The streets, roads, and highways of California are for the benefit of all citizens, and any local attempt to restrict traffic is disfavored:
The use of highways for purposes of travel and transportation is not a mere privilege, but a common and fundamental right, of which the public and individuals cannot rightly be deprived.… All persons have an equal right to use them for purposes of travel by proper means, and with due regard for the corresponding rights of others.[19]
Absent express authority, localities may not determine which traffic shall and shall not use streets.[20] A bicyclist “has all the rights” of the driver of a vehicle[21]; moreover, bicycle riders have the same right as automobile drivers to the use of streets.[22] Other road users often fail to recognize this fundamental principle (and so do police and courts). It was well expressed by the Supreme Court of Minnesota as early as 1894:
A bicycle is a vehicle used now very extensively for convenience, recreation, pleasure, and business, and the riding of one upon the public highway in the ordinary manner as is now done is neither unlawful nor prohibited, and they cannot be banished because they were not ancient vehicles, and used in the Garden of Eden by Adam and Eve.[23]
The California courts have said, more prosaically, “A bicycle … is recognized as a legitimate means of traveling upon the highways or streets of a city either for business or pleasure.”[24]
As a direct consequence of Cal. Veh. Code § 21200 and the holdings cited supra in Rumford v. City of Berkeley,[25] Hunt v. Los Angeles Ry. Corp.,[26] and Flury v. Beeskau,[27] bicyclists are entitled to travel on all roads except those that are lawfully prohibited to them.[28] Motorists are frequently unaware of this principle, and sometimes react with anger—and occasionally with belligerent actions—when bicyclists “intrude” onto “their” roads. This response is especially likely when a separated bike path is available nearby.
Many motorists do not know that legally, bicyclists on conventional roadways are never required to use a separated path, or even a shoulder.[29] Further, there are persuasive reasons why cyclists prefer the roadway. Like other travelers, bicyclists want to reach their destinations safely, conveniently, and with minimum delay. Paths are often indirect and disconnected; they fail to serve the cyclist’s destination; they may be poorly designed and maintained; and they are usually shared with pedestrians. The roadway has none of these drawbacks. Nor are sidewalks or paths adjacent to a roadway safer than the road, as noncyclists and even many cyclists believe. Bicycle riders on sidewalks parallel to arterial streets have been found to suffer bicycle-car collisions 1.8 times the rate of those on the adjacent roadway (because of blind conflicts at intersections and the promotion of wrong-way travel).[30] The conclusion that parallel paths are undesirable is accepted as fact in existing standards for bikeway design.[31] In any case, almost every bicycle trip must at some point use roadways shared with motorists, because the roadway system serves nearly every origin and destination, while bicycle facilities do not and cannot.
Bicyclists, too, may be unaware of their right to use the roadway, ignorant of its advantages, or intimidated by belligerent motor vehicle traffic. As a result, bicyclists may be unwilling to exercise their rights under the law. A clearer statement of the law would lead to greater respect for bicyclists’ rights.