Bicycle 'blue tickets' hit 15,919 in their first six months, a report says.
2.2%
of agree votes went to the 72 on drivers' violations
1,417 comments read to the bottom · every number is below
My lady's reading
This is what my lady thought, before looking at this comment section.
A guess: the comments will be full of the idea that Japan's roads are soft and lenient - rule-breaking is fine for cars, but not for bicycles.
It feels like nothing but "bring in licences" and "ride on the pavement".
The comment that was quoted is as good as a driver saying: bicycles will get run down, so anyone not wanting to be run down should ride on the pavement.
Even car drivers - who cannot drive at all without a licence - are speeding, skipping stop signs and using phones at the wheel every day.
Well, 15,000 comes to about two people a day per prefecture, which shows the police are doing next to no work at all - no wonder the frustration builds up.
That is my lady's reading.
Some of this can be counted. How many agree presses went to comments criticising cyclists, and how many to comments mentioning drivers' violations? How many comments called for licences, or for riding on the pavement? And does the two-a-day division hold up? First, though, what the story does not say.
The news
At 3:43pm on 5 November 2026, Kyodo News published a story on Yahoo! News.
In the six months since April, when Japan began giving cyclists aged 16 and over "blue tickets" - notices to pay a fixed penalty for a traffic offence - 15,919 have been issued (a provisional figure), according to a National Police Agency tally.
According to the story, the most common offence was using a smartphone or similar device while riding, at 6,904, or 40% of the total. Next came failing to stop at a stop sign, 5,559 (35%), running a red light, 1,374 (9%), and entering a level crossing when it was closing, 1,155 (7%). Riding on the pavement accounted for 18. Tokyo issued the most, 2,977, followed by Osaka with 2,853 and Saitama with 1,893; Yamagata, Mie, Tokushima and Nagasaki issued one each. July was the busiest month, with 3,078, and the monthly average was 2,653. Over the same period, accidents involving bicycles fell by 3,091 from a year earlier to 31,021; an official at the agency said greater safety awareness among cyclists since the system began "may be one factor".
Context for readers outside Japan
Yahoo! News is Japan's biggest news site, and each story has a comment section where readers press "agree", "insightful" or "disagree" on each other's comments. Under Japanese traffic law a bicycle counts as a vehicle and is meant to ride on the left side of the road; riding on the pavement is allowed only where signs permit it, for young children and older people, or when the road is unsafe to ride on. Drivers have long received blue tickets for minor offences; since April 2026, cyclists aged 16 and over can receive them too, instead of facing a criminal case.
What the story does not say
The story reports only the blue tickets given to cyclists. It does not say how many tickets were given to drivers and motorcyclists over the same six months.
It does not say how many warnings or instructions were given short of a ticket. Nor does it say why pavement riding accounts for only 18.
On the 3,091-fewer accidents, the only explanation in the story is the agency official's view that safety awareness "may be one factor". The story does not say whether fewer people are cycling.
82 to 18: 1,417 comments, sixteen hours in
I read all 1,417 parent comments, as they stood between 7:37am and 7:39am on 6 November, about sixteen hours after publication. The site showed 1,423 parent comments, so 6 did not come through. The article showed 1,783 comments in total at about 7:36am.
The buttons came to 17,401 agree, 1,382 insightful and 4,083 disagree. Presses for, against presses pushing back: 82 to 18.
The votes lean hard toward the top: the first comment alone holds 40.2% of the agree presses, the top 2 52.0% and the top 5 63.9%. The first comment also drew the most disagree presses in the thread, 1,046.
The comment my lady shared: 17th
This article settles it. Only 18 tickets for riding on the pavement means about 0.1% of the total, so unless there is an accident on the pavement, the other 99.9% is let off. That is the fact of it. So on busy main roads and narrow roads, where the risk of an accident or death from contact with a car is very high and very dangerous, I wholeheartedly recommend riding on the pavement, not the roadside strip, while taking full care of pedestrians.
