Would you support graduated licensing for motorcyclists?

Is limiting new riders' access to large-cc motorcycles a good idea, or would it be another case of the government prying too deep into the decisions of an individual's life?

If I had to abide by these rules, I would probably grumble. Like the year with my learner's permit, though, time would pass quickly, and I would likely have a higher likelihood of arriving at the end of the first year alive. To the respondents, raise your hand if you never had a serious pucker moment in your first year of riding.

Pretend that the upper limit was 250 cc. Now, if these limitations did go into effect, the floodgates would be open for the Japanese manufacturers to bring all of the cool smaller-displacement bikes here to the States.

YES!

If for no other reason, than my lust for well-engineered sub twofiddycc bikes.

But seriously, I learned that way by choice, and can think of several instances where I would have gone down hard with more HP added to lack of skills.

Another yes. Our local Ayn Randies will surely hate this, but I think all non-commercial vehicle licensing should be graduated.

A new rider on a Hayabusa or a new driver in a Z28 presents a clear threat to public safety as well as a drain on public resources when they go the the ER. Your plan for bikes works, for cars it would need to be more about power/weight with a clause added in for simple weight to keep 16 yr. olds out of Expeditions, Suburbans, etc. The exception here is for vehicles registered as commercial or farm use.

I also learned on a small bike (CB350) so I have no great stories about learning to ride on a CBR900 and laying it down at 140 in a Wal-Mart parking lot or anything.

Yes and no.... + Now that I've had my lic over 20+years fine. + It would bring us in line with the rest of the world. + It would help the aftermarket company's again with small car hop up kits pipes etc. (on the fence) + & - It would keep some squid kids alive. - we'd be giving up a freedom with more regulations.... something that makes this country great is are freedom to choose.

Where I live, there's a 250cc cap for 1st year licence holders, (excluding 250 two-strokes.) However, a power/weight ratio limit works much better. That way, you're not outlawing a whole bunch of older, larger-capacity (but low-power), affordable bikes. Unfortunately, my state doesn't see the wisdom in this .

Europe has had this sort of licensing for younger rides for quite a while - basically for the first couple of years you could only ride bikes with 33bhp or less, but there was no limit on engine displacement. In the UK, if you're over 25, you can take an additional test to remove the power limit early or you take the test on a bike with at least 50bhp to get the full license straight away.

I started out with the restricted license but once I was comfortable with a bikes, I took the second test and got the limit removed early. Personally I think it's a good idea, a fairly light bike with 33bhp takes getting used to already so the gradual move up the power/weight ladder is a good thing.

I would definitely support that. I am doing it by choice as well. I love small bores...

If you go down at 60 mph wearing only shorts, Corona tank top, and flip flops, its gonna hurt no matter how long it took you to get to 60 MPH.

Much like helmet laws, blue laws, tobacco regulations, gun regulations, taxes that prop up the lower class, I am against it. America is supposed to be a free country, after all.

Personal story: My first bike was a modified ZX-9 Ninja. I am still alive. I love me some liter bikes!

If I had a liter bike, I think I would be dead...

93gsxturbo wrote: If you go down at 60 mph wearing only shorts, Corona tank top, and flip flops, its gonna hurt no matter how long it took you to get to 60 MPH. Personal story: My first bike was a modified ZX-9 Ninja. I am still alive. I love me some liter bikes!

The problem is how much higher than 60 mph a 600 cc or literbike can get. And how fast it can get there. Only the guys who are still alive can proclaim "I'm still alive!"

I think that 250 cc or 500 cc are good stepping stones because above that displacement, the correlation between displacement and power becomes weaker. The problem with power:weight ratios and such is that there would be a lot more caveats, and it would be a lot more difficult to enforce.

Why does this have to be a government thing? Seems to me that if the cause is correct, a private organization could build the support, get proper sponsorship and provide some great information to new riders. We could:
Add it to MSF
Get some pro-riders to support it
Start a whole new organization
Work with the mfg's of less than 600 cc bikes
Think of it as the difference between Street Survival and your DMV licensing test. There is no real publicly visible survival/training group for motorcycles other than the MSF and they do their absolute best to maintain a quite low profile.

I have never heard of a larger motorcycle absorbing the impact and protecting the rider. Both lightweight and heavy motorcycles weigh just a fraction of a modern car. Whenever I see motorcycle crash pictures, the motorcycle is in one place, and the rider is somewhere else; perhaps in a few places, depending on how bad the crash was.

