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From:Taylor Pope <br />To:GRP-City Council <br />Subject:Comment on item 9.A. for 12/22/25 <br />Date:Monday, December 22, 2025 4:24:04 PM <br />Some people who received this message don't often get email from taylor@tmpope.com. Learn why this isimportant <br />While I welcome an update removing the vestigal language about licencing and registration <br />through the Fire Department, I think several of the details are increasing severity of <br />restrictions to an unwarranted - and possibly even unintended - effect. <br />The most egregious is the speed limit. While different classes of eBike have limits to which <br />providing assist is allowed, manual effort and hills allows riders to surpass those limits. The <br />current wording of 8.4 E, F, G, and H indicates that would be prohibited, even if they remain <br />under the posted speed limit. I believe this to be poor phrasing, not a deliberate over- <br />restriction, but in either case it should be updated before changes are adopted. <br />8.5 regarding parking seems similarly over-restrictive. Restricting business district parking solely to <br />designated racks is definitely too strong with given the current availability of bike parking accommodations, <br />especially for non-traditional bikes and other modes covered in the language. One key example this doesn’t work <br />with are cargo bikes, which often fit better in a car parking space than they do in many racks, and the phrasing <br />seems like it also includes low speed vehicles, which certainly do not belong in bike racks. <br />There are several other areas where restrictions are tightened that probably warrant explicit justification before <br />we enact more restrictive versions of existing state restrictions. Helmets are unambiguously <br />good, but there is evidence to suggest that helmet laws do more to discourage cycling than to <br />encourage helmet use. Trick riding is divisive, but the restrictions seem too all-encompassing. <br />I also think the tightening of restrictions on where cycling is allowed ought to include speed- <br />based exceptions. There are many parts of the city without safe alternatives to using <br />pedestrian-only areas as defined in the currently proposed text, and allowing other vulnerable <br />modes to responsibly share those spaces would make them substantially safer than pushing <br />them into unsafe alternatives. Endangering pedestrians is already illegal, and irresponsible <br />inconsiderate cyclists will not change their behavior based on these changes they likely won't <br />hear about, but responsible citizens might make unsafe changes based on it. <br />To close out one more minor clerical suggestion: 8.2 F and G seem out of order, as F references the definition <br />in G. <br />Thank you, <br />Taylor Pope