WRT “Wheeled recreation device or toy?” they mean skateboards, push-scooters and those infernal combustion engine powered scooters that have no legitimate place to go (as opposed to legal, they’re legal on the footpath even at 30kph, but never on the road). Critical Mass periodically has cops get officious and tell skaters to get off the road.

It’s amusing, although not particularly enlightening, to note that the term “shared path” is defined in rule 242: “Travelling in or on a wheeled recreational device or toy on a footpath or shared path”. Wheeled recreation device or toy? What’s that all about?

Incidentally, bicycles are neither “wheeled recreation devices” nor “toys”; they have their own section of the rules: “Part 15 Additional rules fo bicycle riders” (that’s rules 245–262).

Which neatly brings us to Crowlie’s point about legitimacy. Interesting word legitimate:

1. according to law; lawful: the property’s legitimate owner.
2. in accordance with established rules, principles, or standards.

So, by virtue of their inclusion in the road rules, bicycles are inherently legitimate road vehicles. Clearly Crowlie is riding at is a different connotation: not the legal legitimacy (there’s no room for argument there) but a more informal legitimacy: just being accepted as normal road traffic.

The issue pedaller raises is further in the complex you describe as simply needing more attention placed on developing infrastructure for bicycle traffic. Not to mention seeing bicycles as legitimate traffic both commuting and for other travel, rather than being a proto-pedestrian “fun” pastime.

I wonder how you’ll go, pedaller, if you are pulled over by an officious constable and reply with treadly’s summary? You could always provoke it and make your case in court as a test for bringing the whole issue to light for media and further discussion… It would make great copy on wheels of justice ;-) Ghandi on wheels.

On your suggestion I’ve gone and had a look at the Australian Road Rules at the National Transport Commission—I presume that is the definitive source.

This is how rule 24 defines shared zones and their speed limits:

24 Speed-limit in a shared zone

(1) The speed-limit applying to a driver for any length of road in a shared zone is the number of kilometres per hour indicated by the number on the shared zone sign on a road into the zone.

Note A driver driving in a shared zone must give way to any pedestrian in the zone…

(2) A shared zone is the network of roads in an area with:

(a) a shared zone sign on each road into the area, indicating the same number; and

(b) an end shared zone sign on each road out of the area.

(3) In subrule (2) (a) and (b):

road does not include a road-related area.

Firstly, you are wrong that shared zones “all have a speed limit attached of 10km/h”, although that speed limit is common it may be different depending on what is displayed on the sign. But that’s a minor quibble.

However I do draw your attention to clause (3), and flipping back to rule 13 we find:

13 What is a road-related area

(1) A road-related area is any of the following:

(a) an area that divides a road;

(b) a footpath or nature strip adjacent to a road;

(c) an area that is not a road and that is open to the public and designated for use by cyclists or animals;

(d) an area that is not a road and that is open to or used by the public for driving, riding or parking vehicles.

Shared zones specifically exclude road-related areas, and off-road bike facilities are included under clause (c).

According to rule 242, what we’re actually talking about here is a “shared path”:

(2) A shared path is an area open to the public (except a separated footpath) that is designated for, or has as one of its main uses, use by both the riders of bicycles and pedestrians, and includes a length of path for use by both bicycles and pedestrians beginning at a shared path sign or shared path road marking and ending at the nearest of the following:

(a) an end shared path sign or end shared path road marking;

(b) a no bicycles sign or no bicycles road marking;

(c) a bicycle path sign or bicycle path road marking;

(d) a road (except a road-related area);

(e) the end of the path.

Indeed this is the kind of signage that I see along the off-road part of my regular route, not shared zone signs.

I can’t find anything that stipulates a speed limit for shared paths, so it’s possible that no speed limit actually applies to shared paths (and there’s a lengthy discussion in that point alone). But at the very least extrapolating the speed limit from shared zones is not correct—and it certainly doesn’t mean that “if you ride on a shared path your speed shouldn’t exceed 10km/h”.