One of the problems with modern motorcycling is vanity. How many times have you heard people judge a bike by its displacement? I can only imagine that this drives a lot of people to purchase a larger displacement bike simply to prove something to their peers. And why not? Unlike cars, there's a very weak relationship between speed and cost. A new super sport bike costs the same amount of money as an economy car, and it can be financed! Imagine if anyone just off of a learner's permit and a thousand bucks in his pocket could buy a ZR1.

I am a pretty conservative person, but I can't say I'd be totally against it. I mean, I know my own limits, and a 250CC regulation would knock me out of the bike category that I wanted, also, I know this is more concentrated on sport bikes, but there are some younger riders that will never leave the Harley brand and a basic Sportster puts you out of this category already.

Also, lets revise it to say no "liter bikes", all that will happen is companies who produce the liter bikes will shoot for 950CC or something similar to qualify their bikes to a certain category.

To add to the idea that we seem to be assuming sport type bikes, I am sure that some older model liter bikes might be barely on par with a modern 600s in terms of power/weight.

I say no just because they would find a way to double or triple the fee for this service in a few years for our own protection. I am shocked how many times I ended up going 120mph in town on a wimpy 600cc "starter" sportbike though.

As long as you base it on the right parameters I think it might work. Engine size seems like a bad idea... base it on power to weight...

None of this accounts for all the new riders who crash because their bike's race-oriented geometry required too fine of control for the untuned lizard brain.

MrJoshua wrote: I say no just because they would find a way to double or triple the fee for this service in a few years for our own protection. I am shocked how many times I ended up going 120mph in town on a wimpy 600cc "starter" sportbike though.

I think the key word here is "in-town." Picture this: The driver turning left in the opposite direction sees a motorcycle, and based upon notions of how fast a person is going on the road (and the lack of depth perception due to the single headlight), he turns left in front of the bike. Before you have time to think "oh E36 M3" you are a nuisance for the concrete washing crew. So, you may be wearing a helmet and full gear. I'm realizing now that gear may downgrade a fatality to an extended stay in the hospital, major injury to minor, etc., but really, there are no guarantees. Did you hear about the girl here in Gainesville who passed away a few weeks back while learning how to ride? She was wearing a helmet, but her motorcycling career was still only 30 feet long.

I'm only becoming in tune with the dangers we face after spending some time in the saddle myself, and realizing how fine the line is between rubber side down and rubber side up. I consider just about every accident due to rider error, because only the rider is capable of improving his or her likelihood of surviving. After reading numerous news stories/accident reports, I have noticed one consistency among them: Motorcyclist, dead, vehicle occupants uninjured.

Now, here's some evidence. It has been a few weeks since I have read them to write a paper, but they find strong correlations between the machine's performance and the rider's tendency to crash. They are all .pdfs of respected research journals, except the Hurt Report (its common name), which is the often-referenced DOT study. It's 30 years old, so imagine how the study would be different nowadays with machines that have double the horsepower at a lighter weight.

Role of Motorcycle Type in Fatal Motorcycle Crashes - Journal of Safety Research

Death by Motorcycle: Background, Behavioral, and Situational Correlates of Fatal Motorcycle Collisions - Journal of Forensic Sciences

Hurt Report

Behavioral and eye-movement measures to track improvements in driving skills of vulnerable road users: First-time motorcycle riders - Transportation Research

A Vincent Black Shadow weighs 458 pounds and produces 55 hp. A GSX-R 1000 weighs 448 pounds and produces 191 hp. (And my apologies, these values are from Wikipedia so please take them with as many grains of salt as you would like).

The libertarian me says no, but my personal desire says yes for a couple reasons. First, I think it would save lives. Second, it would create a need for fun, smaller, low displacement bikes. Might be good for the economy too, by creating a market for starter bikes for manufacturers to fill. However, I think doing it like how the Brits do it by using a horsepower restriction might make more sense; it would also allow people to buy bigger bikes and just restrict them to meet the horsepower limit temporarily.

Why just bikes?

How many young peaple die on a large displacement bike vs how many die in cars by distracted driving, too much car, street racing etc etc etc.

It's an instrusive law into avery small segment of the population. It won't save the lives you think it will. Becuase they still won;t wear helmets, boot long pants, gloves or a proper jacket.

If you are going to instill laws to protect motorcyclist, the instill mandatroy riders education, like the MSF course. That will save lives.

But if you want another intrusive law into my freedon under the great banner of "think of the children" I thiknk you should start with the kid in a 3600 lbs, 250 HP parents minivan with a 200 watt stereo and full entertainment system. That will make a reall difference.

