What I'm learning from cycling in Tokyo

[Flying_Monkey]

I'll start this in the form of a little cycling safety quiz (answers at the end, no cheating):

1. You are at a crossroads. You'd like to go straight on but the road ahead is a one-way street with a 'no entry' sign. Do you:
a. Get off your bike and walk it down the side of the one-way street;
b. Turn either left or right and find an alternate route; or
c. Blithely cycle straight ahead anyway?

2. You are on a busy street which is filled with motor vehicle traffic. Do you:
a. Make your way carefully up the inside of the cars and trucks;
b. Overtake with caution on the outside;
c. Switch onto the pavement / sidewalk?

3. You come to a set of traffic lights. Red is against you. Do you:
a. Stop and wait;
b. Proceed carefully in case any traffic is coming from either side;
c. Cycle straight on regardless of the light and the traffic?

4. Approaching a junction of two major roads, you realise that the place you are going is just a mile up the road to your right and on the right of that road. Do you:
a. Turn right with the traffic and then signal and turn right when your destination approaches;
b. Turn right and then stop and cross the road at the nearest crossing to your destination;
c. Turn right and cycle against the traffic so you don't have to cross the road when you get to your destination?

5. When you want to turn, do you:
a. Make sure it is safe, signal appropriately, and then turn;
b. Look around and then turn;
c. Just turn whenever you feel like it?

Well, if your answers were all c's, you are clearly an experienced Tokyo cyclist. As far as bikes are concerned, whatever the law says, pretty much anything goes. And although it's disconcerting, there's absolutely no point in worrying about what everyone else is doing. And after a while, you start to do the same - as a rule I try to avoid doing all the c's above, but at the same time, I have done all of the at one time or another. What's more, I have never (in months of cycling here over the years) ever seen an accident involving a bicycle. There's absolutely no cycling 'infrastructure' in terms of separated routes etc., although the parking facilities for bikes at train stations are amazing. And, in the largest urban area on Planet Earth, it all seems to work. I'm not sure what it can teach anywhere else though - it largely relies on the basic politeness of people. So that's the UK out...

 

[Jezston]

I believe cycling on the pavement isn't illegal in Japan?

 

[robjh]

Whenever I'm cycling in a new country I try and take my cues from local cyclist behaviour and do as the locals do, but I've still got caught out a few times. In Berlin I was stopped by a policeman for cycling on a segregated cycle path in the opposite direction to the motor traffic - I should have been on the path on the other side of the street (which meant cross 4 lanes of traffic and a section of elevated metro to get to it). And in Ljubljana I was ordered off the road and out of the buslane, though the police happily watched me cycle off into a crowded pedestrian precinct.

 

[Flying_Monkey]

I believe cycling on the pavement isn't illegal in Japan?

It's entirely a local matter - which is why it's so confusing. In most of Tokyo it is technically illegal, but the pedestrian crossings still have bicycle lanes which feed onto the pavements, and in practice most people cycle on the pavements when it suits them.

 

[Jezston]

Ljubljana

 

[jarlrmai]

Catchphrase of Delboy Trotski

 

[Twelve Spokes]

I enjoyed my time cycling in Tokyo and cycled quite a few miles on shopping bikes hired from the hotel near Ginza itchome station (Y19) I think it was.I knew you could cycle on the pavement but was not really comfortable with this I did cope ok.Didn't know of the other rules.I remember the Hotel,it was Monterey Ginza.I have been to Japan twice.I found the driving very good (considerate to cyclists) and the people very nice.Plan to go on a bike tour there one day.Im doing Thailand again this year,in two months.

 

[recumbentpanda]

I believe the legal situation re cycling on pavements in Tokyo is actually very similar to the UK: There are a lot of 'shared use' sections of pavement, and a lot of ambiguous signage. The tendency is for the police not to be too concerned about infringements of the law (which can be difficult to nail down precisely) as long as everyone takes care.

Given the general level of civility in Japan is rather high by UK standards, pavement cycling is rarely a problem.

Tokyo is however, a very big place indeed, and I would not be surprised if cycling culture varied somewhat from district to district. What is pretty clear however, is that bikes, in many forms, are respected as a key part of the urban transport mix.

I did witness one cycle accident during my stay there. A long section of shared use footpath crosses the Katchidoki-bashi going westbound over the Sumida river, and continues into the district of Tsukiji. Commuting on foot along this was never a problem except one morning when a young man on a bicycle came tearing along at about twice the speed of all the other cyclists. Being a foreigner, I was the only person to protest. He ignored me and I watched in alarm as he tore through the crowds and smacked into the side of a left turning motorcyclist at the next intersection. I was expecting a punch-up, but the motorcyclist just told him to look where he was going and rode off. Very different culture :-)

 

[BarryBonkers]

Love the "quiz." In SE Asia, all of the (c) answers applies to motorbikes and scooters. I am surprised it's a similar situation in Tokyo regarding bicycles.

I wish I had taken my bicycle to Japan. Once you get outside the city, the countryside is incredibly beautiful.

 

[Flying_Monkey]

I should clarify that the answer c. in most cases is entirely illegal, but is what cyclists generally do at least some if not all of the time here. In theory, the police should stop people doing most of them (except the pavement cycling - dependent on where it is), but they don't pay any attention, which is probably, on balance, a good thing. I have once been stopped by the police while riding some years ago here, but that was the down to the problem of 'cycling while being foreign' - i.e. because I was foreign and riding a bike, I must have stolen it. 3 squad cars involved, lots of questioning, made worse by the fact that I was riding my wife's bike, which was registered in Chiba (the next-door prefecture), not Tokyo. No real apology when they let me go either. I am not sure this would happen now - I have noticed a real change in police attitudes to foreigners (or at least white foreigners...) over the last 10 years.

@recumbentpanda, when I was living here several years ago, I saw an incident in which the driver of one of those ubiquitous tiny vans knocked off the driver of one of those ubiquitous mopeds. The van driver picked up the guy, there was a lot of bowing and everyone then drove off. No police etc. at all. I'm not sure if the moped rider was really alright though.

 

[Jezston]

I want to visit Japan again.

Flying_Monkey - hi! Nice to meet you. Mind putting me up for a couple of weeks?