Bicycles are widely used in Japan for everyday life by people of all age groups and social standings. Commuting to school, work or to the closest railway station, picking up children from preschool or doing the daily groceries are among the activities commonly done by bicycle.
Types of Bicycles
In Japanese, bicycles are known as jitensha or charinko (slang). The most common bicycles for every day use are typically equipped with a basket and/or a child seat (or two), a simple lock, a kickstand and just one gear.
Basic everyday bicycles cost around 10,000 Yen (about US$ 100), while used ones are available for less. More advanced models with multiple gears, for example, are slightly more expensive.
Foldable bicycles, mountain bikes and road racing bicycles are getting more common, but are still vastly outnumbered by the inexpensive everyday bicycles.
Road Rules
In theory, bicycles are supposed to use the streets and not the sidewalks, except when signs indicate that the sidewalks are for common use by pedestrians and cyclists. In praxis, however, cyclists tend to use the sidewalks at all times.
Due to the high popularity of bicycles, there are dedicated bicycle parking areas near most railway stations and shopping centers. Here and there you may even find multi-storey parking garages for exclusive use by bicycles.
Where there is a lack of designated parking space, bicycles will be ruthlessly parked even in clearly designated non-parking zones. In some areas, wrongly parked bicycles may be removed by the local authorities and can only get returned against a fine.
Bicycle Theft and Registration
Bicycle theft is not uncommon. Especially the scenario of being stranded at a railway station without continuing bus connection or someone to drive you home, creates occasional thieves. In order to fight bicycle theft, every bicycle in Japan is supposed to be registered with the police against a small one-time fee.
If you buy a new bicycle, the registration process will likely be handled by the store, but if you take over a used bicycle from somebody else, you are supposed to re-register the bicycle under your name at the local police station in order to avoid misunderstandings.
Most bicycles are equipped with a basic lock (see illustration below on how to use it), but more sturdy locks are required if you are concerned about bicycle theft.
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