Skyline Drive, Shenandoah National Park - photo courtesy of Virginia.org
As currently written, the Senate’s transportation bill, S.1813, would introduce mandatory sidepath law on roads in our National Parks and other Federal lands. (This means that anywhere there’s a “bike path” next to a road, cyclists would be required to use it, and prohibited from using the roadway.)
In Virginia, this could affect cyclists’ right to the road on the Blue Ridge Parkway, Colonial Parkway, George Washington Memorial Parkway, Shenandoah National Park, and our many National Battlefields, Monuments, and military bases.
Note that Virginia has no mandatory sidepath or bike lane law. In fact, state law prohibits such laws.
Don’t let the Feds take away your right to the road. The League of American Bicyclists has prepared a petition to remove this language from the transportation bill. Please sign it, and get your friends and family members to sign it too.
Please forward this to your bike club mailing lists, and share it on Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus, etc.
Also see this article at Adventure Journal.
![\"Quantcast\"/](\"//pixel.quantserve.com/pixel/p-ffAr_0M34f91E.gif\")
Comments on this entry are closed.
Agreed. A mandatory sidepath law would be unjust, unfair, unnecessary, and counter-productive. What a genuinely stupid idea.
But here’s a question: where is there a sidepath along either the Blue Ridge Parkway or Skyline Drive? Surely nobody would consider the Appalachian Trail as such, for those sections where it runs nearby. And is there a sidepath along Colonial Parkway?
Wayne: whether or not there currently are sidepaths, or may be in the future, we can’t risk being harassed off the road onto a substandard facility, There’s also too much opportunity for management to cry, “Danger, danger,” for cyclists, in order to get a sidepath built for other users. On principle, we’re opposed to any mandatory sidepath law. Such laws are illegal in Virginia. One would hope the Parkway’s laws would be consistent with the states that it runs through, instead of management or NPS making up their own.
Come to Cape Hatteras National Seashore Recreational Area where previously free access to the beaches by four wheel drive vehicles has been heavily curtailed and now costs $150 for a permit.
Bikes will be next to have a permit at Shenandoah National Park…….When will the systematic removal of the Public from NPS controlled land be addressed. When will enough be enough for America.www.ncbba.org