BCCOM, as well as other stakeholders, have been involved with the Superintendent of Motor Vehicles over several issues regarding motorcycling.  We were involved in a meeting, given recommendations by the OSMV's office, asked for our feedback, feedback was given and completely ignored.  These proposed recommendations are now going into effect despite resistance from many groups involved in the consultation process.

 Please read the proposals and BCCOM's response at the link above.

 While many of you will agree on some of the proposals, many will not.

The Coalition feels this is a heavy handed way to make the public feel that government is being proactive while in our opinion they are being reactive. These recommendations do not address that 66% of all motorcycle accidents involving another vehicle are the vehicles fault. 

They do not address that rider training needs to be rewarded i.e. rebate on insurance.

BCCOM feels that the only stakeholders that were listened to were ICBC and law enforcement. If you are opposed to these changes now is the time to let your voice be heard, as soon it will be too late. Please write your thoughts to the OSMV and cc Kash Heed, as well as your MLA.

 Steve Martin
Superintendent of Motor Vehicles
PO Box 9254 Stn Prov Govt
Victoria  BC  V8W 9J2
or email: OSMV.Mailbox@gov.bc.ca

Honourable Kash Heed
Solicitor General
Room 236
Parliament Buildings
Victoria  BC  V8V 1X4
or email:  kash.heed.mla@leg.bc.ca

 Please go to the link below to find your MLA's contact information:
http://www.leg.bc.ca/mla/3-1-1.htm

Staff recommendations addressing Motorcycle and Scooter Parking in Vancouver

Hello,

Thank you for your interest regarding motorcycle and scooter parking in Vancouver. Currently the City of Vancouver has 42 metered spaces dedicated to motorcycle and scooter drivers. Several of the City’s parking facilities (Easypark) also provide scooter and motorcycle parking at a reduced rate.

For Council's consideration staff are currently reviewing options to expand motorcycle and scooter parking opportunities and would like your feedback on the following options:

1.      Create Free Parking Areas for Peddle Assisted Scooters, Limited Speed Motorcycles/Scooters and Zero Emission Scooters

        Staff would install a painted area, signage and a stencil within streets' far side corner clearances (the areas between the crosswalk and the last metered parking spot) and allow peddle assisted scooter drivers, limited speed (less than 50cc) motorcycle/scooter drivers and zero emission scooter drivers to park within them for free.

2.      Reduce Parking Meter Rates and Allow Multiple Vehicles Per Spot
        Staff would allow all scooter and motorcycle drivers parked at a meter to pay 50% of the existing rate if they utilize the City’s pay-by-phone system and allow multiple scooter and motorcycle drivers to park         within each metered spot.

While there are other variations to these options, we want to ensure that any new regulations are easy to understand and are consistent with the City's transportation policies.

If you do not wish to be contacted again in this regard please let us know.

Yours truly,
Andrew Kent

Projects | Engineering Services
City of Vancouver
Email: andrew.kent@vancouver.ca

Dear BCCOM Members,

Well it appears now is the time that counts! The first letters were to support the motion and now that staff has come out with recommendations it is time to write and give reasons as to why it does not please the people that reside in Vancouver who ride motorcycles. There a hundreds of reasons why parking should be accepted but I guess each individual needs to come up with reasoning they can stand behind.

Staff will be putting these recommendations in the local Vancouver papers asking for public comment so we need to get as much input in as possible.



Below is BCCOM's official response.


 

Dear Andrew,

Thank you for your email, I must say the B.C. Coalition of Motorcyclists is extremely disappointed with the route taken by staff. 

Powered two wheelers have been largely ignored in past transportation plans where as in other areas such as Toronto, Barcelona, London, San Francisco and Asia have been promoted successfully as an alternative form of transportation.  These areas consider powered two wheelers as part of the solution in dealing with traffic congestion, as well as green house gas production.

