An interesting report from the UK has this to say about the cause of bicycle crashes with cars resulting in injury and death:
With adult cyclists, police found the driver solely responsible in about 60%-75% of all cases, and riders solely at fault 17%-25% of the time.
The cyclists’ lobby group CTC said the report showed that the government needed to focus more on driver behaviour rather than on issues such as cyclists wearing helmets. The TRL published a separate DfT-commissioned report today in which it was estimated that the universal use of helmets could save between 10 and 15 lives a year, a conclusion disputed by the CTC.
“The main cause of crashes seems to be ‘failed to look properly’, whereas very few cyclists are injured or killed acting illegally, such as failing to use lights at night or disobeying traffic signals,” said Chris Peck, from the lobby group.
“We believe this report strongly supports our view that the biggest problem for cyclists is bad driving. With that in mind we are greatly concerned that the government still seems fascinated with analysing and promoting cycle helmets, the value of which appears to be inconclusive. We believe that the government should now focus on tackling the causes of injury which appears to be mainly inconsiderate and dangerous driving. Reduced speed limits, stronger traffic law enforcement and cycle-friendly road design are the solutions.”
Our situation in the U.S. cannot be compared directly to the UK. But I think these results are probably very similar to our situation (except that British bicyclists appear to be hit from behind more than U.S. bicyclists — check here).
My own road experience demonstrates to me that the times I’ve been in real danger have been the result of drivers either being inattentive or not caring about my presence on the road.
How do we change driver behavior? How do we instill respect for all road users?
Do we design out way out of this problem? I wonder about this.
Do we fine our way out of this problem? This is a better, but politically untenable, solution.
How do we encouarge drivers to give a damn about other road users as human beings deserving of respect and care?
Comments 5
If you get an answer to these questions . . . please let me know!
Actually, on a more serious point, I’d almost like to see a progressing system of licensing:
To drive a lorry, you must first get a car license & use it for 12 months.
To get a car license, you must first get a motorcycle license & use it for 12 months.
To get a motorcycle license, you must first pass Bikeability III, & use it for 12 months.
So it would take at least two years to get behind the wheel of a car, but by that time you’d have had the fragility of human life at least partially hard-wired in.
Posted 15 Dec 2009 at 4:58 pm ¶I take a very skeptical view of the notion that motorists are solely at fault 75% of the time. It is inconsistent with the way I see cyclists ride and I’ve seen nothing on this blog to suggest Andy sees a better quality of cycling. Reading UK newspapers enhances that skepticism.
My own road experience is that when I’ve been in serious danger, it’s because I did not fully appreciate the danger of a road or path condition, or when it appeared a motorist was enraged and considering using his vehicle as a weapon. Fortunately, none have actually done so or I might not be writing this.
The last time I was in real danger due to driver inattention or not caring was in 1973. The only other time was in 1969. Knock on wood.
I DO like Karl’s suggestion of going further in graduated licensing. I’d suggest some sort of “continuing education” requirement as well. We need more autocross anyway.
Posted 15 Dec 2009 at 8:41 pm ¶The figures come from how you tally the data. When we look strictly at motorist-at-fault crashes, 2/3 of the crashes involved sidewalk cyclists. Motorists are technically at fault when they hit a sidewalk cyclist while entering or exiting a driveway because they must yield to sidewalk traffic… even though it may be nearly impossible for them to see a fast-moving cyclist on the sidewalk (especially one riding against traffic).
When we remove all the sidewalk crashes and look strictly at on-road crashes we find that cyclists were at fault (ROW/TCD violation, salmon and ninja riding) in 49% of those crashes. Motorists were at fault in 31% And the rest were undetermined.
If you mash up the numbers and include sidewalk crashes with on-road crashes, you would come up with a higher percentage of at-fault crashes for motorists. But that masks the point that the cyclist was riding in a way that contributed to the crash.
Similarly, most of the on-road crashes are a result of the cyclist using poor lane or intersection position. So, when we look at the 31% of on-road, motorist-at-fault crashes, we can eliminate the majority of those with smart cycling techniques.
I totally agree we need to have higher education and competence requirements for drivers. It should be a high priority. The incompetent and stupid decision-making I see from motorists is mind-boggling. I’m grateful for my situational awareness and understanding of how to avoid being hit by them. Until we can fix the system, we have to give cyclists the tools to deal with stupid motorist mistakes. The bigger showing of competent and confident cyclists we have, the higher the ground from which we will be able to push changes in the traffic culture.
The problem I have with studies that place higher blame on motorists is that they have less impact on forcing changes in the culture and more impact on reinforcing “roads-are-dangerous” and victim-cyclist mentality. Both reinforce the detrimental mythologies and prejudices behind discriminatory laws and motorist hostility.
Posted 16 Dec 2009 at 11:49 am ¶Hey all… Would love to comment on your comments, but heading to STAR Team meeting now. Then I have 3 classes of final exams to grade before the Thursday morning deadline. Look for me to re-surface by Thursday afternoon
Posted 16 Dec 2009 at 4:17 pm ¶So I almost ran over a cyclists this week.
I have about four car lengths to come off the highway and take a right split in the road which requires me to change three lanes to get there. To make it more fun, the exit ramp descends, so you can’t really see the traffic on this three lane road coming behind you.
I pull on and this typical guy in a lexus shoots up hugging my blind spot, so I slam my brakes to let him pass me since no one is behind me, and cut across the lanes. And what should be happening, but a cyclist over in the far lane who is riding on the sidewalk starts to cross the curved right turn off. I slam my bakes almost hitting the guy.
Honestly, I don’t even know who was in the wrong there. Should he have maybe looked? Should i have kept track of the highway, three lanes and checked for cyclists and kitty cats in trees at 40-50? Drive slower? that’s not really a practical option given the flow of traffic. the fact is the speed limit on the road is 50 and people go much faster.
So this guy throws a soda at my car. Now while I actually felt terrible about it and was really feeling low, when the soda hit my car I got furious. Of course I probably just scared him to death and he could have been hurt. Throwing a soda kind of makes sense.
So what’s the point? You may feel like drivers just don’t care one way or the other…and frankly maybe some of them don’t. But even the ones who do, have a problem. It is really difficult in high traffic, high stress situations to be mindful of smaller objects when you’re worried about being rear ended at speed by a mack truck or being side-swipped by a pickup that isn’t licensed or registered or carrying insurance
The general road situation is too tense. Honestly I think the cohabitation model is a fantasy. We need to either substantially embrace rail, foot, and bike or we need to have different travel zones. At bare minimum we need cyclist lanes. Sharing the same road is terribly impractical.
We just had a really worthwhile and prominent citizen run down here by someone in a car and I have to say it really made me question this idea that bikes can always safely mix on the road.
Posted 17 Dec 2009 at 11:33 am ¶