Cycling UK Forum

gaz wrote:There is a CTC brieifng doument from 2010 concerning public footpaths.

I am not persuaded by the CTC's treatment of the question of whether you have a right to push a bicycle on a footpath.

They establish that a person pushing a bicycle is a pedestrian not a driver of a vehicle. They then extrapolate to say that pedestrians are allowed to walk on footpaths so you must be allowed to push a bicycle on a footpath. But the right to walk on a footpath cannot extend to all other activities without limit, there must be concept of what is an acceptable thing to do while walking, and what is not because it goes beyond just walking. They do actually allude to this through the judgement on "natural accompaniment". As I understand it, that was a view that the right to walk on a footpath included the right to take something that is a natural accompaniment to walking. Specifically, pushing a pushchair or pram was regarded as a natural accompaniment, but pushing a bicycle was not. The CTC dismiss that as being in Scotland and not relevant in England and Wales. But even if that specific judgement is not relevant, it seems to me the concept is. I would want to argue that pushing a bicycle should be regarded as a natural accompaniment, but I would view that as something that had to be argued rather than just obvious.

I suspect that the only thing that a thread like this shows is how little most of us know of the real intricacies of the law. Virtually all my own limited knowledge of this mini, subsectionette of the law came from mugging up to be a CRN / RtoR rep and more recently discussing topics on here. My most recent bit of research in any depth, which unfortunately ground to a halt in the deep virtual sand of the internet escape lane, was an attempt to identify the legal basis of the right to cross a footway driving a vehicle. (Regular readers will remember a thread where a poster described a place where cyclists regularly rode across a footway to reach some sort of bike parking facility (IIRC) and there were PCSOs lurking like hyenas at a water hole * dishing out fixed penalties.) I did rather think that covering this type of thing, which is just a little more complicated than merely stating that footway cycling is illegal would have been one of the strengths of the CDF site, which I suppose is why I'm so miffed that there is just a blank page on such a topical subject.

I wish I'd saved some of the links because I discovered all sorts of nuggets (all no doubt still open to a trip to the Supreme Court for anybody with panniers full of gold sovereigns.) Eg:-

It seems any route along which the public generally have a right to pass and repass is a highway. Their right of way (RoW) may be only on foot, when the highway will be a footpath, with a horse (recently amended to include a bicycle) it will be a bridleway, and if they have a RoW with any vehicle, it is a road. The Highways Act, 1835 created highway authorities with a duty to maintain roads at the public expense. (It might have made more sense to call them "road authorities" because they had no duty to maintain those highways which were not roads.) Since there is a constant source of tension between the public exercising RoW's and the property rights over which they pass, and with the modern increase in leisure use of these historic rights, there have been various legislative attempts to standardise things.

Whenever I look at the linked CTC advice on this, I really do think it wasn't prepared by a lawyer. Eg this:-

The Highway Code
The Code illustrates a prohibitive ‘no vehicles’ sign with the words ‘no vehicles except cycles being pushed’ underneath to qualify the message. The bicycle is defined in law as a vehicle, but the rationale behind this sign suggests that cycles being pushed are to be regarded as exempt from vehicular restrictions.

I'd confidently suggest that a lawyer would say that the existence of the exception plate demonstrated that in its absence, there would be no exception. I don't think it needs a wig and gown to see that.
*Ok, OK. That's artistic licence.

True, but signing is not always very reliable, and the Highway Code is not the law, so its drafters may not have got things completely right? We know, for example, about debates over whether a No Entry sign is being used where No Vehicles is intended.

In particular, whilst I see your argument about the plate, one could be put up by a Council which simply wanted to be quite clear about its intentions in a particular location?

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So how come, in a pedestrianised shopping area in my home town ( with one of those red circle signs ), when I frequently stop and chat with police officers, ( All three of us wheeling our bikes along the footpath ) I don't get told I shouldn't wheel my bike on the footpath?

