At school commuting hours you see bicycles riding side by side, on the roadway and on the pavement alike. A car coming up behind cannot get past; on a pavement, people on foot move to the edge. I looked into where this sits in the rules.
If you cycle in Japan, this one is worth knowing, because the fine attached to it started in April 2026.
The short answer first.
- Riding side by side is called heishin (並進) and is prohibited by Article 19 of the Road Traffic Act
- What is prohibited is heishin by a "light vehicle" — not bicycles specifically. The text also draws no distinction between roadway, pavement or roadside band
- The only exception is a road carrying a "heishin permitted" sign. Even then it is limited to standard bicycles, and three or more abreast is not allowed (Article 63-5)
- You will almost never see that sign. Hyogo Prefectural Police state plainly that there are no such designated locations in the prefecture
- The penalty is a fine or petty fine of up to ¥20,000. Since April 2026 it also carries an on-the-spot ticket, with a fixed penalty of ¥3,000
- But the ticket system covers ages 16 and over. Lower-secondary students, and some in their first year of upper secondary, fall outside it and receive guidance and a warning instead
- Among people injured or killed while riding a bicycle, 15-to-19-year-olds are the largest age band (2024: 11,997 people, 18.3%). Under-20s account for roughly 30% of the total
Below, the primary sources for each of those.
This article organises the content of laws and public documents. Whether a particular case is an offence is for the police to judge. Provisions are quoted from the version in force as of 11 August 2026. Amounts are in Japanese yen; at the time of writing US$1 was about ¥159 (11 August 2026).
1. The legal word is not the everyday word
In ordinary Japanese, riding side by side is usually called heisō (並走). The Road Traffic Act uses a different word: heishin (並進). The heading of the article reads "Prohibition of heishin by light vehicles."
It is a textbook case of a legal term drifting away from the everyday one.
Below I use the word the statute uses. Read it as "riding side by side."
2. The ban is Article 19; the exception is Article 63-5
The prohibition first.
Article 19. A light vehicle shall not ride abreast of another light vehicle in cases where light vehicles would be riding abreast. Road Traffic Act (Act No. 105 of 1960), Article 19. Translation mine.
A short provision, with two things worth reading closely.
The first is that the subject is a "light vehicle", not a bicycle. Light vehicles include handcarts and trailers pulled by hand. This is not a bicycle-only rule.
The second is that no place is specified. Roadway, pavement, roadside band — the provision does not write them separately. I come back to this in section 4.
Then the exception, which is Article 63-5.
Article 63-5. A standard bicycle may, on a road where riding abreast is permitted by a road sign etc., ride abreast of another standard bicycle notwithstanding the provisions of Article 19. Provided that this does not apply where three or more standard bicycles would be riding abreast. Road Traffic Act, Article 63-5. Translation mine.
The ban is Article 19; the exception is Article 63-5. Japanese-language explainers sometimes have these two the wrong way round. Worth checking before citing a number.
The exception has its own detail. It is limited to "standard bicycles" — a bicycle whose body size and construction meet a Cabinet Office Ordinance standard and which is not towing another vehicle. The National Police Agency gives not exceeding 190 cm in length and 60 cm in width as the guide. Tandem bicycles and velotaxis (pedal-powered taxis with a passenger seat) do not qualify. Some bicycles cannot ride abreast even where the sign is present.
And "three or more riding abreast" is carved out by the proviso. Even with the sign, two is the limit.
3. The sign that permits it is almost never there
The sign does exist. It comes from Appended Table 2 of the Order on Road Signs, Road Markings and Road Surface Markings.
Meaning indicated: that, by the road sign under Article 63-5 of the Traffic Act, a standard bicycle may ride abreast of another standard bicycle (excluding cases where three or more would be riding abreast; the same applies below in this item). Order on Road Signs, Road Markings and Road Surface Markings (Prime Minister's Office and Ministry of Construction Order No. 3 of 1960), Appended Table 2. Translation mine.
It is an indication sign, number 401, white on blue. Not a sign that prohibits something, but one that says "here, you may ride abreast."
The difficulty is that there is hardly any road carrying it. Hyogo Prefectural Police put it plainly.
I could not find any public document giving a national count of installations. Hyogo was the one case I could confirm. Still, it seems unwise to proceed on the assumption that "there is probably one on the road near me." If you have no memory of seeing the sign, treat that road as one where riding abreast is not permitted.
4. What is happening on the roadway, and on the pavement
The National Police Agency explains why riding abreast is a problem in these terms.
On the pavement
Being unable to get past bicycles riding abreast on a pavement may be the more familiar experience. But the pavement case needs something checked first: bicycles may use the pavement only in limited circumstances.
(i) Where a road sign etc. indicates that standard bicycles may travel on that pavement.
(ii) Where the rider of the standard bicycle is a child, an infant or another person specified by Cabinet Order as one for whom travelling on the roadway by standard bicycle is deemed dangerous.
(iii) Beyond the preceding two items, where, in light of the roadway or traffic conditions, it is deemed unavoidable for the standard bicycle to travel on the pavement in order to secure the safety of its passage. Road Traffic Act, Article 63-4, paragraph 1. Translation mine.
The "person specified by Cabinet Order" in item (ii) is set out in Article 26 of the Road Traffic Act Enforcement Order as children and infants, persons aged 70 or over, and persons with a specified physical disability. "Child" here means under 13. Lower-secondary and upper-secondary students do not fall under this item.
And even where the pavement may be used, how it may be used is prescribed.
Keep to the roadway side of the centre, go slow, and stop if you would be in the way of someone walking. Meeting those conditions while riding side by side seems difficult.
