Bicycle Injury Statistics

From what I have heard and do not ask for any scientific experiments or
lancet article on it, but flashing red led on the back of bikes attracts
drunks like a magnet.
Just what I heard.

Also, people act drunk when they are not or sleep at the wheel so
watch your mirror. I might put an angled flag extending toward traffic if I
was that paranoid. Ask a bike shop for those. They have red flags too that
stick straight up a few feet and there is a drag factor and that would be
best during the day.
Good powerful lights and maybe stick to the sidewalk.
just my 2 cents

Quoted message said:

Hello,
I was wondering if there was anywhere that I could find statistics
about bicycling injuries...specifically I am looking for night vs. day.
I want to see if it is worth it to scrap the car insurence and give up
driving. Mainly I'm just worried about getting hit by a drunk driver or
something at night (maybe I shouldn't be worried about this.) I'm sure
that I could get enough bike lights to make myself noticable to most
people.

Just buy a good life insurance policy.

Seriously, as long as you assume that nobody can see you, wile
paradoxically doing everything you can to be seen, will prevent these
things from happening.

One advantage of night riding is the loom of headlights. You get
considerable forewarnng of an approaching vehicle, which is especially
valuable on blind corners and rises. These hazards are far worse during
the day!

I have ridden at night for decades, in cities and in the country, in
the U.S and in Germany. I have ridden with lights and reflectors, and
with all black clothing and no lights at all. As long as you
understand the route and consider the route ahead of you--and the
outs--then you will be fine.

The biggest mistake a biker can do is to put himself in a position
where the there is no way out. Don't yield the right lane when there is
no shoulder etc. If you ride in camo black, don't ride in the middle of
the road, and pull off into the grass when thraffic comes along your
route.

Besides, who is going to have proper statistics on this issue, and of
what value is it? Most of those killed were probably drunks who lost
their drivers licenses and are now out and about onm huffies with the
10-speed bars swung upside down with no brakes.

Of course there are experienced or thoughtful riders killed too, but
how to separate the statistics into something meaningful?

After sailing across oceans in little boats, I am often asked, "isn't
it dangerous, weren't you afraid?" What am I supposed to say? "I
could've stayed home and gotten run over by a bus."

Bill replied:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Hello,
I was wondering if there was anywhere that I could find statistics
about bicycling injuries...specifically I am looking for night vs. day.
I want to see if it is worth it to scrap the car insurence and give up
driving. Mainly I'm just worried about getting hit by a drunk driver or
something at night (maybe I shouldn't be worried about this.) I'm sure
that I could get enough bike lights to make myself noticable to most
people.

Besides, who is going to have proper statistics on this issue, and of
what value is it? Most of those killed were probably drunks who lost
their drivers licenses and are now out and about onm huffies with the
10-speed bars swung upside down with no brakes.

Of course there are experienced or thoughtful riders killed too, but
how to separate the statistics into something meaningful?

Riley Geary has some statistics from the U.S., for example this
presentation:
http://www.zzapp.org/rileygea/itsa/bkfat.htm

Bill provided a good caveat to these statistics above.

Thanks for the info!
I checked out the statistics Mike (exactly what I was looking for), and
you were right Bill, it is hard to put things together to come up with
any solid conclusion. It looks like around half of the fatalities
happen at night though, so I think that is something that I will think
on.
Thanks!
- cjkogan111

Quoted message said:

Thanks for the info!
I checked out the statistics Mike (exactly what I was looking for), and
you were right Bill, it is hard to put things together to come up with
any solid conclusion. It looks like around half of the fatalities
happen at night though, so I think that is something that I will think
on.
Thanks!
- cjkogan111

Think of it this way--riding at night is more dangerous
than riding during the day, regardless of the rider.
OTOH, the fatality statistics which look so bad for
night riding are skewed by the drunken doofii
who tend to make up a substantial portion of the
night riding population.

This is for another thread, but looking only at
fatality statistics provides a woefully incomplete
view of the overall risk of cycling.

Robert

<[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

[email hidden] wrote:

Quoted message said:

Think of it this way--riding at night is more dangerous
than riding during the day, regardless of the rider.

I looked at all those graphs and didn't come up with this. There wasn't
anything in that research that said why riders in the dark were more likely
to be injured or killed. It didn't divide out the well lighted folks versus
those riding unlit. It didn't divide out those riding in expected places
versus those riding the wrong way down the sidewalks.

