Saskatchewan, a province already known for being unfriendly to motorcyclists, will see life become even more difficult for some riders when Saskatoon’s loud pipe law comes into effect in a few weeks.

Over the past few years, motorcyclists in Saskatchewan have had plenty to complain about, with stratospheric hikes in rates from the provincial insurance body, SGI. Now they’re about to get hassled on another front.

Although it was passed months ago, the Saskatoon loud pipes law will finally come into effect this June, after a year’s grace period. The city government originally passed a bylaw in 2014 that placed a decibel limit on motorcycle exhausts. Now, the law comes into full effect on June 1.

Before that date, the police are offering three free clinics that allow riders to have their bike checked out for bylaw compliance. The free clinics are April 25 and May 10 at Redline Harley-Davidson, at 1 PM, and on May 30 at the Taylor Street MD Ambulance location at 1 PM. Riders at the clinics won’t be ticketed for non-compliant machines, and the police will also “offer riders advice on how to bring their machines up to community and industry standards,” says the CBC. Does that mean they’re going to preach a sermon against ape hanger handlebars, or give a lecture on licence plate orientation? It’s hard to say …

It’s also hard to say how long the Saskatoon bylaw will last. Every spring, municipalities across the country roll these anti-noise bylaws out after enraged citizens complain about riders rolling around town with open pipes. Some places pass the laws and keep ’em in place (see: Quebec City’s ban on bikes in the Old City). Other places (see: Bathurst, New Brunswick) pass the law and end up having to change things down the road, when it backfires for one reason or another.

Despite the hit-and-miss results of the laws, here’s no question that anti-loud-pipe sentiment has spread across the country in recent years. While the crowd espousing loud pipes are still spouting the same lines about saving lives, soon we’ll be at a point where almost all Canadian cities have loud pipe bans, leaving riders reliant on their bike’s horn if they want to be heard.

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