General Cycling Discussion - Bicycle Speeding Ticket

On some of the bike paths around Montreal (specifically the Lachine canal one, for those of you who know the area) there are posted speed limits of 20km/h. Even when I was pooped on my mountain bike I went well clear of that speed. I have beenb told that 'cops' on scooters go around and hand out tickets.

Has anybody ever gotten one of these tickets anywhere? I am curious what juristiction these guys are in.

Now that I have my new road bike, I almost want to try and go as fast as I can just to get a ticket. I would be pretty proud of it. "I went so fast on my bike that I got a ticket" :rolleyes:.


:beer:

Getting a ticket on a bike path with a 20 km/h limit isn't really much of an accomplishment, now is it?

I've seen the scooter cops from time to time on the paths, when I take them -- I think I saw them twice last year, but I tend to stay clear of the paths. You'll also see the summer employees of parks Canada around, we call them "the rangers." I've never heard of anyone who's ever gotten a ticket on the path though; of course, most of the people I ride with keep to the road.

I do know of people who've been busted for poaching trails on Mount Royal, though. I've even outrun a horse cop and once bluffed my way through a confrontation. The fine for that is $100.

The real treat is a ticket for speeding on the ROAD. If you get that, frame it. I was once stopped on the Gilles Villeneuve Circuit for speeding [I was doing around 50+ km/h]. I really, really wanted them to give me a ticket, but no dice. I would have loved to have had a ticket for speeding on a Grand Prix race track.

You're right, I'll have to go down the GP circuit and get up to speed and try there. That would be an accomplishment. That would go nicely on the side of the computer!

Anybody else been ticketed? :beer:

In the UK, cyclist can get fined for "furious pedalling" even if they are withing the speed limit.
A guy on a fixed wheel got fined for doing 25mph in a 30 zone.

ticketed for furious pedaling? What on earth for?

Is that "furious" as in "fast" or "mad".

If it is the latter, then I'd be fined a lot, since I'm "mad" about a lot of things.

So what if your legs move fast anyway? Sounds like a pretty subjective decision on the part of the police. Who really decides how fast is too fast for a human left to move.

Strange:(

There was a story in the SF Chronicle the other day about some people who had gotten speeding tickets on their bikes for going too fast down a hill. Again, I think it's a matter of acting like a vehicle if you want to be treated like one.

As far as the "furious peddaling", that's just plain stupid. I would love to get a ticket for that just to laugh at the wanker who gave it to me.

andy

Thats some funny stuff!!!!!!!!:beer:

We rode the Lachine trail on both of our visits to Montrial. We enjoyed the ride, but did not see any scooter cops. We did see a lot of signs for no riding abreast - I suspect they would write you up for that.

We also rode out to the Grand Prix curcuit - by accident. I told my wife, hey wait, these red and white curbs look familier. Then I saw some stands and realized where we were.

Mt Royal is a kick - not TOO hard to ride up, and not TOO fast coming down.

A friend from Bolder, Co told me they enforce speed limits on the trails there. And I believe he said the speed limit is like 10 mph! What a bummer.

When I *am* on the path and see the cops/rangers, I sort of slow down and when they're out of sight- speed up! of course, if you're going pretty fast they can't catch up to you anyways. I doubt they give out many tickets on the paths- the roadies tend to get off the path at the first chance, and what remains are generally pedestrians on bikes or rollerbladers.

a cop car flashed it lights at me once. I came down the road and follow a car at about 30mph, i was probaly at 25ish mph on a 7 speed 20" bike. I didn't see the flash but i did see the cop car.

My buddy told me that the cop flashed its lights at me as i went past. I didn't see because i was too fast and passed the cop.

That was the only incident with the COPS.


i have yet to see a cop give me a ticket for pedaling fast in 1st gear and going about 10mph on the road.

FuJi

I don't know about Canada and Britain, but in Australia, you cannot get fined for speeding since bicycles are not required to have speedometers.
(even motorised bicycles are not speed limited).

You could get fined for 'reckless driving' though, if you did 50 km/h past a school with kids all over the road.

That makes sense, do the cops on scooters have radar guns?? Even if they did, it wouldn't do much good if the cyclist didn't want a ticket. How on earth would the scooter, (or bike) catch you and pull you over? I hope you don't have a license plate on your mtb. heheheheh

I am searching my memory to find an image of any ticket being issued for speeding, by motorist, much less cyclist.

