Thanks to Bill and Ev Sluis for flagging the growing summertime nuisance of speeding, baffle-less motorbikes through the streets of Gibsons (Coast Reporter letters, July 17).
The race track is indeed open. Its home straight starts at the bottom of Gower Point Road's S-curve and continues until the next zig-zag just before Bonniebrook Beach. The kilometre or so stretch is an open invitation for bikers - and often motorists - to open up the taps and hurtle through what usually is a quiet residential area at speeds anywhere between 70 and 100 km/h.
I've yet to see any form of speed trap on Gower Point. In fact, when I complained about speeding motorbikes along the road to an officer manning a radar trap in the 30 km/h zone outside Gibsons city hall, he said: "There's not much we can do about motorbikes. They've only one small licence plate, they've usually gone by before we can flag them down, and we're not allowed to pursue them."
That's comforting news for anyone facing a stiff fine and three penalty points for passing city hall at a few km/h over the 30 km/h limit - over-zealous policing for cars, it seems, and apparently no policing at all for speeding motorbikes.
Either way, speeding, unsilenced bikes are a recurring summertime nuisance that grows by the year and it's time for a clamp down throughout the area on both motorcycle speed and the excessive noise they sometimes create.
The pickings may not be as easy on Gower Point Road or elsewhere in the municipality as the 30 km/h zone outside city hall, but we can be sure that the resulting contribution to public safety and peaceful enjoyment of this and other areas in and around Gibsons would be much greater.
Barrie Wall
Gibsons
