Originally Posted by John Forester

Cycling into downtown Washington DC from Dulles airport, I crossed the Potomac on Chain Bridge, and noticed that the road paralleling the river was posted NO TRUCKS and carrying a lot of traffic headed my way. OK for me, I figured. A cop stopped me after about a mile. He really couldn't figure out what statute I was violating, but wrote down something inapplicable. I was attending a three-day meeting in DC, and needed to return to California, so I got an early trial date. Once I arrived in court they changed the charge (not legal in the courtroom, but legal once I left it). There is or was a Federal Regulation saying that cycling is prohibited in the National Capital Parks, except upon roads and such other places as permitted by the Superintendent. Great swathes of area around the national center are part of NCP, cyclists use the roads there all the time, and nowhere is there a sign saying BICYCLE RIDING PERMITTED ON THIS ROAD. There should have been a comma separating "roads" from "and such other places as permitted by the Superintendent", but there wasn't. So the court read the regulation as prohibiting cycling on all roads except those on which the Superintendent had posted permission, despite the fact that cyclists used these roads daily (I knew some who used park roads during their commute, and who were experts in traffic law). The trouble was that I had followed traffic into town along a normal commuting road, the Something or Other Memorial Highway, which had some special status, although there were no signs posted to inform users of its special status.