Editor: Growing up in Vancouver in the 1940s and '50s, and raising four children in the '60s and '70s, bicycle licences were required and, like cars, had to be renewed each year.
We were also required to have a bell or horn on the handlebars, tail lights and, if you rode at night, you had to have a headlight.
All other vehicles on the road today - trucks, cars, motorcycles and scooters - require licences. Why not bicycles, particularly when Lower Mainland taxpayers are being heavily taxed to support these expensive bike lanes and our transit system? Bicycle riders can have their bikes transported on buses and the various trains at no additional cost. In other words, bikes get to ride for free.
The room on transit trains allowed for bicycles could be used for more seating, particularly for seniors since the young people rarely give up their seats for us.
The mayors of the Lower Mainland should put their heads together and come up with a reasonable licence fee for cyclists and put the money toward providing better transit.
R.D. Grant
