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news
Fixed gear bike running brakeless © Simon MacMichael.jpgCalifornia county bans brakeless fixies
California’s Ventura County has banned fixed-wheel bikes from trails and bike paths.
A hit-and-run crash between two riders on the Ojai Valley Trail in September left one with severe injuries. The other fled the scene but was reported by parks director Ron Van Dyck to be riding a bike with no brakes at high speed.
Park officials therefore pushed for a ban on fixed-wheel bikes, which are sometimes ridden without brakes.
The Ventura County Board of Supervisors unanimously approved the ban on Tuesday, according to the Ventura County Star.
It’s not the first time brakeless fixies have been a target of local law. In 2006 Portland, Oregon bike messenger Ayla Holland was stopped for riding a brakeless fixie, and subsequently fined.
In a similar later case in Portland, the rider managed to argue that the transmission constituted a braking mechanism and escaped a fine, but for a while some Portland police were believed to be deliberately targetting riders of brakeless fixies.
In 2010, Australian bike shops were threatened with fines of up to AUD1.1 million for selling fixies without two brakes.
In the UK, the law is straightforward. The Pedal Cycles (Construction and Use) Regulations 1983 say that a fixed wheel bike has to have a front brake, and regular bikes with freewheels have to have two independent braking systems, one of which operates on the front wheel.
We haven’t been able to find any cases of someone being fined in the UK for riding a brakeless fixie.
John has been writing about bikes and cycling for over 30 years since discovering that people were mug enough to pay him for it rather than expecting him to do an honest day's work.
He was heavily involved in the mountain bike boom of the late 1980s as a racer, team manager and race promoter, and that led to writing for Mountain Biking UK magazine shortly after its inception. He got the gig by phoning up the editor and telling him the magazine was rubbish and he could do better. Rather than telling him to get lost, MBUK editor Tym Manley called John’s bluff and the rest is history.
Since then he has worked on MTB Pro magazine and was editor of Maximum Mountain Bike and Australian Mountain Bike magazines, before switching to the web in 2000 to work for CyclingNews.com. Along with road.cc founder Tony Farrelly, John was on the launch team for BikeRadar.com and subsequently became editor in chief of Future Publishing’s group of cycling magazines and websites, including Cycling Plus, MBUK, What Mountain Bike and Procycling.
John has also written for Cyclist magazine, edited the BikeMagic website and was founding editor of TotalWomensCycling.com before handing over to someone far more representative of the site's main audience.
He joined road.cc in 2013. He lives in Cambridge where the lack of hills is more than made up for by the headwinds.
Latest Comments
- chrisonabike 3 sec ago
That would not withstand challenges given it's an "advisory cycle lane". So not illegal to drive or park in. In fact in many cases it would make...
- matthewn5 22 min 40 sec ago
A friend in my cycling club has a new Ribble Allroad, I think the model with 105, and when I asked how he was finding it (before reading this...
- Rendel Harris 31 min 45 sec ago
Well yes but that's if you're looking at an equation x = n x 3 where n is any number less than 5. If you're looking for a number that is three...
- check12 1 hour 49 min ago
Get them back? They've never gone away for me, cheap tdf winning bikes on eBay with rim brakes and cheap rim brake aero wheels, just don't tell...
- Simon E 2 hours 32 min ago
It used to be called Buy Nothing Day as a protest against the the Black Friday discounting madness. The constant BF adverts, promos and stuff...
- chrisonabike 4 hours 47 min ago
Apologies - you're quite right! Something about presentation and comprehension...
- wtjs 5 hours 8 min ago
You can find out whether they're lying about 'taking action' by asking them what they actually did. When they refuse to tell you, citing various...
- chrisonabike 9 hours 53 min ago
Also don't forget - Sustrans are a charity *....
- chrisonabike 10 hours 4 min ago
Yes ... but (just due to the large numbers of people affected) this likely would only proceed in the UK at a very ... cautious ... pace....