"Sir, you were travelling at the horrendous speed of 15 mph. You could have scared someone!"

Originally posted by MichaelW
In the UK, cyclist can get fined for "furious pedalling" even if they are withing the speed limit.
A guy on a fixed wheel got fined for doing 25mph in a 30 zone.

"furious pedalling"

:crash:

:rofl:

Originally posted by MichaelW
In the UK, cyclist can get fined for "furious pedalling" even if they are withing the speed limit.
A guy on a fixed wheel got fined for doing 25mph in a 30 zone.

Hahahaha...........that is so lame. They ticket you for how fast is your cadence???? :D

Heh, heh...don't know why I suddenly made the connection, but I happened to think about this on my way home and thought I may as well post it. :p

A couple of years ago I was reading the Lucia series by E.F. Benson--they are humorous books about the social battles of the small-town English upper class in the towns of Tilling and Riseholm back in the 30's or so. Lucia fights for social supremacy against her arch-rival, Elizabeth Mapp. (Masterpiece Theater did a very good series of Mapp and Lucia.)

In the last book (Trouble For Lucia) Lucia, now Mayor of Tilling, is nearly knocked down by a delivery boy on a bicycle speeding past. She decides that bicycling would be a great way to impress her subjects, and she and her S.O., Georgie, get bikes and practice secretly on the backroads, crashing into innocent construction workers. :D Eventually they make their public debut on bicycles, ("You'll both be killed!" screams one friend on seeing them. Guess the attitude toward biking hasn't changed!) starting a fad for biking in Tilling.

Anyway, Lucia loses control coming down a hill, and later a constable comes to the house to inquire about a report of a bicycle being driven at a reckless speed down the lane. Lucia is thrilled with the thought of how bold and daring she will seem to actually get a ticket for speeding on her bike. When the policeman hesitates to give a ticket to the mayor, she has to be quite insistant, in order to have the glory of appearing in court to pay her speeding fine...

I don't know about Canada and Britain, but in Australia, you cannot get fined for speeding since bicycles are not required to have speedometers.

Unfortunately this isn't true. I looked up South Australia's road rules and it says this:

Bicycles are classified as vehicles and
therefore bicycle riders have the same
responsibilities and must obey the
same rules as motor vehicle drivers.

Bicycle riders must obey the same
speed limits as drivers of motor
vehicles.

You can be charged with a traffic
offence in the same way as a motor
vehicle driver. This includes
incurring demerit points against
your Driver’s Licence, if you hold
one.


The laws are written to suit the authorities.

I don't need a drivers license to ride a bike, but if I have a license I can loose demerit points for a cycling infringement.
If I don't have a license I can still ride, but not loose demerit points. Ironically, there is no law for riding without a license.
The laws are so sketchy, that it would take a major infringement for a judge to remove demerit points from a drivers license.

CHEERS.

Mark

Originally posted by Dutchy
I don't need a drivers license to ride a bike, but if I have a license I can loose demerit points for a cycling infringement.
If I don't have a license I can still ride, but not loose demerit points. Ironically, there is no law for riding without a license.
The laws are so sketchy, that it would take a major infringement for a judge to remove demerit points from a drivers license.
Well, I'm going to have to ask you to quote the relevant clause, because, with all due respect, I think that you're wrong. True you can receive a fine for traffic offences, but no points will come of your license. That would defy all logic, and I've never seen such a clause in my readings of the road rules.

True you can receive a fine for traffic offences, but no points will come of your license. That would defy all logic, and I've never seen such a clause in my readings of the road rules.


I was just as surprised to read this.

http://www.transport.sa.gov.au/bikesouth/General_Information/index.html

top of the page "Cycling and the Law" there is a PDF file 3.1mb. Go to page no.5.

CHEERS.

Mark

I'll try looking at that file again at work tomorrow where I have a faster connection.

However, sceptic that I am, I don't trust any information on the laws of bicycling that isn't written in actual legislation. It wouldn't be the first time that documents such as this 'Cycling and the Law' were incorrect on obscure points of law like this.

So, with this in mind I did a quick search of the Queensland legislation (I chose Qld. because a. it's my home state, and b. I know where to find the information relatively quickly) and turned up the following.