Ayesha wrote:So how come, in a pedestrianised shopping area in my home town ( with one of those red circle signs ), when I frequently stop and chat with police officers, ( All three of us wheeling our bikes along the footpath ) I don't get told I shouldn't wheel my bike on the footpath?

Think about it. Then think about what you would be saying if they came out with something that didn't agrre with your point of view.
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A "No vehicles" sign of that type indicates that there is a traffic regulation order in force, whose general effect is to ban all vehicles. There will almost certainly be exceptions for statutory undertakers, vehicles being used for the purposes of the emergency services etc. Around here, at least, the standard wording of such a TRO would exempt pedal cycles being pushed by hand. As I've noted on other threads, the existence of such exeptions suggests that some municipal lawyers think that wheeling a bike would otherwise be illegal.

Whether the police in question either know this or care is something I'd doubt. It's something where I should have had to phone a friend if I'd been asked, before I took a specific interest, after I had retired.

I think I might be losing the will to live. Time to go and polish the inside of my mudguards. But perhaps not on the road, foorpath or in a shopping mall?

I think I may be losing the will to live. Time to go and polish the inside of my mudguards. But perhaps not on a footpath or in a shopping mall.

You polished your mudguards twice.

http://www.direct.gov.uk/prod_consum_dg ... 070644.pdf

That's how I read it.

If it doesn't mean what it says, how many other statements in the book don't mean what they say?

I've sussed it.

All the traffic signs in the HC are only applicable in one small hamlet called Beesworth.

Everywhere else, they mean something different and its up to the roaduser to decide the correct meaning to suit them.

In South Leeds, for example, "Vehicle" includes little girls' dolly buggies, scooters carried by school children and skateboards tucked in students' backpacks.
Bicycles, tricycles, unicycles, quadricycles and other human propelled wheeled contraptions are strictly forbidden from being pushed, carried or influenced by telekinesis.

Of course, the Highway Code isn't law. The Traffic Signs Regulations and General Directions 2002 is. The caption to sign 617 is "All vehicles prohibited except non-mechanically propelled vehicles being pushed by pedestrians".

This lends credence to the view that a bike being wheeled is still a vehicle, so any law about vehicles (that doesn't specify "driven") applies to wheeled bikes.

What we need to know is what constitutes 'Mechanically propelled'?

Is it Piston, rod and crankshaft? Does it include gas turbine turbo jet blast propelled vehicles? Rockets?

The regs are still not clear enough.

Can 'Mechanically propelled' be affixed to vehicles which employ hydrocarbons rather than carbohydrates as their fuel source? Hydrogen?

We are still confused.

The little old lady can be prosecuted for PULLING her Tartan pattern shopping trolley, because she's NOT PUSHING it,,,

Let's have a ruling. While wheeling your bike, if your centre of gravity is ahead of the front axle, you are PULLING it and this is unlawful. If your centre of gravity is behind the front axle, you are PUSHING it and this is acceptable.

wot a load of bollox....

Ayesha wrote:What we need to know is what constitutes 'Mechanically propelled'?....

With regard to an individual sign, you need to know what the TRO says. It should be easy enough to check - they are normally available at the offices of the relevant highway authority and whenever I've wanted to check one, they've invariably found it simpler to send me a copy. (It's not something I've made into a hobby.)

PS If and when you get around to doing that and when next you are having a chat with the local police, try a few test questions, based on the text.

I've no intention of surfing any website to investigate a TRO.

If and when I come across a town center with the sign we are debating, I will get off and wheel my bike.

If there happens to be a traffic cop or PCO who intercepts me, he/she will politely advise me of the local laws.

I will offer an appology, explaining I'm on a 125 mile ride for pleasure and obide by their notifications.

I very much doubt if I will be hogtied, arrested, read my rights and spend the next twelve hours counting grey bricks in a police cell.

After forwarding my appology, I will ask if they know of a good ice cream parlour. That will be my only question.

Out of interest, presumably a motor car being pushed is still a vehicle. I would guess that you don't have a right to push a car along a public footpath. But are all the various motoring offences (one way streets, drunk driving for instance) still applicable to a car being pushed?