Watch Out For The Nervous Cyclist
Dr Ian Walker carried out some interesting on-the-road research a couple of years back. He was trying to assess the likelihood of a cyclist being involved in a collision under varying circumstances. His central research method was to ride around with a whole bunch of sensors on his bike, which then measured how much space cars gave him as they passed.
The logic was that closer = more dangerous = more likely to mow the cyclist down like a combine on the prairies at harvest time. Now putting aside my personal [completely unverified by any sort of real scientific experiment, and therefore worth less than shares in Northern Rock] opinion that most danger comes from drivers hitting you at junctions, rather than overtaking on the straight & narrow, this is still some interesting research.
What he found was that . . .
- Drivers compensated for cyclist wearing helmets. Taking account of their obvious extra proficiency and the fact that they were wearing crumple zones (uh . . the helmet), drivers overtook noticeably closer to the cyclist. On average, they passed the bike with only 8.5cm of clearance - that’s less than four inches!
- Drivers gave un-lidded cyclists a wider berth, making them less likely to be hit.
- But safest of all . . . ? Guys - get yourself a long blond wig! As well as putting you in touch with your feminine side, and opening up a whole world of transvestite possibilities, it may just save your life. Drivers gave Dr Ian the widest berth when he was dressed as a woman - averaging an extra 14 cm (almost six inches) of breathing space . . .
- The basic conclusion (HIS conclusion - not mine) was that the less confident you look as a cyclist, the less likely you were to end up as a statistic.
So why is this relevant to me (and, presumably, you). I mean, we’re both high-mileage-out-in-all-weathers-staring-down-death-and-winning-every-time kind of cyclists, aren’t we?
Yeah, well. Yesterday was my proper first ride out after taking a slide across the road last Monday. And it was early enough in the morning for there still to be frost on the ground. And I was riding Trixie The Fixie - a bike with some rock solid predictability to her handling, but still with a fixed wheel, and likely to spank my bum if I didn’t treat her with respect.
So I was riding cautiously. In fact, I may just have spent 70 minutes as the Safest Cyclist In England.
Workout:
- Type: Cycle
- Date: 02/11/2008
- Total Time: 1:09:00.00
- Distance: 18 miles
- Average Speed: 15.65 mph
Hi,
Glad you found my research useful. I just thought I should point out a slight issue before your readers panic too much: I found that drivers got 8.5 cm closer when I was wearing a helmet - they didn’t leave just 8.5 cm! Actually, probably the best way of presenting the findings is this: over 25% more drivers passed within 1 metre of the bike when a helmet was worn. And yes, sadly the wig made an even bigger difference.
By the way, you’re dead right about junctions being the main problem - around 75% of cyclist/car collisions are at junctions. (This is in itself interesting, as for all vehicles around 62% of collisions are at junctions, meaning that cyclists are at even more risk near intersections than other road users.) The thing is, although there are *more* collisions at junctions, they tend to be at slower speeds and so the outcomes can often be not too bad. I wanted to look at overtaking collisions because although they are rare, they are nearly always really nasty when they happen.
Dr Ian - Thanks for the extremely prompt correction (prompt enough to make me paranoid!) When I read the thing on the BBC site, I thought it sounded really close - if I’d bothered to check what they actually said, maybe I’d have been more accurate.
Interesting stuff indeed.
There are several local cyclists who use the “look really goofy on your bike” strategy. Usually that means a really silly looking helmet (like say, one outfitted with bull horns, or giant peacock feathers)… Or possibly wearing absolutely ridiculously colored clothes.
Of course, I’m far to vain to be caught riding a bike looking like that… but I have considered it.
I’m curious how the Doctors findings relate to this approach? Is it really that the drivers are expecting “inexperienced” riders? Or is it that they are noticing them as “more noticeable for some reason”…
I’m going to pass this information on to Jeff. Any chance I can to make him look goofy, er, I mean *safe* I’ll try!
@ Brad - I’ve come across quite a lot of people who have felt that looking outlandish or otherwise goofy makes drivers treat them with more caution, and I’m sure it’s true. The thing is, I’m really reluctant to recommend this as a safety approach. On the one hand, cyclists have the right to use the road in safety, and I don’t like the idea of it being incumbent upon them to go to extreme lengths just to avoid being mown down. And on the other hand, we’ll end up with escalation. Pirate hats and feather boas might work today, but how long until drivers start to get used to them and cyclists have to come up with something ever more silly to get their attention?
Excellent point Ian!
This is such a tough issue… it comes down to the basic question of how do you force society wide change in attitude?
Based on my experience, it seems to me that MOST DRIVERS simply don’t notice, don’t care, or actually proactive dislike cyclists. This attitude has to change.
I don’t want to trivialize other examples discrimnation (racial, gender, sexual preference, etc) but it seems to me that the same basic principal is at work here. The majority often has a hard time accepting the minority. And so as a member of the minority, we need to find a way to shock the majority into noticing us and paying attention to our needs.
Civil disobedience is one tool that organizations like Critical Mass us to raise awareness of the issue. What other tools can we better leverage?