You have speed limits on bike paths? 
What is the speed limit on your bike path?
How are bikers supposed to obey this speed limit when they don’t have a speedometer mounted to their bike?
I was wondering when the sushi story would swim up to the surface again. I got a raw deal on that one.
Ugh. No more fishy jokes.
Wait. Are you saying Germany does not have speed limits on bike paths? Maybe not. Autobhan rule, anyone?
I don’t think speed limits are uncommon. Because it’s a shared-use path, a limit of 15 mph seems reasonable. There are cyclists of various levels, runners, horses along the sides, and the occasional skateboards, inline skates, unicycles, etc.
Our awesome bike path is very popular, and has tons of people on it on nice days. It gets busy. Not recommended for small children, for example, unless parents teach them to ride predictably, stay right, and look both ways. It’s amazing how many people just stop on the pavement, or step onto it without looking, as if they never saw anyone else using it. That’s why we have bells on our cycles, to give a warning without people having to look.
And a lot of us have speedometers. Mine is worn on my wrist.
Side note:
If you follow the link above, it tells about “my” local bike path. I didn’t know if was one of the longest paths as described there. The cool thing is that there’s more to it than the main 32-mile length. In Folsom there are many, many more miles of bike path, some of which are a continuation of the main path, including the loop around Lake Natoma, which is part of our regular rides there. I linked that bike path to several others (with some road riding) when I did my century ride two years ago.
Ours doesn’t have any (bicycle) traffic lights on it, but there are plenty of road crossings with stop signs, though most of them are 4-way stops.
In Germany the general speed limits for cars apply to bikes as well. This is 50km/h (31mph) within cities and 100km/h (62mph) in the countryside. These speed limits can be altered by traffic signs. But I have never ever seen such a sign on a bike path. So we are talking about theoretic limits not many bicyclists or unicyclists need to worry about. Plus there’s a law that bikers violating speed limits can only be prosecuted in extreme cases as they are not supposed to have a speedometer. If I remember correctly, it was something about 50% over the limit, which would be 46 resp. 93mph.
Here I learned about the limit of 15mph on the Jedediah Smith Memorial Trail which is not much.
In the UK there was once a law against “furious cycling”. Anyone riding so fast as to be a danger to others was in breach of this law. It makes sense because the stopping distance of a bicycle doing 30 mph on 23mm high pressure tyres downhill must be pretty long - as indeed is the stopping distance of a 36 inch unicycle on short cranks.
There have been a small number of cases of pedestrians being killed by cyclists, and there are many cases of pedestrians being injured by cyclists. The pedestrian is in many ways the most vulnerable road user of all.
Cycles and walkers do not mix easily. A walker can stop, turn, step to one side, or step backwards almost in an instant. A bicycle at high speed has very limited manoeuvrability.
Imagine if all pedestrians wore helmets.
Why not try combining the two and write as you ride - after all us unicyclists have to find something to do with our hands. The bonus being that you probably won’t even notice the red lights, let alone the police.
<raises hand> oh hang on - do red lights on a pedestrian crossing (crosswalk?) count? Over here such lights are just advisory (for pedestrians - I’m not sure the law could cope with giving a judgement on whether unicyclists should obey them), so I reckon they shouldn’t, but guilty as charged if they do. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a red light on a bike path except on toucan crossings - we don’t really have the same sort of bike path infrastructure either. Oh, and whilst we do have stop signs, I can’t think of a single one round here.
If you can’t use your unicycle to flee from police then what is it good for haha
Follow-up to the incident
By a not-surprising coincidence, the same cop was driving around the Park today while I was out. I’m pretty conspicuous, so it was also not surprising that she squelched that police-car squelch and got my attention. I hopped off and walked over to her SUV. She repeated something I pretended not to have heard the first time: “I think you’d better exit the park now.” I feigned surprise, and she brought up the incident of a few days ago. I explained that she had me confused with my brother, who also rides. I further explained that I was an auxiliary cop back in the 90s and that I was well aware of the rules of the road. It was a very pleasant exchange, ending with her asking me to mention said rules to my brother. I then continued my ride.
Now I just have to hope that she pulls over my brother one of these days. That would be pretty funny.
Is she hot, like Miss Ayelery? I hope she pulls me over.
So the next guy on a 36 that she sees will get the third degree for violating traffic laws and fleeing from the scene? Remind me not to ride in Central Park for a while.
In case it should come up, what do you look like David? I would rather not be mistaken for you!
Scott
The story keeps getting better, but you say “I” a lot. I’m starting to suspect that this was not a friend.
That’s another reason why I use a bicycle bell out there. If they can step aside without having to look, there’s less of that “instant” side-stepping, hesitation and squirrel-like indecision. 
Here he is in front of his store, near the Ride The Lobster finish line in 2008:
You’re getting confused - I’m fairly sure that is his brother.