[Donunder]

This is a situation that has been commented upon by various motorcycle magazine editors before, but ...it's happened again!

Question 45 in the census form asks how the respondent travelled to work on 9 August, and includes the choice of "motorbike or motor scooter".

Question 54 asks for the number of registered motor vehicles garaged at the respondent's on the night of 9 Aug. The instructions say to include vans and company vehicles kept at home, but to exclude motorbikes and motor scooters.

Why this anomaly? I asked the local Census area manager, who happens to ride a Kwaka Ninja and is an old mate of mine, why the government specifically has asked for motorcycles not to be included in this count and he is as much in the dark as I am. You would think that as the Census is supposed to be a "snapshot" of Australia on that one day in time, that the ownership of motorcycles, whether for commuting purposes, pleasure, economics, whatever, would be something for future city planners, demographers, government road and transport departments, etc to consider.

It seems odd to me that the Statistics Bureau acknowledges that some commuters ride to work, but then tries to refuse to acknowledge motorcycle ownership in a later question. Or do they think our bikes magically appeared on the morning of 9 Aug for the ride to work and then just as mysteriously disappeared into thin air when we arrived home?

It sucks that we as motorcycle owners and therefore supporters of the large sales maintenance and accessories industries relating to motorcycles, to say nothing of our rego and insurance commitments, can be so disaffected by this bureaucratic direction. Why are they so intent, again, on refusing to gather details of motorcycle ownership?

 

[windinhair]

It was a matter of conjecture in the local paper here on the southern border Don in the editorial comment today--I am off to the National Capital tomorrow for the weekend and at the risk of alienating some public servant prick relatives of mine I may well alienate the pricks by asking prudent questions as to such-pointless really as they are clones of the spin and one may as well have a few schooners and reds and ignore their socialist garbage.Milo give me strength.:furious:

 

[ockerstrom]

So should all us motorcycle riders write in the number of registered motorcycles we own in Question 54 anyway?

And what of those who don't own a car but do own and ride a motorcycle as their only form of motor vehicle?
Is it assumed they use public transport despite the fact they have been deliberately excluded from the census count of vehicle owners?

This smacks of Government bodies only wanting to collect data that validates their own agendas for future planning to control the population and the direction the country progresses in.

 

[K1W1]

If I had to choose between conspiracy and public service incompetence I would pick the latter every time.

 

[Justdrew]

Ignorance could be bliss.

If I had to choose between conspiracy and publis service incompetence I would pick the latter every time.

I wonder if it is better that these mindless public servants ignore us at this time. As we all know if the motorcycle was invented in the present time it would be banned as too dangerous a form of transport, we do live in a nanny state where our choices are slowly being eroded from us.

John Howard introduced the gun buy back levy to remove firearms from private ownership and effectively penalised thousands of law abiding citizens while criminals still manage to use concealed weapons in crimes.

What would it take for some do gooder public servant to convince the government that a buy back of all registered motrorcycles would make life safer and remove a cost from the health budget.

How much compensation would they pay for a second hand Vstrom? Or worse still just ban them with out any compensation, remembering that we are a minority interest group and our votes are spread out over many electorates.
Having the actual number of motorcycles currently registered may be just the data they need for such a proposal togerminate in a public servants cranium..

 

[windinhair]

Good post Drew and a reasonable analogy.we had a seminar at work recently which involved a "mock court" of which most of us have would have been exposed re OH&S refresher etc--real life court room stuff.--the pre amble involved seat belts/air bags and crumple zones---"hands up the motorcyclists here" says he--you have none of these says he.I immediately felt isolated and some what vilified as a rider--I did not respond,the one thing about belting your head on a brick wall is it feels good when you stop.:headbang:

 

[windinhair]

If I had to choose between conspiracy and public service incompetence I would pick the latter every time.

If you were to enjoy a meal and a wine with some of the public servants I acquaint you would soon realize that they are not capable of conspiracy,in fact they would not now how to spel it.:yesnod:

 

[saturn 5]

We all must come to terms with the fact, that as a group we hold little interest to governments and the associated bureaucracy, much the same as say a golf club when it comes to census. Never mind the fact that we are a legitimate player in transport and all of which that encompasses.
Strangely enough, we are specifically INcluded when it comes to matters such as road rules and especially fines. All of a sudden we become a relevant part of planning but only from this perspective.
I can only guess that from a demographers perspective we are all lumped together in a homogeneous mass, called traffic. At this point in time we must be more associated with social activity rather than transport.