There are 26,500 (2007) and 27,500 (2008) licensed and insured motorcyclists in the City of Vancouver and feelings are that with the increasing downtown congestion that the time has come for the City of Vancouver to allow on-street parking by motorcycles, mopeds and scooters to utilize the wasted “corner clearance” spots and to encourage an alternate form of transportation that uses less fossil fuel, takes up less space on the road and uses less man made products to produce. 

Staff has now taken the recommendations and designated it for electric and zero emissions bikes, which, from what has been seen downtown, park and secure their bikes to bicycle racks, lamp standards etc. and do not even wish to have them on the street for safety reasons.  Also there are under 49cc scooters that are two strokes which pollute far more than larger four stroke engines. These vehicles are not licensed, registered nor do they have insurance which will make this process a nightmare to enforce.

Regarding the pay-by-phone system for larger motorcycles one must assume that everyone has a cell phone and does nothing to encourage tourists who happen to be on a motorcycle.  Correct me if I am wrong but I believe the city by-laws already allow more than one vehicle per spot so that point is moot. 

Clearly the trend toward the electric and zero emissions plan that the staff have come up with is driven towards eliminating emissions such as HC and the NOx which is rather ironic as there are over ¾ of a million cars in this province that at 10 years and older pollute more than a newer bike. With new car buying down and motorcycles sales increasing I’d say that would be enough to show the future.    

If City Engineering, with a Mayor and Council behind them could shut a lane down on a major bridge in such a forward thinking manner I would ask that staff do more research in this area to try to bring the City of Vancouver into the fold of what many other cities and countries have already found regarding promoting motorcycling in the cities. 

Please see below a paper written by Dr. Stephen Stewart of Translink regarding emissions and the trends in purchasing both automobiles and motorcycles.

Sincerely,
Adele Tompkins, executive director
B.C. Coalition of Motorcyclists

 Adele,

 This is what I have immediately to hand. You might already have this. The obvious emissions advantage is in reducing CO2. And for new motorcycles and scooters the, the emissions of HC, CO and NOx for 2010 are about as good as what cars reached maybe 10 years ago. A new bike is certainly better all round than an old car.

 Steve 

Motorcycle Emissions

 Recent Licensing Trends

The past couple of years have seen a significant increase in the number of motorcycles licensed for use in BC. From July 2007 to July 2008, a period that saw zero growth in the light-duty vehicle fleet for the first time in decades, the number of licensed motorcycles grew by 12%.  In the previous 12 months, from July 2006 to July 2007, the motorcycle fleet grew by 6% while the overall light-duty fleet continued its historical trend of around 2% growth.

To put this in context: July 2008 motorcycle numbers were 82,000, compared to an overall light-duty fleet of about 2.5 million vehicles, which is about one motorcycle out of every 30 vehicles.

The number of motorcycles in use is very seasonal, so there are always far fewer in January than in the preceeding July.  However this effect was much less marked this past winter, so that January 2009 actually shows a 30% increase over January 2008.  In fact, 37% of the number licensed in July 2008 were licensed in January 2009. Although, this does not necessarily mean that the winter saw 37% of last summer’s level of motorcycle activity and use, it does mean that over one third of the motorcycles continued to be available for use during the winter.  The smaller motorcycles appear to be the ones more likely to remain licensed throughout the winter.

The growth has come from introduction of new motorcycles. The older motorcycle numbers show only a moderate trend to the decreased numbers normally expected from an aging fleet of vehicles.  So, most existing motorcycles continued to be re-licensed, while at the same time new motorcycles were added to give the 12% increase in overall numbers.

All sizes of motorcycle have increased in numbers. But the biggest growth has been in the smaller engine sizes.  For these smaller engines the numbers of each model year are about double from 2005 onwards compared to 2004 and older.  For the newer motorcycles, 50% have engines of 750cc or less, 25% are 250cc or less, and 16% are only 50cc. The 50cc scooters are offered by all the Japanese manufacturers, some European manufacturers, and an increasing number of Chinese and other Asian manufacturers.