この記事が出た事によって結論が出た。
歩道通行の取り締まり件数が18件って事は全体の約0.1%程度なので歩道内で事故でも起こさない限り残りの99.9%は見逃してくれてるっていう事実。
となればやはり交通量の多い幹線道路や狭い道路では車との接触による事故や死亡のリスクがとても高く危険なので路側帯を走らずに歩行者に充分配慮しながら歩道を走行する事を全力で推奨します。17th by agree presses: 142 agree, 6 insightful, 39 disagree, and 4 replies. 14th in the site's recommended order. It holds 0.8% of the thread's agree presses.
It opens by working out that the 18 pavement tickets are about 0.1% of the total, and ends by recommending pavement riding, with care for pedestrians, on roads where the risk of a crash or death involving a car is high. 18 divided by 15,919 is 0.11%, so that division matches the story's figures.
Criticising how cyclists ride: 81.1%
Riding against traffic, phones, earphones, ignoring stop signs and red lights, speeding on the pavement: the comments criticising how cyclists ride number 571, or 40.3% of the thread, holding 81.1% of the agree presses, 76.5% of insightful and 59.4% of disagree.
The first comment (6,990 agree) is among them; without it, 68.4%, and without the 2nd as well, 60.6%. The first comment says it is hard to believe any enforcement is happening, that bicycles tearing along the pavement, phones, earphones and riding against traffic are still everywhere, and ends by asking for enforcement to continue where dangerous riding happens. It says nothing about cars.
Of the 571, only 20 also mentioned drivers' violations, drawing 42 agree presses between them.
Mentioning drivers' violations: 72 comments, 2.2%
The comments that mentioned violations or dangerous driving by people driving cars - phones at the wheel, speed, squeezing cyclists, passing too close, parking in bike lanes - or said cars should be ticketed too, number 72, or 5.1% of the thread, holding 2.2% of the agree presses. Without the top 2 comments, 4.6%.
These 72 drew disagree presses readily: 5.4% of the thread's disagree presses, which relative to agree is 2.5 times the rate for the thread as a whole. This one shows it most plainly.
Cyclists using phones while riding do stand out, it's true. But why isn't the far more dangerous "phone use while driving a car" cracked down on? On the Meishin Expressway and elsewhere, many people have died because of phone use at the wheel. Waiting at the lights at a junction, I see drivers looking at phones or on calls - it seems like one car in ten. Instead of just "picking on the weak", like cyclists, shouldn't the truly dangerous phone use in cars be cracked down on?
自転車のながら運転、確かに目立ちます。
でも、もっと危険な「車のながら運転」はどうして取り締まらないのでしょうか？
名神高速等で、ながら運転で沢山の人が亡くなっています。
交差点で信号待ちしていると、１０台に１台と思えるほどながらスマホや通話しながらの運転手を見かけます。
自転車の様な「弱い者いじめ」だけではなく、本当に危険な車のながら運転を取り締まるべきではないでしょうか。21st by agree presses: 80 agree, 4 insightful, 84 disagree, and 2 replies. More disagree than agree. The highest of the 72 is the 20th (88 agree), saying phone use while driving should be dealt with more strictly for cars as well as bicycles.
Some comments ran the other way. The 28 saying cars are strictly policed while cyclists get off lightly hold 3.3% of the agree presses. The 8th (334 agree) says tickets for cyclists are far fewer than for cars, motorcycles and mopeds; the 15th (172 agree) says society demands strict discipline from drivers yet turns a blind eye to cyclists' offences. In this thread, cars appeared more often as the side already being policed.
Licences and "let us use the pavement": 92 together
The comments calling for bicycle licences, number plates or compulsory lessons number 59, or 4.2%, holding 13.0% of the agree presses. Nearly all of that is the 2nd comment (2,054 agree); without it, 1.3%.
The comments saying cyclists should be allowed on the pavement number 33, or 2.3%, holding 6.1%. The highest is the 4th (670 agree), written from the cyclist's side: a rule saying ride on a road full of fast cars is too much. The 17th, the one my lady shared, is also here.
Together, 92 comments, 6.5%, holding 19.0%.
