Obviously not a popular idea, and understandably. Still, I haven't heard any alternatives offered.

Ah, well - hopefully with 650 odd views, hopefully those that need to might think twice before kiting dangerously close to families and other beach-goers.

Cooky said..
Still, I haven't heard any alternatives offered.

The answer Cooky is education not legislation. Cooky if you see something being done dangerously and without care for others, then share some of your experience with the offender there and then. Winging on a forum achieves nothing. If every experienced kiter did this, it would soon stop any individual developing any dangerous habits.

A licence will achieve nothing. An idiot will be an idiot with or without a licence. The only difference would be that they would be licensed idiots.
A licence would just increasing the individuals confidence in himself, but do nothing for his situational awareness of others, which is I think your argument for a licence. Educate not legislate is the answer Cooky

Cooky said...
Obviously not a popular idea, and understandably. Still, I haven't heard any alternatives offered.

Ah, well - hopefully with 650 odd views, hopefully those that need to might think twice before kiting dangerously close to families and other beach-goers.

Oh puh-lease.

You've heard the alternative. No licensing.

It's not like you've presented any well thought out case for licensing.

Who's gonna be the water cops doing the license checks?
Who's gonna audit the schools to ensure correct instruction?
Which set of teaching standards is going to be used?

How is licensing going to help anyone?
Idiots will be idiots, licenses or not.

You sound like you work in some redtape laden government department.
Or perhaps you have some business idea that would feed off a licensing system, hence your push for it.

In short licensing will give no benefit to anyone or anything, except the licensing system itself.

If someone does the wrong thing on the water, having a license will do nothing, if they're honest, they'll own up to the consequences, if they're the type to do a runner, license or not, they'll do a runner.

So, how does licensing benefit anyone?

Maybe you want to start a business putting license numbers on people's kites.

kiterboy said..

So, how does licensing benefit anyone?

Maybe you want to start a business putting license numbers on people's kites.

Hear hear!

Maybe Germany is not a bad option for you coooky. Just don't mention the war.

Ricardo1709 said...
I think its a great idea ,we could possibly have waterproof number plates (and the variety of styles could be endless) attached to our chests and even a yellow and green personally activated light at each end of the bar to indicate turning,especially helpful for those that don't know port from starboard and on our backs we have like different coloured P plates to signify our proficiency,sounds great doesn't it

It would have to be different colored K plate......K for kook......

Both unlicensed :-)

SammyJay and juicerider - you both mention education as the answer. I whole-heartedly agree.

How do we ensure kiters have a minimum level of education prior to endangering others?

Licensing is one option. Are there others?




Xanthian - I don't think I need to convince people of the value of driver's licenses. I believe you'd be mad not to see the merit.

Or Naplan for kiters?

So what you're saying, is despite the fact we have more sharks eating surfers than kite surfers causing injury or death, despite the fact we have more kite surfers than regular surfers, we need to leave the sharks alone but go kitesurfer hunting.

I have no objections to a theoretical driver's license that tests someone's ability. I obtained such a racing license once.

My drivers' license test didn't actually involve emergency stopping, btw. Purely parallel parking, u-turns, and bureaucracy enforcement.

What's more, the licensing system, whilst not teaching you to drive, charges you money every year without requiring you to pass a medical, or get re-tested. Much like vehicle registration, the licensing system proves that you can pay a bill.

Hell, they *even* force you to fill out a fake log book these days, and try to come up with rules like how many passengers can be in a car and what hours the driver is allowed to drive, rather than actually teaching someone to operate a vehicle for fear of them being confident behind the wheel.

No exaggeration. I see no value in drivers' licenses as created. Even the demerit system makes no sense as any real penalty ignores it anyway (hoon laws, drunk driving, drug driving, curfews, etc.), and crashes don't cost any demerits. There's not even a distinction made between endangering onesself and endangering others. (Quite literally, there have been officers telling people to go do that stuff on a country road, where there are other officers hunting for people who aren't endangering anyone else.)

Licensing kite surfing is a recipe to have police go and ping someone who's testing out his kite repairs in alkimos, or has just gotten a foil board, or just doesn't want to wear a helmet and floaty vest.

This **** ends up with cameras being banned ffs. And you're encouraging it.

Xanthian said...
Yes, because driving licenses both prevent crashes and solve road rage.