Overall, Harley Davidson accounts for almost a third of all the new motorcycles in British Columbia. It is followed by Kawasaki, Yamaha, Honda and Suzuki, all with similar shares. In 6^th, 8^th, 9^th and 10^th place are BMW, Ducati, KTM and Triumph.  For each Triumph sold there are 24 Harley Davidson’s. In 7^th place overall is Benzhou, the Chinese scooter manufacturer. 75% of Benzhou sales are 50cc, with the remaining 25% being 150cc.  Six  more scooter manufacturers (Kymco, Vespa, Piaggio, Aprillia, Geely, Derbi, and Keeway) appear in the 20 most popular makes.

Motorcycle Emissions

Motorcycles generally use much less fuel than cars or trucks, and therefore produce much less CO₂. However, new motorcycles are allowed to emit more HC, CO and NOx, and therefore do not need to have such efficient emission control systems as are required on new cars and trucks. 

New Motorcycle Emission Standard

From 2006 the Canadian and US federal requirements for motorcycles were brought into line with California standards that applied from 2004. The standards are set to become stricter in 2010, and the maximum allowable emissions of CO will be 12 g/km, with the maximum HC+NOx set at 0.8 g/km.  But, the intention of the new standards is not to force universal adoption of sophisticated emission controls on motorcycles.  Electronic fuel injection and catalytic converters are becoming normal on larger motorcycles, but smaller motorcycles will be able to meet the standards in more affordable ways. In fact, for the smallest engines, all that is required is a switch to 4-stroke engines instead of 2-stroke. The available data shows that the 2010 standard is already being met, with ease.

Comparison with New Car and Truck Standard

Even though most new motorcycles will have emissions significantly lower than their maximum allowed, the average new car or truck continues to be significantly cleaner than these typical new motorcycles. However, there are different allowable levels of compliance with the new car and truck standards. These standards  were introduced in 2004 and are known as Tier 2 standards. Tier 2 includes nine different Bins, where Bin 0 has essentially zero tailpipe emissions, with Bin 9 allowing the highest level of emissions. Each manufacturers sales have to average to the equivalent of Bin 5.  If the typical new motorcycles shown in the table were all cars, then their emissions would place them in Tier 2 Bin 9. For context: the diesel Smart car sold from 2004 to 2006 was also a Bin 9 vehicle.  But placement in Bins 3, 4 or 5 is normal for most cars. Bin 9 was no longer accepted from the 2007 model year onwards.

Comparison with Previous Standards and with In-Use Vehicles

Before Tier 2 was introduced in 2004, new light duty vehicles were certified to a series of standards known as Tier 1 (1996-2003); Tier 0 (1988-1995) and Pre-Tier0 (1975-1987).  As vehicles age, and accumulate mileage and defects, it is normal for their emissions performance to deteriorate, so older in-use vehicles typically emit at higher levels than was originally allowed by their certification.  It is clear from the table, that the typical new motorcycles shown above have emissions performance better than the original certification requirements for older cars and trucks.

 CO2

 An average car uses about 10 litres of gasoline per 100km of driving, and drives about 16,000km per year, to give total annual CO₂ emissions of 4 tonnes.  Motorcycle fuel consumption ranges from about 6 L/100km down to less than 2 L/100km, and for the same annual kilometres driven this means about 2.4 tonnes down to 0.8 tonnes of CO₂ per year. So, a replacing a car with a new motorcycle would give between 5.4 and 9.6 tonnes of CO₂ reduction over 3 years.

 Stephen Stewart

Senior Project Engineer AirCare Program

Attachment of number plates 3.011 Number plates issued for a vehicle under the Commercial Transport Act or Motor Vehicle Act must be attached (a) one plate to the front and one plate to the rear of the vehicle, if 2 number plates are issued for a vehicle, and (b) to the rear of the vehicle, if a single number plate is issued for a vehicle. [en. B.C. Reg. 279/2006.]