A female cyclist zipping along the walkway of Kachidokibashi bridge in Tokyo’s Tsukiji district grazed the arm of a French pedestrian.

She shouted “sorry” and sped away, going so fast that all her bangs were blowing backward.

The startled Frenchman, 46, said it was “unbelievable for a bicycle to be going so fast on a footway.”

Kachidokibashi bridge, built over the Sumidagawa river in Chuo Ward, falls under the jurisdiction of the Tokyo metropolitan government. The four-lane Harumi-dori street on the bridge is full of traffic day and night.

Although the left edge of the roadway is marked for bicycle use, cyclists also can use the walkways. A signboard states “cyclists should run slowly on the roadway side” of the sidewalk.

As both ends of the bridge are sloped, cyclists can quickly gain speed on the descents.

A junior high schooler, 13, who lives nearby and goes to class via Kachidokibashi, said walking on the bridge can be “horrifying” because of the bicycles.

“I never check my smartphone while passing through the bridge,” the student said. “I do not put on earphones either.”

The “danger zone” has seen a growing number of visitors heading to the Tsukiji Jogai Shijo (outer market) shopping district.

Tokyo Tower and Tokyo Skytree can be seen from the bridge, so couples often walk there side by side while chatting and taking in the view.

“I cannot believe no serious accidents have happened here,” the Frenchman said on the bridge.

The tourist said that in his homeland, different lanes are set aside for cars, bicycles and pedestrians around the popular sightseeing destination of the Paris Opera.

THREATENED BY AUTOMOBILES

Cyclists are using sidewalks for safety reasons.

A woman on a bicycle with her child in a back seat said she is “afraid of the roadway.”

She said vehicles are always parked on the road edge that is marked for bicycle use.

“I have to swerve sharply into the traffic side to avoid parked automobiles each time,” she said. “This process is troublesome and dangerous.”

According to the National Police Agency, three pedestrians were killed and 309 seriously injured in accidents with cyclists in 2022. Forty percent of the incidents occurred on footpaths.

Bicycles are treated as a type of light vehicle under the Road Traffic Law, meaning that, in principle, they must run on the left side of roads and off of walkways.

Shinji Wada, head of the Tokyo metropolitan government’s safety and facility department, said cyclists started to prefer walkways from the early 1960s to early 1970s.

“Automobile traffic rose dramatically during that period of high economic growth, resulting in a large number of cyclists being hit by cars,” Wada said. “Cyclists started riding on footpaths for safety. This is behind the public’s deep-rooted perception of (dangerous) bicycle operations.”

CHANGE PERCEPTION

Bicycle purchases have increased during the COVID-19 pandemic as people try to avoid the “three Cs” of closed, crowded and close-contact settings.

A number of cyclists now work as home-delivery agents, while rental bicycles have become more common.

The Tokyo metropolitan government, encouraged by these social changes and seeking to address the lack of cyclist-only roads in the capital, plans to introduce four main types of bicycle lanes.

In the first category, roadways and bicycle lanes will be separated with a fence or curb.

Bicycle lanes in the second category will be marked in blue on the left side of roads.

In the third category, white bicycle symbols and direction arrows will be painted on the left edges of roads.

In the fourth category, lanes for cyclists and pedestrians on sidewalks will be separated with plants, fences, painted marks or other means.

Kachidokibashi bridge falls under the third category.

Tokyo officials said cyclists can also operate on footways in the second and third categories when: traffic signs say it is permitted; the cyclists are children under 13 years old; the cyclists are seniors aged 70 or older; the cyclists are physically disabled; and there are no other means for safety.

In all of the cases, bicycle riders are urged to travel slowly.

BIKE LANES NOT ENOUGH

Asked what category most streets fall into, Wada said: “Lanes should essentially be completely separated for automobiles, cyclists and pedestrians like in the first category. But roads in Japan are so narrow that most of them in Tokyo are classified as the second type.”

The metropolitan government has developed 300 kilometers of bicycle lanes so far.

An additional 600 km of bicycle lanes will be established primarily at tourist destinations, areas around major stations and in accident-prone zones by fiscal 2030.

Still, Wada said that will not be enough to keep cyclists off sidewalks soon.

He said Tokyo is first looking to work with police to crack down on automobiles parked in bicycle lanes so that cyclists can feel safer on roadways.