On the pavement, the opposite view was more common. The comments saying cyclists on the pavement are dangerous number 111, holding 44.2%. The first comment is among them, and without it they hold 6.8% - but by number they are more than three times the 33 asking to use the pavement.
The 52 saying, from the cyclist's side, that the road is dangerous because of cars hold 6.7%, and the 17 of those that went on to say ride on the pavement hold 5.6%. From the driver's side, 39 comments said cyclists on the road are frightening or in the way, holding 0.3%. The 11 of those that said cyclists belong on the pavement drew 35 agree presses in all. One said the writer was afraid of running a cyclist over one day; it drew no agree presses.
"Too little enforcement": 57.9%
The comments saying enforcement is too thin, never seen, or should be stepped up number 533, or 37.6% of the thread, holding 57.9% of the agree presses. The first comment is among them; without it, 29.7%. Counting by wording alone, at least 114 comments said plainly that no enforcement had ever been seen.
The 139 saying the police look the other way or are not working hold 4.9%. Comments saying either number 603, or 42.6%, holding 58.7%, or 31.0% without the first comment.
One comment did my lady's division. The 19th (113 agree, 25 insightful, 21 disagree) says 15,000 in six months sounds like a lot, but per prefecture it is about two a day - so how much work is being done? The 15 comments that did a per-day or per-prefecture division hold 1.1%.
The 164 calling it point-scoring or money-raising make up 11.6% of the thread but hold 2.4%. The 75 opposing the blue-ticket system itself hold 0.3%, with more disagree than agree.
Two a day, and the gap between prefectures
Here is the division with the story's figures. 15,919 divided by 47 prefectures, and by six months - about 183 days - comes to about 1.9 a day per prefecture. My lady's "about two people a day" matches the story's figures (the story counts tickets).
But that is an average. Tokyo's 2,977 come to about 16 a day, and Osaka's 2,853 also to about 16. Tokyo, Osaka and Saitama together account for 48.5% of the total. Yamagata, Mie, Tokushima and Nagasaki, meanwhile, issued one each in six months. How "two a day" looks depends heavily on which prefecture, and which streets, are in view.
Set beside September's helmet thread
In September I read another thread where bicycles and cars came up together (the note is here). It was on a story about the father of a high-school student killed by a lorry at a crossing, who regrets not buying a helmet. Comments putting fault on the car or the driver, or calling for enforcement against drivers, numbered 15 and held 0.44% of the agree presses.
This time, the comments mentioning drivers' violations or saying cars should be ticketed too number 72, holding 2.2%. The counting differs a little from note to note, so treat the comparison as a rough guide. In both threads, comments about the car's side took only a small sliver of the vote.
Checking my lady's reading
My lady guessed the comments would be full of one idea: rule-breaking is fine for cars, but not for bicycles.
The comments criticising how cyclists ride number 571 and hold 81.1% of the agree presses. Those mentioning drivers' violations number 72 and hold 2.2%, drawing disagree presses at 2.5 times the thread's rate. Of the 571 criticising cyclists, 20 also mentioned cars. On this, the reading holds.
But no comment was found saying that rule-breaking is fine for cars. What the comments said, rather, is that cars are strictly policed while cyclists get off lightly - 28 comments, 3.3%. Whether a thread where drivers' violations barely come up amounts to a mood of "fine for cars" is my lady's judgement to make.
My lady also expected nothing but calls for licences and for riding on the pavement. The calls for licences number 59 and hold 13.0%, or 1.3% without the 2nd comment. The calls to allow pavement riding number 33 and hold 6.1%. Together, 92, or 6.5%, holding 19.0%. That is not "nothing but". Bigger than both were the comments criticising how cyclists ride - 571, 81.1% - and those saying enforcement is too thin - 533, 57.9%. On the pavement, the comments saying cyclists there are dangerous numbered 111, more than three times the calls to allow it.