That said, I could not find a public document stating what offence riding abreast on a pavement constitutes. Article 19 specifies no place, so it reads as though it applies on a pavement too, but I could not confirm a National Police Agency document saying so. What is certain is the separate set of rules on when the pavement may be used and how. For what it is worth, violating the pavement-speed duty (Article 63-4, paragraph 2) carries the same ¥3,000 fixed penalty as riding abreast.
5. The ¥20,000 penalty and the ¥3,000 fine are two different things
Two amounts appear, so it is worth separating them.
The penalty under Article 121, paragraph 1, item (viii) is a fine or petty fine of up to ¥20,000 (about US$126). That is a criminal penalty.
The fixed penalty comes from the traffic infraction notification system that began on 1 April 2026, and is ¥3,000 (about US$19). It appears on the National Police Agency's list under the name "violation of the prohibition on riding abreast." Paying the fixed penalty means no prosecution is brought.
(riding abreast)
(Art. 121(1)(viii))
¥3,000 is one of the lower bands on the fixed-penalty list. The same ¥3,000 band holds the pavement-speed duty violation, carrying a passenger, and failing to use a cycle track. Running a red light is ¥6,000; holding a mobile phone is ¥12,000.
6. Under-16s are outside the system, but not outside the rule
This is likely the part that matters most to parents of lower-secondary students.
The ticket system covers ages 16 and over. The basis is Article 125, paragraph 2 of the Road Traffic Act, which excludes persons under 16 from the definition of an "offender" for these purposes. The National Police Agency's material lists "a violation by a person under 16" among the cases handled by guidance and a warning. The Tokyo Metropolitan Police write that persons under 16 will, in principle, be given guidance and a warning.
Worth being careful: this does not mean lower-secondary students may ride abreast. It remains an Article 19 violation. What changes is the procedure that follows. Instead of the route that ends in paying a fixed penalty, it ends in guidance and a warning.
And given the 15-to-19 age band, the treatment changes partway through the first year of upper secondary school. Two students riding next to each other on the same journey to school can be on different procedural footings.
7. The largest group injured on bicycles is 15 to 19
Below is the National Police Agency's count of people killed or injured while riding a bicycle, by age band.
| Age band | Killed or injured | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Under 5 | 361 | 0.6% |
| 5–9 | 1,868 | 2.9% |
| 10–14 | 5,111 | 7.8% |
| 15–19 | 11,997 | 18.3% |
| 20–24 | 4,781 | 7.3% |
| 25–29 | 3,860 | 5.9% |
| 65 and over | 12,672 | 19.4% |
| Total | 65,481 | 100.0% |
2024. From the National Police Agency's road traffic statistics. Intermediate bands omitted.
Taken in five-year bands, 15 to 19 is the largest. The 65-and-over row is not a five-year band but everything above a threshold, so as a single age group 15–19 is the peak. Adding 10–14 gives 19,337 people aged 19 or under, roughly 30% of the total.
On helmets, the National Police Agency records the pattern by school level.
What is established in lower secondary school comes off in upper secondary. Whether riding abreast follows the same shape is not something this article can establish. But two numbers pointing the same way in the same age group seems worth recording.
8. The state puts riding abreast alongside weaving and racing
The content of road safety education is set out in a National Public Safety Commission notification. Riding abreast appears in the section for lower-secondary students.
(b) That one must not cut in front of vehicles at intersections or before level crossings, or thread between them to get ahead.
(c) That one must not ride abreast, weave, race and the like.
(d) That when travelling in a roadside band one must not impede the passage of persons on foot. Road Safety Education Guideline (National Public Safety Commission Notification No. 15 of 1998), Section 3, "Road safety education for lower-secondary students." Translation mine.
Riding abreast sits in the same list as weaving and racing. What the three have in common is not that they look like messing about, but that they make the rider's movement unreadable to the cars and people around them.
The same guideline asks for education reflecting the high number of bicycle accidents among lower-secondary and upper-secondary students respectively. The lower-secondary section also notes the importance of parents being involved.
For schools, the Ministry of Education issued an administrative notice on 21 October 2025 circulating the National Police Agency's Bicycle Rulebook to prefectural and designated-city boards of education and others. The arrival of the ticket system is information that has been delivered to schools.
Closing
On the page, riding abreast is prohibited by a single short sentence. The sign that would permit it exists but is almost never installed. The ticket system has now attached an amount to it, while part of the age group with the largest numbers sits outside that procedure.
Riding abreast means the car behind ends up crossing the centre line. That is what Fig. 1 is about.
What is written here is one way of looking at it. Texts get amended, and practice varies from place to place. If you notice something, I would be glad to hear it through the contact form.
Sources
- Road Traffic Act (Act No. 105 of 1960), Articles 19, 63-4, 63-5, 121, 125 e-Gov (Japanese)
- Road Traffic Act Enforcement Order (Cabinet Order No. 270 of 1960), Article 26 and Appended Table 6 e-Gov (Japanese)
- Order on Road Signs, Road Markings and Road Surface Markings (Order No. 3 of 1960), Appended Table 2 e-Gov (Japanese)
- National Police Agency Traffic Bureau, Bicycle Rulebook, September 2025 PDF / bicycle portal
- National Police Agency Traffic Bureau, "Road traffic accidents in 2025," 26 February 2026 PDF
- National Police Agency, road traffic statistics: bicycle casualties by age band (2024) e-Stat
- Road Safety Education Guideline (National Public Safety Commission Notification No. 15 of 1998) NPA reference materials PDF
- Hyogo Prefectural Police, "Traffic rules for bicycles" prohibition on riding abreast
- Tokyo Metropolitan Police, "Introduction of the traffic infraction notification system for bicycles" explanation
- Ministry of Education, "Circulation of the Bicycle Rulebook," administrative notice of 21 October 2025 page