Another brilliant Aldermanic proposal-- $25 license and mandatory safety course for all cyclists in Chicago
Got a call from a Trib journalist for a reaction.... 3rd ward alderwoman, no time to look up the name which I'm blocking on. Sometimes this job interferes with my internet usage...
Anyone got anything?
How many times have we been here before....
Views: 2704
Replies to This Discussion
-
Permalink Reply by Duppie on
-
Maybe you should come up to Edgewater more often. Gays? Sure. Lesbians? Sure. Entitled mothers who think their brood should be allowed to scream in local establishments? yep, that too. But db hipsters who live in $550 apartments? Not really.
Now Rogers Park, that place is a hipster-cesspool, if you ask me...
globalguy said:Well, thanks for taking the bait, Hipster DB. All I was saying was that with a little cash-based cred (how else do Rahm's bikey minions have an impact) you could get out of your Edgewater tofu flop and actually attend a Mayors Bike Advisory Blah Blah Blah and rage "I paid the fee but they took the bike lanes out of Washington Square!" ... "WTF" my Brooks-saddled Butt ...
h' $550 said:WTF?
-
Permalink Reply by Thunder Snow on
-
Predictably, the Trib's resident Jack Kass weighs in:
www.chicagotribune.com/news/columnists/ct-met-kass-1024-20131024,0,...
chicagotribune.com
Dig into your spandex shorts, Little Bike People
City Hall wants its money, and a $100 fee is only fair
John Kass
October 24, 2013
A Chicago alderman has come up with a great idea that every taxpayer — except the Little Bike People — will love:
A $25 city registration fee for adults riding bikes in Chicago.
It's a great idea, but it doesn't go far enough.
Instead of a $25 registration fee, why not a $100 registration fee? That way, Mayor Rahm Emanuel can plug holes in the budget.
When I suggested on Facebook that the Rahmfather could even give Chicagoans free cable TV if he made the bike fee high enough, the hordes of Little Bike People seethed in rage.
"I hope they put a $1,000 fee on beer can chicken so everyone can have free cell phones, Internet and Netflix," wrote bicyclist Grant D. "That way, the 'little cooking people' would pay for us little bike people."
Ald. Pat Dowell told me that she rides a bike, loves the idea of bikes in Chicago and has been a proponent of increasing the number of bike lanes.
What bothered her is City Hall essentially raising the city amusement tax on cable TV, which Dowell said would hit senior citizens the hardest.
The cable TV tax boost was proposed as Emanuel introduced a $7 billion budget with a $339 million budget hole.
Emanuel, who once loudly promised he wouldn't nickel-and-dime taxpayers to death, essentially nickels-and-dimes almost everybody to death — except his favored constituency, the bike people.
"But you can't balance that on seniors," Dowell said. "Most of our seniors don't go out for fancy dinners downtown or spend a lot of money at the theater or concerts. They don't spend their entertainment dollars that way. They watch cable TV. So I thought, 'Who else could contribute?' And I thought about the bicycle riders."
Under Mayor Rahmfather's plan, car drivers will be squeezed for about $120 million in traffic tickets from his infamous speed and red light cameras.
Those cameras are fronted as being all about safety. But who are you kidding, Rahmfather? They were always about the revenue.
And bicyclists — especially the aggressive kind with their spandex shorts, cleats and wild yellow shirts, zipping through red lights — they don't pay a dime.
Why should a driver pay and not a bike rider?
Many bicyclists respect the rules of the road. They're also often in danger from thoughtless car drivers. And no, I didn't write that last line as some verbal prophylactic against the irrational hatred often directed at me by the militant two-wheelers. It's true. There are good little bike people.
But the bad ones should pay.
It's only fair. A $25 registration fee is a pittance. That's why it should be increased to a C-note.
Mayor Rahmfather should also mandate that every bike commuter have a city sticker. And a license plate, so that when they run the red lights, the city's Rahm-cams can take their photos and make them pay through the nose just like the rest of us.
At a meeting with the Tribune's editorial board Wednesday, the mayor was asked what he thought of Dowell's proposal.