It is on page 21 of this (http://www.legislation.qld.gov.au/LEGISLTN/SUPERSED/T/TransptOpRUMDLR99_01B_.pdf) legislation. '“demerit points offence” means an offence, other than an offence committed by a person while riding a bicycle, tricycle or
power-assisted cycle, against a provision mentioned in schedule 3.' (my emphasis)

In searching the SA legislation to see if there is something similar, I found that in schedule 7, part 2 of the Motor Vehicles Regualtions (http://www.parliament.sa.gov.au:8080/ISYSquery/IRL1844.tmp/1/doc#hit1), there's a list of offences that bicyclists can commit, with the number of demerit point earned listed alongside, so it would appear that for SA, you are right.

Still, all is not lost. I fail to see the justification let alone the logic for this, as it would seem does the Queensland legislative assembly. It might be worth checking out what the other states do, and if SA is unique or at least unusual in this it makes a strong argument for changing it. A similar thing happened here recently with the warning device clause . Basically QLD was the only state that said you had to have a bell and only a bell for a warning device. It was changed in the last revision of the regs.

I got clocked by a bored policeman with a radar gun going 15mph. He was just passing the time though, not seriously going to give me a ticket! He just shouted it at me as I passed.

I wasn't aware of a pedalling furiously offense. I'll have to moderate my pedalling in future! :D

Ellie

Originally posted by MichaelW
In the UK, cyclist can get fined for "furious pedalling" even if they are withing the speed limit.

That law must be an archaic remnant of days past. One of the greatest dangers we cyclists face is motorists underestimating our speed and turning or merging across our path. One of the most effective defences against this is to gear down and "pedal furiously" at, say, 130 RPM, to give the illusion of speed. I use this tactic frequently when approaching intersections.

In California, bicyclists can be fined $271 per minor incident (the same as motorists!), but the infraction is not supposed to go on one's driving or auto insurance record. However, we always advise cyclists to ask the ticketing officer to write BICYCLE in large, prominent print. Appearing in traffic court is generally an easy way to get the fine reduced substantially.





Accused: "Please note, your Honor, that I was cycling, not driving, at the time."
Judge: "You were on a BICYCLE? Pay the bailiff $20 and get out of here."

Originally posted by Ellie
I got clocked by a bored policeman with a radar gun going 15mph. He was just passing the time though, not seriously going to give me a ticket! He just shouted it at me as I passed.
Once when I went passed a policeman pointing a radar at me I shouted out 'How fast am I going?' (smiling of course) He shouted back, likewise smiling, '25' or whatever it was, and gave me a thumbs up.

I occasionally go through breatho stops as well. I always slow down and ask if they want me to stop for a check. They always wave me on.

I don't think that the police here are particularly concerned about cyclists, especially considering the number of helmetless riders I see around. I guess they figure we can't afford the bribe.

Last Year on my way home from Barrie, I was using Hiway 11, which is Yonge at Richmond Hill, I saw a Cop pointing his radar gun at me, and since I was not in a hurry, I stop and strike a conversation with the said cop, and asked him what was my speed at the radar and he said, I was doing 35 kliks on a 50 km. zone, half jokingly I asked him if was I doing over 5o Klik will he give me a ticket for speeding, he said nah, Why bother, the road I was traveling is a nice stretch of 4 lane road, he has more important things to do than give me a ticket.

For the Ozzies - remember you law is basic English law, therfore it's true, you get get points knocked off your driving licence for sppeding on a bike.

If you ever get caught don't admit to having a driving licence

I found this out the hard way, luckly before I had a licence, and I was drunk not speeding, but same rule potentially applies, although wether anyone has ever actually been prosocuted in recent times who knows ?

Never got a ticket for speeding on the Lachine canal even when going more than 40kph. I have made several deliberate attempts to be busted by sprinting at 60kph+ on Sherbrooke St. but no luck. It may be because of a very smooth controled acceleration my acutal speed is deceptive unlike the "Tashkent Terror" Djamolodine Abdoujaparou who would weave all over the road while winding it up to 75kph. Although being pulled over and asked to slow down by a pair of very charming lady police officers was fun.:beer:

Originally posted by Brains
For the Ozzies - remember you law is basic English law, therfore it's true, you get get points knocked off your driving licence for sppeding on a bike.

I think the chances of Australian law being identical to English law are pretty slim. In my previous posts in this thread I would have thought is was pretty clear that there isn't even consistency within Australia's states and territories, so the above comment is pretty laughable whether it is true that bicycle offences go against your driver's license or not.