Umm, what?

Cooky said..
MDSXR6T - True, but aren't you glad that some training and a certain level of proficiency is required to drive a car? I shudder to think how many more crashes, injuries and fatalities would occur if licenses were not required to drive.

You would presumably be familiar with the fact that it is harder to obtain a motorbike license than a driver's license, yes?

I obtained my motorbike license, and then 3 months later, I finally learned how to ride a motorbike. Slow control, using the rear brake during an emergency stop and not pulling over when an invisible fire hydrant is marked on a kerb, were the only three things my license test told me. One of those things was actually potentially dangerously wrong and didn't even have a legal basis.

What I needed was approximately 30 minutes on a race track.

Similarly, when I obtained my driver's license, I passed my test because I spent all of my time looking everywhere except directly in front of me. Mirror, mirror, speedo -- every 10 seconds. Was so much that I half the time forgot to even check my blind spot before changing lanes. Objectively speaking, the safest way to drive is to actually look in front of you, no matter what speed you're doing. Period.

Why do you think the northern territory road toll tripled after they introduced speed limits?

You live in a freaking society where the police claim that driver education doesn't save lives because trained drivers drive faster, and keep a straight face.

And yet you still buy it?

The safest kiters are those that make the most mistakes while learning. They are also the most visible thing scaring beach goers. There's no way to resolve that conflict.

Unless you yourself want to become the ****-police and go to the beach with a hook knife to cut the lines of someone you don't think should be kiting, I don't think you're going to address the fact that people are dicks. (Plus, y'know... that just means you lived long enough to see yourself become the enemy)

Pretty sure I pitted next to you at a trackday at Barbagello a few years ago., small world. Sorry this should be in the motorbike section.

For those that are promoting the idea of paying a regular license fee...

Let's keep it simple shall we and jot down the pros and cons, no waffling on, point form only so to keep it clear.

Licensing:

Pros -
- revenue raising (only a pro to those who love paying unecessary bills)

Cons -
- revenue raising

But you could be, BYO calculator..

Hey Cooky,

In My opinion a licenses are just an over-regulated piece of crap, because they are ther for the masses, not the 5% who are inconsiderate and dont give a toss or have an extremely different view on life. A license actually only provides an insurance option for these sort of people, kind of like giving most of the GST to the worst performing states. Unless theres adequate infrastructure to enforce the rules, a certin % of the population treats it as a joke.

I almost had my first accident the other night, 9:30pm a motorbike weaving in and out of traffic, doing 30km over the speed limit through roadworks on the freeway in WA. No lights, no helmet, no license plates. I got out of the car as he got off at the same off ramp and told him he was a temporary australian. He drove through a red light and carried on. Now in the next budget we have a $90-120 increase for no fault insurance???? Huge trucks use the right lane on both the roe, tonkin, Mitchell, and Kwinana major roads every day.

Cooky you live in WA? Im not being racist, Im being observationist. Have you noticed certain ethnic backgrounds think its fine to do 80km in a 100 km zone in the right lane of the freeway? Guess what, their "license" was transferrable from other countries where they have never been over 60km? Drive around any major roads for 2-8 hours and you will be lucky to see a traffic cop. I have driven in Germany, YES they do follow the rules and have a culture where the Me-Me-Me types get put down.

Same goes with Kitesurfers. 95% of kitesurfers are considerate, sharing, will offer launches etc. It's like asking all Muslims to get a license for being muslim???

swinginginthewind said..

Cooky said..
SammyJay and juicerider - you both mention education as the answer. I whole-heartedly agree.

How do we ensure kiters have a minimum level of education prior to endangering others?

Licensing is one option. Are there others?




Xanthian - I don't think I need to convince people of the value of driver's licenses. I believe you'd be mad not to see the merit.

Hey Cooky,

a bit of info released here in WA the other day by our esteemed Plodders

over 700 unlicensed drivers have been caught on the roads since the start of the year.

Licensing is not going to stop the aforementioned dicks that are out there.

Something else to contemplate, during this summer's downwinders I had a couple of quiet chats with 2 kiters riding in the flagged zones - both were from overseas and both were completely disinterested in what I was explaining.

Yeah but what about the guy teaching at a restricted beach you had a quiet chat with and he told you its his country and he can do what ever.... bugger off to where you came from....