Emanuel described Dowell as a thoughtful person and took pains not to criticize her.
But he also took pains not to anger the Little Bike People. He lusts after that hipster vote cycling along Milwaukee Avenue, and he's been featured in the newspaper riding a bike, though without a helmet, because he's probably worried about looking like Michael Dukakis on a two-wheeler.
"As it relates to her tax, she can propose, it's her idea, but it was our view that I don't think that's the right way to go," Emanuel said. "But she'll make her call. ... I want to see the details of what she has to say. I sure don't want police involved in policing whether you bought a bike license. I would rather them focus — as I've been clear on — violent crime rather than, 'Did you get a bike license?'"
Later, I ran into the mayor in a Tribune elevator. He repeated his concern that police resources shouldn't be diluted going after reckless bikers.
I told him police didn't have to do it. He's got plenty of payrollers in the Department of Revenue. If they're going to squeeze merchants on the cigarette tax and squeeze mom-and-pop stores, why not let them squeeze some pro-Emanuel spandex shorts?
"And if they don't have a sticker, you impound the bikes," I said, "like you impound a car."
The Rahmfather kept walking, as if I were a street-corner prophet offering a pamphlet about the end of the world. But he stopped when I said the magic words:
Can't you see all that revenue coming City Hall's way?
Then he took off down Michigan Avenue, quickly walking away, as several bicyclists ran red lights as if in homage.
Imagine Streets & San garbage trucks loaded with impounded bikes. Or bikes that had been hit with the Bike Boot.
You want your bike back? You want your car back? Pay City Hall.
"... Will you just shut up already, you 'little car person'?" wailed Nelson T. on Facebook.
But I can't, friend Nelson. I'm all about the 14th Amendment: Bikes and cars equal under the law.
Yet I can sense that seething anger in the Little Bike People. Happily, I ran into an expert clinical neuropsychologist, Dr. Robert L. Heilbronner.
Why are the LBP so angry?
"Perhaps because they feel an unbridled sense of freedom, and by warning them, what you're doing is imposing limitations on them," Heilbronner said. "You're reminding them of something that will befall them."
Like City Hall coming for the cash.
It's inevitable.
Twitter @John_Kass
Copyright © 2013 Chicago Tribune Company, LLC
-
Permalink Reply by Lisa Curcio on
-
I thought the hipsters with the $550 month rent lived in Little Village.
Duppie said:Maybe you should come up to Edgewater more often. Gays? Sure. Lesbians? Sure. Entitled mothers who think their brood should be allowed to scream in local establishments? yep, that too. But db hipsters who live in $550 apartments? Not really.
Now Rogers Park, that place is a hipster-cesspool, if you ask me...
globalguy said:Well, thanks for taking the bait, Hipster DB. All I was saying was that with a little cash-based cred (how else do Rahm's bikey minions have an impact) you could get out of your Edgewater tofu flop and actually attend a Mayors Bike Advisory Blah Blah Blah and rage "I paid the fee but they took the bike lanes out of Washington Square!" ... "WTF" my Brooks-saddled Butt ...
h' $550 said:WTF?
-
-
Frankly, I think that is one of his most obviously tongue in cheek pieces in recent time. And he is quite grateful to Alderman Dowell for giving him the opportunity to jump back on this bandwagon.
Thunder Snow said:Predictably, the Trib's resident Jack Kass weighs in:
www.chicagotribune.com/news/columnists/ct-met-kass-1024-20131024,0,...
chicagotribune.com
Dig into your spandex shorts, Little Bike People
City Hall wants its money, and a $100 fee is only fair
John Kass
October 24, 2013
A Chicago alderman has come up with a great idea that every taxpayer — except the Little Bike People — will love:
A $25 city registration fee for adults riding bikes in Chicago.
It's a great idea, but it doesn't go far enough.
Instead of a $25 registration fee, why not a $100 registration fee? That way, Mayor Rahm Emanuel can plug holes in the budget.