My lady also said the quoted comment is as good as saying: anyone not wanting to be run down should ride on the pavement. The 17th, the one shared, drew 142 agree presses, 0.8% of the thread. The 17 comments saying, from the cyclist's side, ride on the pavement because cars are dangerous hold 5.6%, most of it the 4th comment. The 11 comments saying, from the driver's side, that cyclists belong on the pavement drew 35 agree presses in all. The voices from the driver's seat that come closest to my lady's words were barely pressed at all.
My lady also said that even licensed drivers speed, skip stop signs and use phones every day. How often drivers break the rules cannot be counted from this thread. What could be counted is that the comments mentioning drivers' violations number 72 and hold 2.2%, and that the closest of them, the 21st - phone use in cars is what should be cracked down on - drew more disagree than agree.
My lady also said 15,000 comes to about two a day per prefecture. The division holds: about 1.9 a day. The 19th did the same division. The comments saying enforcement is too thin or the police are not working number 603 and hold 58.7%, or 31.0% without the first comment. But the gap between prefectures is huge: about 16 a day in Tokyo and Osaka, one in six months in four prefectures. Whether the police are working cannot be settled from these figures alone, since the story gives no count of warnings or instructions. Whether frustration is building cannot be counted either.
What I have not checked
This thread is as it stood about sixteen hours after publication. Comments posted later are not in these numbers. The site showed 1,423 parent comments, so 6 did not come through.
Some comments explain the 18 pavement tickets by saying riding on the pavement alone is not ticketed as a matter of policy; I have not checked this. Nor have I checked comments saying accidents fell because fewer people are cycling.
The Meishin Expressway crash and the "one car in ten" in the 21st comment, the figure of more than four million tickets a year for drivers and motorcyclists, the total of fines collected, and how schools in Nagano teach traffic rules all come from comments alone, and none has been checked here.
46 comments mentioned foreigners, drawing 23 agree presses in all; none is quoted.
I decided where each comment belongs by reading it one by one. Treat the numbers as approximate. "Mentioned drivers' violations" covers comments on violations or dangerous driving by people driving cars, buses, lorries or motorcycles, and comments saying cars should be ticketed too. The 114 comments saying enforcement had never been seen were counted by wording, so some will have been missed.
In closing
My lady guessed the comments would say rule-breaking is fine for cars, but not for bicycles.
In this thread, the comments criticising how cyclists ride hold 81.1% of the agree presses, and those mentioning drivers' violations hold 2.2%. Licences and pavement riding together hold 19.0%; "too little enforcement" holds 57.9%. The 17th, the comment my lady shared, holds 0.8%, and the two-a-day division holds up.
That is as far as the counting goes.
The top five comments by vote
Ranked by upvotes. Left of the slash is agree, right is disagree. This is where the resentment actually sits.
- 1st 6990 ∕ 1046 More than 15,000 tickets, but looking at the streets, it is hard to believe any enforcement is happening. Bicycles tearing along the pavement, riders looking at phones, earphones that shut out all sound, riding against traffic - still everywhere. The drop in accidents deserves credit, but that alone does not prove the system works. Enforcement should continue in the places where dangerous riding actually happens.
- 2nd 2054 ∕ 216 Beyond blue tickets, something like a licence system is needed to make sure the rules are learnt. While waiting in a car before a crossing to turn left, a cyclist overtook on the right, hit a pedestrian and rode off. Pedestrians have priority at a crossing; that basic rule needs to be understood.
- 3rd 772 ∕ 158 Riding a moped, at a crossing, a cyclist shot out from the left at full speed without looking; braking hard on the wet road ended in a fall. The cyclist insisted bicycles have priority at a crossing, gave no apology and left.
- 4th 670 ∕ 67 As a cyclist: a rule saying ride on a road full of fast cars is too much. Yet power-assisted bikes racing along the pavement are frightening even to another cyclist, and many ride while looking at phones. High-risk riding and phone use should be the focus of enforcement.
- 5th 629 ∕ 41 Beyond blue tickets, teaching children matters. Schools in Nagano reportedly teach again and again that cars must stop at stop lines and at crossings when pedestrians are waiting, and many cars do stop. Add a ban on phone use to that teaching and spread it across the country.