Quoted message said:

OTOH, the fatality statistics which look so bad for
night riding are skewed by the drunken doofii
who tend to make up a substantial portion of the
night riding population.

This is for another thread, but looking only at
fatality statistics provides a woefully incomplete
view of the overall risk of cycling.

Yep.

My personal experience: I was riding this week to a tennis tournament 6
miles from my house. I was always taking the exact same route, sometimes
during the day, sometimes after 10pm at night. It felt much safer at night,
as you rarely saw a car on the streets without seperated paths, and when you
did you could see them coming from a long ways away, so you can make sure to
get out of their way even if they don't see the bright red blinking leds,
reflectors, front headlights, and reflector jackets.

Quoted message said:

Cathy Kearns said:

<[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

[email hidden] wrote:

Quoted message said:

Think of it this way--riding at night is more dangerous
than riding during the day, regardless of the rider.

I looked at all those graphs and didn't come up with this. There wasn't
anything in that research that said why riders in the dark were more likely
to be injured or killed. It didn't divide out the well lighted folks versus
those riding unlit. It didn't divide out those riding in expected places
versus those riding the wrong way down the sidewalks.

True, these things are not in the stats. There
is some guesswork involved if we want to draw
such conclusions based on what is available.

My guess is that night riding is so much more
statistically deadly than daytime riding (about half
of cyclist fatalities occur at night, while only a small
percentage of cyclist rider-miles/hours occur at
night; and this is true even though almost no children
ride at night, and children always make up a substantial
portion of total cyclist fatalities), that this could not be
explained by the special type of rider and riding we
tend to see at night, that there must be something
more to it.

Keep these things in mind:

First, "Much more statistically deadly than daytime riding" means
little. The dangers of daytime riding are constantly being
exaggerated. The true danger of fatality (or serious injury) is
miniscule, on the order of one fatality for 3000+ person-years of
riding. "Much more than miniscule" could still be negligible.

Second, in the US at least, it really is a completely different
population riding at night, and a very bi-modal one. Instead of the
bell curve of competence that you see in the daytime, night riding
seems to consist of a few dedicated cyclists fitted out with decent
lights and expensive equipment, plus a large number of ex-drivers who
need to find another way home from the bar. And yes, that's based on
personal impression. I can't prove it because...

.... Third, there is little or no good data on night cycling - for
example, on whether those cylcists killed at night were using legal
lights. It's a question that's essentially never asked. And given the
low number of fatalities or serious injuries, it would need to be asked
and properly recorded in almost every incident to gather enough data
points for decent conclusions.

That last one is not going to happen soon. Why? Because society has
enough to worry about with the real dangers. We'll be very lucky
indeed to _ever_ get meaningful data about something so minor as to
cause just 300 fatalities per year in a population of nearly 300
million!

Scroll about halfway down this page
http://www.benbest.com/lifeext/causes.html to see the "pedacycle"
[sic] listing, just 2% of the motor vehicle deaths in the US. That
makes cycling deaths roughly 1% of accident deaths in the US, or less
than 0.005% of all deaths. Night cycling deaths, then, are about
0.002% of all deaths.

IOW, don't hold your breath waiting for the grant money to come in.
Just accept the fact that cycling - even at night - is reasonably safe.

Quoted message said:

We would prefer if every fatality were
the result of some clear mistake on the part of the
cyclist--that way we could persuade ourselves that
accidents will be easily avoidable as long as we
make no silly huge mistakes, that we can steer our
own fate as long as we ride visibly predictably and
follow the traffic laws.

Well, follow the traffic laws and otherwise use decent common sense!

Quoted message said:

Unfortunately, the statistics do not support this.

??

I suppose it's unfair to ask, since my internet access will be very
limited for many weeks, and my files of data are not with me. But I
don't know what statistics you're using!

The general rule of thumb is that of serious bike crashes involving
cars & bikes, roughly half are the cylcist's fault.

Some say that number is inflated, since "winners write history." But
OTOH, it's likely that many of the "motorist mistake" ones could have
been avoided with more cyclist sense and skill. IOW, use decent common
sense - including planning ahead for bad scenarios.

It's not that hard. And it's not that dangerous!

BTW, about an hour ago I rode out at night in this very crowded city to
pick up some "One Hour" film. Generator headlight working beautifully,
new bike running very smoothly, it was a joy.

- Frank Krygowski