I don't really like the idea because well it is more government intrusion and if you are dumb enough to buy a 1000 and not be uber careful well that is just Darwin at work same with not wearing proper wear. I wish there were better 250cc bikes available though.

93EXCivic wrote: I don't really like the idea because well it is more government intrusion and if you are dumb enough to buy a 1000 and not be uber careful well that is just Darwin at work same with not wearing proper wear. I wish there were better 250cc bikes available though.

The less goverment the better!

"Being shot out of a cannon will always be better than being squeezed out of a tube. That is why God made fast motorcycles, Bubba....

Hunter S. Thompson "

Another favorite:

Life's journey is not about arriving at the grave safely in a well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, totally worn out, shouting "...Holy ****...What a ride!"

Besides if there wasn't morons to buy big bikes and crash them who'd be supplying the motors for small scale race cars?

racinginc215 wrote:

Maroon92 wrote: If I had a liter bike, I think I would be dead...

Your small bore bike is just giving you a false sense of security. I'd rather put down a full dresser at 60 then a 250 at 60. at least I've got some mass to absorb the impact. I'd much rather hit a car on a bigger bike too. bigger frame bigger fork tubes bigger triple trees. See your thinking it's a 250 I can't get hurt. you lose respect for small bore pretty quick when your thinking it's safer, riding a liter bike you know it can kill you fast and your a lot more cautious.

You may think that, but I think you are wrong. I fully respect the fact that I can still dump the bike at 55 and hurt myself. I fully respect that I could easily slam headlong into a car and kill myself. I respect the bike, I know the full extent of it's capabilities, because it is possible to reach them on the street. It's similar to why I would rather drive a Miata on the street than a Lamborghini, it's more fun to ride a slow bike fast than it is to ride a fast bike slow.

I would fully support it then go out and even put myself into the system as proof of that. I really like the 33hp restriction that they have in the UK. Buy a bike, put on the kit, take off after a year. I am pretty sure you can hustle a roadglide down the road with just 33hp if you really wanted to.

wearymicrobe wrote: I am pretty sure you can hustle a roadglide down the road with just 33hp if you really wanted to.

As opposed to the 58 hp stock and probably 48 hp when they put open headers on and lose all back pressure and run really lean.

Mental wrote: Why just bikes? How many young peaple die on a large displacement bike vs how many die in cars by distracted driving, too much car, street racing etc etc etc.

Amen! You hit the nail on the head.

Mental wrote: It's an instrusive law into avery small segment of the population. It won't save the lives you think it will. Becuase they still won;t wear helmets, boot long pants, gloves or a proper jacket. If you are going to instill laws to protect motorcyclist, the instill mandatroy riders education, like the MSF course. That will save lives.

Agreed. I think rider/driver training is something seriously lacking in this country. The majority of what I know about handling a bike or car at the limit was learned in a very seat of the pants way. It worked out ok for me, and I'm alive, well, and relatively unscathed. That said, I might not have made some of the more stupid mistakes with some formal training.

If you look at Germany, public transportation is fairly cheap and driving is relatively expensive. Also, the cost of a driver's license is a few grand. All of those factors mean a number of people who aren't interested in driving don't get on the road. The training there is significantly more intensive than here. For example you are tested on a wet course and a sliding plate swings the back end of your car into a slide. Passing means getting straightened out and on your merry way once again. Again, that's a lesson I learned on the fly in a few different cars (and on a couple of bikes). It's expensive both and intensive, but I think the autobahn would be a very suitable reward. Ask any parent who loses a child in a car or motorcycle accident if they would go back and happily spend a few thousand dollars to have their son or daughter back.

Mental wrote: Why just bikes? How many young peaple die on a large displacement bike vs how many die in cars by distracted driving, too much car, street racing etc etc etc. It's an instrusive law into avery small segment of the population. It won't save the lives you think it will. Becuase they still won;t wear helmets, boot long pants, gloves or a proper jacket. If you are going to instill laws to protect motorcyclist, the instill mandatroy riders education, like the MSF course. That will save lives.

According to the second source that I posted above, motorcycles are 27.5 times more likely to be involved in a fatal accident per mile traveled.

Fast bikes are typically less expensive than fast cars. When someone crashes a car, the likelihood of bodily harm is less than that on a motorcycle.

And I completely agree that the MSF course should be mandatory. In Florida, it is required for riders under 21 getting their motorcycle endorsement.