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46 comments
FFS, they're calling for a complete ban on fixed-wheel bicycles. Not for a ban on brakeless bicycles.
It's a evidence-free, kneejerk reaction which ignores the fact that a fixed-wheel with a front-brake (which provides c. 85% of the stopping power) is possibly safer than a freewheel in terms of sensing road conditions, having a direct incentive not to bomb down hills faster than your legs can pedal etc.
Coaster brakes - also popular on bikes in Germany and Holland where they're still on sale. A lot of those old sit up type Dutch bikes have them still.
Coaster brakes. All the "C" ending models in the Sunrace/Sturmey-Archer catalogue have it. http://www.sturmey-archer.com/products/hubs/cid/3/id/15.html
oozaveared: Kick-back / pedal-backwards / coaster brakes are fitted on pretty much the majority (nearly all?) of "normal" (i.e. not sports) bikes in the Netherlands.
They're excellent for about-town, utility cycling because they mean your hands are left free, to signal, carry things (e.g. shopping), use your mobile, etc. The downside is they're not the most powerful brakes.
I could be mistaken but it isn't road legal in the UK, I'm sure the highway code states that a bike needs to have both front and rear brakes. so you would need a front brake with a fixed transmission.
They were/are called "coaster brakes" – I had one on my Schwinn Stingray: http://goo.gl/3rwy1J
That's called a 'coaster brake' - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bicycle_brake#Coaster_brakes
seems odd to ban fixies when the issue is brakes, what are they going to do about bmx's being ridden brakeless??? or do skate shoes and back tyres count as a brake????
A lot of riders on the BMX scene ride brakeless. I've asked a few about it. The usual response is, "Brakes drag and slow you down."
I answer, "They don't drag if you know how to set them up right."
So there you have it, teenage laziness in setting up brakes leads to minimalist cool. The saving in avoiding the cost of a functioning brake is outweighed by the rapid wear of each pair of Vans.
My BMXs have a rear brake. It's enough.
to be fair the kids on the BMXs have a partial point. Much like a proper track bike they aren't really for riding on a road and. OK if someone is riding a BMX on a road maybe they should have a brake. I bet they can stop em faster than a lot of cyclists can with brakes. And it's not fair to call it teenage laziness. It's more about wanting the cache. Quite the opposite in fact. They probably had to take the brake off. And as it happens the lazy ones aren't riding BMXs around they are playing Tony Hawke on the PS3.
hipsters spitting their skinny machiatos all over their rapha city gloves everywhere.
I wish I was cool enough to be a hipster, im just to old, to fat for skinny jeans, I can grow a decent beard, but being a read head it does not look the part, especially with my bald head....but I do have a fixie
scene.jpg
I ride a fixie on the velodrome of Amsterdam, but on open roads I wouldn't dare it. (on a velodrome brakes would even be dangerous and it's one way traffic anyway.)
I know there's a lot of cyclist capable of doing so, but being capable en needing to do so is bit of a difference. at least in my mind it wouldn't hurt to put at least one break on a streetbike. (one is at least free not to use it...)
(Instead of fixed gear, in town I ride singlespeed, makes me feel more save during cornering also, being able to keep the pedal high and lean into the corner.)
(don't think it needs to be a law, it's just a case of awarding Darwin awards)
I don't think it's unreasonable to decree that bikes should have brakes regardless of transmission type.
You can stop a car or (4 stroke) motorcycle on engine braking if you are skilful, but I'd prefer not to share the roads with unbraked vee-hickles, ta.
so if I ride around on a fixie and stab someone in the face, the fixie is the problem? Sounds like they have British Politicians in Cali
the Ventura County Star lacks details - is it fixed gear or fixed gear with no brakes that have been banned?
I ride fixed for my commute but I do have a front brake (as I have no confidence in my ability to stop the bike sharp enough) then again I am in West London and not California...
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