Virginia Kinninmont said:hey all.
The pile of useless worn out components after the last
overhaul of my bike got me to thinking about the waste
associated with cycling. Will the new law affecting
motorists and the deposal of old cars affect cyclists?
No new law here. When old cars here in Denmark are being
put to sleep they must be handed in to goverment approved
recycling centers which then removes the fluids and splits
them up in parts based on material and stuff like glass
and batteries are handled specialy. The owner of the car
pays a premium to cover the cost of that and I think it's
like $150.
Quoted message said:Would cyclists (you/us) be prepared to pay a premium
for cycle components knowing that perhaps we could
reclaim some of the cost by handing in old components
or by reverting to a cycle license scheme like the very
old days?
I won't mind, however it would be pretty impossible to
create such a system. As it is now bikes move freely across
borders and are not registrered like cars. Plus the waste
problem about bikes is really minute compared to most of the
other stuff in our souroundings - for starters lot less
material is involved than in cars. In fact the computer you
are reading this on is a much worse enviromental problem!
Quoted message said:Trying to investigate this gap in the bike market so any
views/help with this 'market research' would be much
appreciated.
Unless you are focusing only the US I think you will find
some big differences in what can be done. For example the
use of bikes are very widespread so a recycling system for
bikes would be easier to make financialy sound. Not that we
really need it because we allready have a recycling system
taking care of most things, it's free for private persons
and works pretty well.
A little statistics about Denmark (Aprox 5.1 million souls)
Number of cars (not counting busses, lorries...): 1.843.000
New cars sold in 1999: 144.000 Number of bikes: 4.2 million
New bikes sold in 1999: 390.000 Number of bikes meant for
children (6 to 12 years): 616.000
On average every adult dane travels 1.2 km by bike every day
and 28.4 km by car every day.
Aprox. 500 people are killed in traffic accidents in Denmark
every year and of thoose about 70 are cyclists. The number
one reason for bike accidents with personal injuries is a
car coming from the right and hitting the cyclist, reason
number two is solo accidents - note that last statistic says
nothing about bad the injuries are solo accidents with fatal
outcome are very rare.
Kind regards
Bruno
--
To mail me write to iddqdATworldonline.dk (U know what 2 do)
More of these westocykler.dkwestocykler.dkOpen ↗ would mean less cars
and less polution.
