Article: Scooter bike lanes plan

[ozbob]

From the Herald Sun click here!

Scooter bike lanes plan

Scooter bike lanes plan

    * Ashley Gardiner
    * From: Herald Sun
    * September 18, 2010 12:00AM

MOTOR scooter riders want to use St Kilda Rd's bike lanes under a plan to have it declared Melbourne's first "safe route".

Scooters would be able to use on-road bike lanes for six months in a proposed trial.

Supporters of the plan say "safe routes" would encourage more commuters to use the cheap and efficient form of transport.

But the idea is opposed by cyclists, who say it will put them in danger.

And they have Roads Minister Tim Pallas on side.

"We have no plans to introduce powered two-wheelers into bicycle lanes," a spokesman for the minister said.

Victorian Automobile Chamber of Commerce executive director David Purchase said motor scooters were one of the answers to the city's transport problems.

They reduced congestion, had a low carbon footprint and diminished demand for parking spaces, he said.

"A six month trial period will enable us to record vital data, with a view to investigating further scooter safe routes in and around Melbourne and other Victorian cities."

Under the VACC plan, low-powered scooters would be able to use designated on-road bicycle lanes, and they would be allowed to filter through stationary or slow-moving traffic.

Riders would need to be properly trained and registered, Mr Purchase said.

The VACC has organised a rally for Sunday, October 10, with hundreds expected to ride from Luna Park to Lygon St.

Australian Scooter Federation chair Hollie Black said scooters were the easiest and simplest way to get around Melbourne.

Bicycle Victoria spokesman Gary Brennan believes the idea will never win support.

[#Metro]

This is probably for T2 lanes. Mind you, the boundary between bicycle and scooter is blurring because it is now possible to get an electric bicycle which is charged by a battery pack and has a top speed around 20km/hour.

Good for people with less mobility, or for those who want a faster trip.

Not sure either way, but scooter lanes? Depends on what speed it goes to I guess?

[Mozz]

I have seen electric bikes doing 50kph on the coro drive bikeway (on the flat) - cant say I support those speeds on shared paths either with or without batteries

[johnnigh]

The differences between an electric bicycle and a moped or motor scooter are first that the electric bike has to be pedalled before the electric motor kicks in and second that the power is limited to 200 watts. There are questions about how fast such a bike should be able to be assisted to, but the principle is that the motor is merely assisting the legs. If non-leg assisting vehicles are allowed in bicycle lanes, not T2 lanes on the road, TT, then they ought to be speed limited by a governor to the speed that an electric assist bike can be assisted to.

Speed differences between ordinary pedal cycles are bad enough now on bike ways, but differences in mass are limited to the rider's weight and some variation in bike and load weight, much smaller than variation in rider weight. With the mass difference that a much more powerful and heavy scooter has, any contact between these vehicles and a cyclist, let alone pedestrian, would be much less benign. And, as we know, even contacts between cyclists and between cyclists and pedestrians can occasionally be fatal, though KSIs are much less than on the motor vehicle dominated road.