When I suggested on Facebook that the Rahmfather could even give Chicagoans free cable TV if he made the bike fee high enough, the hordes of Little Bike People seethed in rage.
"I hope they put a $1,000 fee on beer can chicken so everyone can have free cell phones, Internet and Netflix," wrote bicyclist Grant D. "That way, the 'little cooking people' would pay for us little bike people."
Ald. Pat Dowell told me that she rides a bike, loves the idea of bikes in Chicago and has been a proponent of increasing the number of bike lanes.
What bothered her is City Hall essentially raising the city amusement tax on cable TV, which Dowell said would hit senior citizens the hardest.
The cable TV tax boost was proposed as Emanuel introduced a $7 billion budget with a $339 million budget hole.
Emanuel, who once loudly promised he wouldn't nickel-and-dime taxpayers to death, essentially nickels-and-dimes almost everybody to death — except his favored constituency, the bike people.
"But you can't balance that on seniors," Dowell said. "Most of our seniors don't go out for fancy dinners downtown or spend a lot of money at the theater or concerts. They don't spend their entertainment dollars that way. They watch cable TV. So I thought, 'Who else could contribute?' And I thought about the bicycle riders."
Under Mayor Rahmfather's plan, car drivers will be squeezed for about $120 million in traffic tickets from his infamous speed and red light cameras.
Those cameras are fronted as being all about safety. But who are you kidding, Rahmfather? They were always about the revenue.
And bicyclists — especially the aggressive kind with their spandex shorts, cleats and wild yellow shirts, zipping through red lights — they don't pay a dime.
Why should a driver pay and not a bike rider?
Many bicyclists respect the rules of the road. They're also often in danger from thoughtless car drivers. And no, I didn't write that last line as some verbal prophylactic against the irrational hatred often directed at me by the militant two-wheelers. It's true. There are good little bike people.
But the bad ones should pay.
It's only fair. A $25 registration fee is a pittance. That's why it should be increased to a C-note.
Mayor Rahmfather should also mandate that every bike commuter have a city sticker. And a license plate, so that when they run the red lights, the city's Rahm-cams can take their photos and make them pay through the nose just like the rest of us.
At a meeting with the Tribune's editorial board Wednesday, the mayor was asked what he thought of Dowell's proposal.
Emanuel described Dowell as a thoughtful person and took pains not to criticize her.
But he also took pains not to anger the Little Bike People. He lusts after that hipster vote cycling along Milwaukee Avenue, and he's been featured in the newspaper riding a bike, though without a helmet, because he's probably worried about looking like Michael Dukakis on a two-wheeler.
"As it relates to her tax, she can propose, it's her idea, but it was our view that I don't think that's the right way to go," Emanuel said. "But she'll make her call. ... I want to see the details of what she has to say. I sure don't want police involved in policing whether you bought a bike license. I would rather them focus — as I've been clear on — violent crime rather than, 'Did you get a bike license?'"
Later, I ran into the mayor in a Tribune elevator. He repeated his concern that police resources shouldn't be diluted going after reckless bikers.
I told him police didn't have to do it. He's got plenty of payrollers in the Department of Revenue. If they're going to squeeze merchants on the cigarette tax and squeeze mom-and-pop stores, why not let them squeeze some pro-Emanuel spandex shorts?
"And if they don't have a sticker, you impound the bikes," I said, "like you impound a car."
The Rahmfather kept walking, as if I were a street-corner prophet offering a pamphlet about the end of the world. But he stopped when I said the magic words:
Can't you see all that revenue coming City Hall's way?
Then he took off down Michigan Avenue, quickly walking away, as several bicyclists ran red lights as if in homage.
Imagine Streets & San garbage trucks loaded with impounded bikes. Or bikes that had been hit with the Bike Boot.
You want your bike back? You want your car back? Pay City Hall.
"... Will you just shut up already, you 'little car person'?" wailed Nelson T. on Facebook.
But I can't, friend Nelson. I'm all about the 14th Amendment: Bikes and cars equal under the law.