 

[graham downunder]

It is apparently the same form as last time . Australia dose a cencus every 5 years with 60 questions .The USA dose it every ten years and has only 10 question, apparently people refuse to fill out even ten.
Motorcylist do not matter to Government and the public service has yet to work out there are bike risers that do not have to pedal .

 

[K1W1]

public service has yet to work out there are bike risers that do not have to pedal .

Yeah apparently no Australian motorcyclists have ever won any important international events or world championships.

 

[Snab]

The place to register yourself as a motorcycle rider is in the "Religion" section under "Other".

.

 

[Donunder]

The place to register yourself as a motorcycle rider is in the "Religion" section under "Other".

Amen to that, brother!

We've all at some time found ourselves transported to a special place by our faithful Stroms where we feel a little closer to something unexplainable, or at least a little further removed from the humdrum of daily life. Almost like a "Stromunion" of sorts.

You're right! Who needs official recognition by the grey faces in Stats? We know we're blessed.

 

[K1W1]

We've all at some time found ourselves transported to a special place by our faithful Stroms where we feel a little closer to something unexplainable,

Generally a trip to a hospital I believe.

 

[DLicious]

Just completed the census, and at the very end they give you a chance to comment so I asked why MC's are excluded from the garaged question, not that I expect any of the mindless beurocrats that compile all this useful to the goverment information will tell me :green_lol::green_lol:

 

[windinhair]

From what I can interpret the stats will show who commutes to work on a motorcycle/scooter--They are not concerned with motorcycles as a recreational activity in the same way the census does not ask if you play tennis or volleyball,or how many cricket bats you have ,If you have a motorcycle in the garage tonight big deal and if you ride it to work you have told them so.

 

[wacko-ocker]

Just completed the census, and at the very end they give you a chance to comment so I asked why MC's are excluded from the garaged question, not that I expect any of the mindless beurocrats that compile all this useful to the goverment information will tell me :green_lol::green_lol:

damm I was just heading to your place so you will have to add me to your resident total:mrgreen:

 

[Donunder]

Thanks Windy.

I just thought that they might have been interested to know the number of registered motorcycles out there, regardless of use, so that the growing number of bikes on our roads could be taken into consideration in future planning of road design, parking, traffic rules etc. Live in hope?

On a related topic.... The Brisbane City Council last year introduced a rental bicycle scheme where customers pay to use push bikes secured at various locations around the central city. Periods up to 30 mins are free, but from there on the cost is laughably expensive, and the customer has to provide his own helmet.

The plan was supposed to emulate similar schemes in Europe where the temperate climate, the topography, the provision of safe, separate and roomy cycle ways, the bicycle culture, the usually short length of trips and the acceptable cost make bicycle hire attractive. Needless to say, Brisbane's tropical climate, its complete lack of safe bicycle paths on the totally unsuitable and narrow roads of the inner city, the hills, the distance to get anywhere, the cost and the lack of helmets for hire, have all conspired to doom this very expensive venture to fairly predictable failure.

In a bid to see where we are going wrong, (blind Freddy can see, but any excuse for a European jaunt) a BCC group recently visited Barcelona to see their scheme in action. It is to be hoped that they took account of the literally hundreds of thousands of motorcycles that flood into this city every day, and the extraordinary amount of free on-footpath parking space that is made available to them. For kilometre after kilometre, motorbikes are parked tightly on the lovely wide footpaths facing 90 deg to the gutter. The city fathers acknowledge that the number of commuters could not be serviced by public transport, and that if everyone on a bike tried to drive a car into the city, the place would grind to a halt. Accordingly, parking for bikes is made a priority, filtering is encouraged, and cars stop two car lengths short of intersections to allow filtering motorcycles to move to the head of the queue. To see the way motorcycle riders are treated by car drivers, the police and parking authorities in Barcelona is the stuff of dreams for an Aussie rider.

When will our governments realise as they have done in Europe and in Asia, that without serious decentralisation, and in the absence of clean cheap and reliable public transport, motorcycles are the answer!

 

[K1W1]

I just thought that they might have been interested to know the number of registered motorcycles out there,

They know the number of registered motorcycles it's simply a case of adding up the registrations. Why duplicate information that is already available?

 

[K1W1]

On a related topic.... The Brisbane City Council last year introduced a rental bicycle scheme where customers pay to use push bikes secured at various locations around the central city. Periods up to 30 mins are free, but from there on the cost is laughably expensive, and the customer has to provide his own helmet.

Melbourne Bike Share - been going several years and is pretty much a failure as well because of the requirement for helmets.

 

[saturn 5]

If I had to choose between conspiracy and public service incompetence I would pick the latter every time.

If I had to choose between the two, Kiwi, I'd pick both!!