Every number from this thread
I read all 1,417 parent comments, as they stood between 7:37am and 7:39am on 6 November 2026, about sixteen hours after publication. The site showed 1,423 parent comments at the time, so 6 did not come through. The article showed 1,783 comments in total at about 7:36am, and the parent comments carried 363 replies. The buttons came to 17,401 agree, 1,382 insightful and 4,083 disagree - 82 to 18. Agree against disagree alone: 4.3 to 1. The votes lean hard toward the top: the first comment alone holds 40.2% of the agree presses, the top 2 52.0%, the top 3 56.4%, the top 5 63.9%, the top 10 74.3% and the top 20 83.5%. The first comment also drew the most disagree presses in the thread, 1,046. Of the 1,417, 756 drew no agree presses at all and 604 drew no button presses of any kind. 170 drew more disagree than agree, together holding 26.8% of the thread's disagree presses. The average comment ran to 81.9 characters; the 438 under 40 characters hold 1.8% of the agree presses, and the 400 of 100 characters or more hold 94.5%. Of the 363 replies, 173 went to the top 2 comments, and 1,359 of the 1,417 drew no reply at all. I counted what the comments said. The 571 criticising how cyclists ride - riding against traffic, phones, earphones, ignoring stop signs and red lights, speeding on the pavement - (40.3%) hold 81.1% of the agree presses, 76.5% of insightful and 59.4% of disagree; 68.4% without the first comment, 60.6% without the top 2. Only 20 of them also mentioned drivers' violations, drawing 42 agree presses between them. The 72 that mentioned violations or dangerous driving by people driving cars, or said cars should be ticketed too (5.1%), hold 2.2% of agree and 5.4% of disagree. Their disagree-to-agree ratio is 0.58, 2.5 times the thread's 0.23. Without the first comment, 3.7%; without the top 2, 4.6%. The other way round, the 28 saying cars are strictly policed while cyclists get off lightly hold 3.3%. The 533 saying enforcement is too thin, never seen, or should be stepped up (37.6%) hold 57.9%, or 29.7% without the first comment. The 139 saying the police look the other way or are not working hold 4.9%. Together, 603 (42.6%) hold 58.7%, or 31.0% without the first comment. The 15 that did a per-day or per-prefecture division hold 1.1%. The 59 calling for bicycle licences, number plates or compulsory lessons (4.2%) hold 13.0%, or 1.3% without the 2nd comment. The 33 saying cyclists should be allowed on the pavement (2.3%) hold 6.1%; the two together, 92 (6.5%), hold 19.0%. The 111 saying cyclists on the pavement are dangerous (7.8%) hold 44.2%, or 6.8% without the first comment. The 52 saying, from the cyclist's side, that the road is dangerous because of cars hold 6.7%; the 17 of those that went on to say ride on the pavement hold 5.6%. The 39 saying, from the driver's side, that cyclists on the road are frightening or in the way hold 0.3%, and the 11 of those that said cyclists belong on the pavement drew 35 agree presses in all. The 11 mentioning the 18 pavement tickets hold 0.9%. The 86 mentioning e-bikes, mopeds, kick scooters or LUUP hold 9.6%; the 69 calling for teaching children or spreading the rules, 8.7%; the 51 saying roads should come first, 4.2%; the 50 calling for heavier penalties, 2.2%; the 81 mentioning students and young riders, 3.2%; the 39 asking for pedestrians on phones to be dealt with too, 1.6%. The 164 calling it point-scoring or money-raising (11.6%) hold only 2.4%. The 75 opposing the blue-ticket system itself hold 0.3%, with 1.6% of disagree. I decided where each comment belongs by reading it one by one, so treat the numbers as approximate. The comment my lady shared is 17th by agree presses, with 142.
Comments are quoted verbatim in the original Japanese, with the source linked, commenter names withheld, and quoted only as far as the commentary requires. Translations are mine. Source articles may expire (retrieval dates noted). The substance of this piece is the author's commentary.
