RIP Mushroom Head: DOT Phasing Out Bike Rider Stencil

Everyone seems to have an opinion on cycle paths right now. Should the city have more? Fewer? Should we make them wider? What’s a fair penalty for traffic violations on them?

Far less controversial is a subtle change taking place down on the asphalt: The NYC Department of Transportation is slowly removing the bike path markings that depict a helmeted stick figure rider and replacing them with bigger bike-only symbols.

This change will bring NYC streets into compliance with the latest version of the Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices (MUTCD), the document the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) uses to set the nationwide rules for road signs.

The 11th edition, released in 2023, removed the longstanding helmeted-rider design from the list of acceptable markings for bike lanes, prompting a slow street makeover nationwide. States had to either adopt the document or issue a conforming state version by January 18, 2026.

A source close to the FHWA told Straus News the update aims to increase uniformity on the roads; the bike-only symbol has always been the one used on street signs, and now it will be the only symbol on the pavement, too. They also said it would help avoid confusion for cyclists and others on the road.

Daniel Flanzig, President of the New York Bicycling Coalition board, thought the change would clarify what the lanes are for (bikes). “The older image is a bit amorphous,” he said. “This upgrade is especially important as we continue to see devices such as mopeds using the bike lanes.”

The first version of the MUTCD to include a section on bicycles came out in 1978, following the Bicycle Boom of the early 70s that saw unprecedented bike sales and plans for hundreds of thousands of miles of bike paths across the country. The document gave a few options for pavement markings: words (“BIKE ONLY” or “BIKE LANE”) and a figure depicting an unhelmeted person on a bike. This figure became known as the “barrel jumper” because it really didn’t depict a bike at all: It was just a person standing between two circles with no sign of spokes, pedals or a bike steering wheel. Critics said it looked as if the bent knee of the “rider” was really showing a man leaping over one of the circular barrels in front of him. Our brains filled in the rest.

The 2000 MUTCD was much the same, though the manual curiously gave as an example of an acceptable marking something of a Rebus puzzle, combining graphics and letters: the cyclist symbol under the word “LANE.”

After the National Committee on Uniform Traffic Control Devices (NCUTCD) recommended that the FHWA add a more standard sign, the 2003 version included a symbol of a bike alone—seat, handlebars, and frame, but no rider. The document kept the cyclist symbol, too, but put a helmet on its head, creating what would become known as “Mushroom Head” because of the shroomy-looking silhouette of head and helmet.

The three options—words, bike, and helmeted cyclist—remained until the 2023 update of the document, when the person disappeared from the page.

Several states, but not New York, resisted the deletion. In California, a state whose cycling standards have historically guided national rules, the California Traffic Control Devices Committee advised CalTrans to reconsider the removal, which it deemed arbitrary. Committee members argued Mushroom Head was not only the most popular stencil but also the most universal—easy to interpret regardless of language. But CalTrans responded that the state didn’t have authority over markings and complied with the federal MUTCD deletion when developing its own document.

Meanwhile, the National Committee on Uniform Traffic Control Devices (NCUTCD), which gives the FHWA input on the MUTCD and other documents, also recommended keeping the cyclist symbol. The committee told Straus News that keeping all the options would have let agencies continue using all existing stencils.

Bill Sellin, a longtime bike advocate in California, was not pleased with the recent deletion of the symbol, which he said CalTrans has always used as its standard for bike lanes on highways. “If it ain’t broke, why fix it?”

Sellin has travelled on two wheels through Cambodia, the Yucatán Peninsula, and most of the Pacific Coast. In the 80s, he helped establish the Bicycle Club of Irvine—one of Southern California’s oldest and largest bicycle clubs in a city he considers a “mecca” for cycling—and he is now involved with the Orange County Bicycling Coalition Board (OCBC), which advises the city on best practice for bikeways.

Sellin has yet to notice cities actually replacing the old symbol, perhaps because California made the latest MUTCD effective in January 2026, whereas New York did so in January of 2024.

“ I always thought that the cyclist logo helped to humanize us,” Sellin said. In an email discussing the change with his fellow board members at the OCBC, he made his feelings clear: “RIP Mushroom Head.”

New Yorkers will have plenty of time to grieve the loss, as this project has no strict timeline. The MUTCD allows existing markings to remain for the rest of their service lives, and the NYC DOT will simply replace them as part of its usual repaving. But as the some green bike lanes are repainted with a fresh coat of paint by the DOT in NYC, poor Mushroom Head often has just been painted over without an old or new stencil to replace him.