Yet I can sense that seething anger in the Little Bike People. Happily, I ran into an expert clinical neuropsychologist, Dr. Robert L. Heilbronner.
Why are the LBP so angry?
"Perhaps because they feel an unbridled sense of freedom, and by warning them, what you're doing is imposing limitations on them," Heilbronner said. "You're reminding them of something that will befall them."
Like City Hall coming for the cash.
It's inevitable.
Twitter @John_Kass
Copyright © 2013 Chicago Tribune Company, LLC
-
Permalink Reply by Mike Weez on
-
If this would help pay public employee pensions, provide more money for for bike lanes, and come with a safety class, I'd pay $100 no question. I love Chicago, we're in a financial standoff, so as a token for my support for all the bike infrastructure from the city I'd do it.
I don't get the bike registration though, I'd like to scrap that idea immediately, that would just cost too much for the city to run and would make no sense.
-
Permalink Reply by Tank-Ridin' Ryan on
-
Oh those Edgewater snobs... :)
Duppie said:Maybe you should come up to Edgewater more often. Gays? Sure. Lesbians? Sure. Entitled mothers who think their brood should be allowed to scream in local establishments? yep, that too. But db hipsters who live in $550 apartments? Not really.
Now Rogers Park, that place is a hipster-cesspool, if you ask me...
globalguy said:Well, thanks for taking the bait, Hipster DB. All I was saying was that with a little cash-based cred (how else do Rahm's bikey minions have an impact) you could get out of your Edgewater tofu flop and actually attend a Mayors Bike Advisory Blah Blah Blah and rage "I paid the fee but they took the bike lanes out of Washington Square!" ... "WTF" my Brooks-saddled Butt ...
h' $550 said:WTF?
-
Permalink Reply by Cheryl on
-
+1 (and blocking intersections!)
Fran Kondorf said:Hey, AlderPuppets- you want to make $10M magically appear in the city's coffers?
How about getting CPD to start ticketing the motorists for reckless driving, blowing red lights, not signalling, cell phone use, passing us too closely,...
-
Permalink Reply by Chitown_Mike on
-
My facebook wall has exploded with people crying out to "tax the bikers". I have pointed out I would gladly pay $25, which equates to $.83/lb of bike if they same was put onto their vehicle, plus a tax based on the output of emissions. They all responded they are taxed enough, then went on rants about cyclists not following the rules of the road, cyclists are unsafe, we are all either "douche bag, mustache having hipsters" or "one nut Lance wannabe's", or causing accidents.
They were also as upset, and more when I brought it up, about the potential 50% increase on their cable bill, which from what I read would increase their costs about $11 for the average customer over the course of a year.
SMH....I sometimes just want to give up.
-
-
Sounds like it's time for a FB friend cleaning. Just in time for fall.
Chitown_Mike said:My facebook wall has exploded with people crying out to "tax the bikers". I have pointed out I would gladly pay $25, which equates to $.83/lb of bike if they same was put onto their vehicle, plus a tax based on the output of emissions. They all responded they are taxed enough, then went on rants about cyclists not following the rules of the road, cyclists are unsafe, we are all either "douche bag, mustache having hipsters" or "one nut Lance wannabe's", or causing accidents.
They were also as upset, and more when I brought it up, about the potential 50% increase on their cable bill, which from what I read would increase their costs about $11 for the average customer over the course of a year.
SMH....I sometimes just want to give up.
-
Permalink Reply by Marcus Moore on
-
I wonder how a required "rules of the road" class would work for Divvy usage?...
-
-
I wonder how suburban cyclists would feel about having to register their bike in Chicago. And how we would enforce it since they don't live here.
Marcus Moore said:I wonder how a required "rules of the road" class would work for Divvy usage?...
- ‹ Previous
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- Next ›
Groups
-
Chicagoland Beer Explora…
203 members
-
Wednesday Night for Mort…
1 member
-
Great Lakes Ultra Cycling
270 members
-
Major Taylor Internation…
1 member
-
Critical Mass discussion
261 members
© 2008-2016 The Chainlink Community, L.L.C.
Powered by
