motorcycle. We have a lot of people driving that should not be. The Germans and Swiss drive so much better than us it is embarrassing. Drove on the autobahn two lane section like I-5 to LA. Trucks never moved out of the right lane. No one stayed in the left lane unless they were actively passing. Yes it costs a lot more to get a license there and it should here. Felt safer driving 190 kph in Germany than 70 on I-5.
you mean to tell me that people there know how to merge on the freeway so trucks dont have to get over,man i wish that would happen here :teeth
 
Tiered de-licensing

Another problem that might be addressed with a tiered approach to motorcycle licensing is the cost imposed on society by the aging rider population. While old folks [full disclosure: my 70th is just over the horizon] rant about those damn kids killing themselves on Gixxers, they have themselves created something of a mess. And it might be time to "encourage" them to wind down their riding.

A few facts have come to my attention in the past couple of years: First, while motorcycle crashes per mile traveled have steadily declined, the lethality of crashes--the percentage that result in death--has increased. Second, lethality is significantly higher for older riders. And third, the percentage of older riders among those who crash is much greater than it was in the past. Within the population of motorcycle crashers, the 55+ age group, who die in about 4.5% of their crashes, has statistically displaced riders < 25, who die in about 3% of their crashes. As a result, average lethality in the population has increased. IOW, crashers die more often now than they did 20 years ago because of the old-fart influx.

This lethality trend can be expected to continue because the aging of the motorcycling population continues.

We can't just kick the old coots off the road (even though we might want to ;)). But a gradual reduction in the capability of the machines they ride should reduce the likelihood and severity of their crashes, and save society some dough in the process. Therefore I propose these restrictions:

  • 500cc at 50
  • 250cc at 65
  • 50cc at 80
Face it: They no longer perceive their own limits accurately and can't be trusted to manage their own risk. The best solution is to lead them gently but firmly down the path out of motorcycling.
 

That's one way to read the data. Compare it to the over all age of the riding population. It has shifted to being older. Which could easily explain the data.

We don't have to wait for legislation. We can all take responsibility for our own actions at any point in time. It's as simple, and easy as doing it.

I myself have shifted to smaller bikes (for most of my riding). And even recently I've been scaling back to my smallest (displacement) bike. The smaller bikes in many instances are just more fun to ride.

There's no place on the street that I can legally open up the 899. The stock 50 can be run near its limit all day, and mostly be legal. It changes your focus to being more precise, and more in the game (paying attention). The little bikes reward good riding, because they cannot compensate, with power, for bad riding. While at the same time they are way more forgiving with mistakes because F=MA, and in this case the M is significantly less, and generally A is too (except times like when the Honda Civic drivers enter the equation).

w7sg3zw.jpg
 
New riders familiar with only car engine displacement may have incorrect perception on bike displacement - 600 cc sounds anemic, and 1000 cc sounds about adequate to get moving.
 
...I'm a firm believer that the size of the bike is not the contributing factor, geeze Joey Dunlop died riding a 125 for crying out loud, and his brother on a 250. And you can't argue they didn't know how to ride.

Russ, Joey was on a ~50hp sub 100kg GP bike. Also, he was racing the TT which kills people every year that they run it--bike size not withstanding. So yes you can die on big bikes too. But you are less likely to die if you develop competency both is riding skills, and judgement employing these skills.

For new riders lighter lower powered bikes provide better opportunities to learn, and develop riding skills. This has to do with how the human animal (and most mammals) learn.

Watch young humans, and other young mammals play. This play is experimenting. Learning their limits. To learn you need to experiment. The smaller bikes, due to their substantially lower mass, encourage experimentation, where the larger bikes do not.

On the larger bikes it is too painful, and too expensive to experiment at the same levels that one can on the smaller bikes. Because of physics, and how the human animal learns we don't need to argue the merits of Joey's ability. ;)
 
We can't just kick the old coots off the road (even though we might want to ;)). But a gradual reduction in the capability of the machines they ride should reduce the likelihood and severity of their crashes, and save society some dough in the process. Therefore I propose these restrictions:

  • 500cc at 50
  • 250cc at 65
  • 50cc at 80
Face it: They no longer perceive their own limits accurately and can't be trusted to manage their own risk. The best solution is to lead them gently but firmly down the path out of motorcycling.
There goes the Goldwing market...

:laughing
 
DataDan [LIST said:
[*]500cc at 50
[*]250cc at 65
[*]50cc at 80[/LIST]
Face it: They no longer perceive their own limits accurately and can't be trusted to manage their own risk. The best solution is to lead them gently but firmly down the path out of motorcycling.

I think the size limits suggestions are way to small.
If I was restricted to a 250CC bike I would stop riding.
@6 ft 200 lbs a 250 can barely cruse at 70.
You need to be able to keep up with the flow of traffic, so maybe we should go back to the 55mph limits of the mid 70's.

Now that I think about it it's much safer to drive at 35mph, maybe the max speed limits should be much lower.

That would make Jerry's bullet train a true bullet compaired to a car or motorcycle.
 
you mean to tell me that people there know how to merge on the freeway so trucks dont have to get over,man i wish that would happen here :teeth

Yes.

This is the sign they use. Saw one on the autobahn that was animated. :thumbup

zipper-method-traffic-sign-germany.jpg


Every other car and traffic does not stop.


My favorite German traffic sign. :cool

autobahn-2.jpg
 
Another problem that might be addressed with a tiered approach to motorcycle licensing is the cost imposed on society by the aging rider population........

"This part of your post is just facts"

..............We can't just kick the old coots off the road (even though we might want to ;)). But a gradual reduction in the capability of the machines they ride should reduce the likelihood and severity of their crashes, and save society some dough in the process. Therefore I propose these restrictions:

  • 500cc at 50
  • 250cc at 65
  • 50cc at 80
Face it: They no longer perceive their own limits accurately and can't be trusted to manage their own risk. The best solution is to lead them gently but firmly down the path out of motorcycling.

I should be down to about a 125cc :afm199 But I love my Multistrada.

Some time I hate facts :x But I am working on my getting older plan. I sold the K1600GT because it was getting to heavy and got the Multistrada. When I get old I buy a DRZ400SM. When I can't get my leg over that it will be scooter time. :twofinger
 
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