“what happens to someone who uses a bike to ride to work, then uses it to advertise their business during the day?”

– in that case the bike is evidently rideable. I’m talking about a bike with a chain rusted solid and the tyres perishing off the rims. That bike isn’t going anywhere, it’s just taking up rack space being an ugly billboard – it may not be ‘abandoned’ but for practical purposes it’s not a bike!

An interesting thing to compare would be how long it takes the council to remove a non-functional, unrideable, scrap metal bike that doesn’t have any advertising on it.

It would be hard to tell if a random bike is abandoned, but a bike with signage on it has an obvious way to find the owner.

The council could rule that “you can’t advertise on a bike” to clear them away, but that raises another quandary – what happens to someone who uses a bike to ride to work, then uses it to advertise their business during the day?

The response:

“Bikes being used for advertising purposes are not deemed to be abandoned – Local Laws Officers on routine patrols will confirm if the business is still operating and if it is still operating the bike is not deemed to be abandoned, so therefore council cannot act to remove the bike.

If the business is no longer operating Local Laws Officers will arrange for the removal of the bike.

Bike with Religious messages are covered by the Charter of Human Rights and Responsibilities Act 2006 and hence Council officers cannot act to remove these bikes either.”

I like your ‘Billboard Bike’ name. 😀

Cheers,
J

The newspaper article I linked to says that the Melbourne City Council permit for handing out flyers is $10 per day – it makes parking a bike outside your shop look even cheaper!