Bicyclists riding on streets, roads
and highways are much safer in Minnesota than in most
places in America. Further, the number of crashes in
Minnesota involving a bicycle and a motor vehicle declined
by 37 percent from 1994 to 2002.
Yet each year there are about 1,000 such crashes
in Minnesota, with almost as many bicyclists injured.
In 2001 and 2002, there were seven deaths—and
in 2003, another six deaths—as a result of
these collisions.
Nationally, deaths among bicyclists have declined
from about 800 a year a decade ago to about 600 per
year more recently. In 2003, 622 cyclists were killed
and about 46,000 were injured in collisions with
motor vehicles.
• More than 50 percent of crashes occur when
the bicyclist and motorist are on crossing or perpendicular
paths. Three-quarters of these crashes occur when
either the bicyclist or the motorist fails to yield
the right-of-way at an intersection.
• The most severe crashes—those resulting
in the death of the bicyclist—occur when the
bicyclist and motorist are traveling in the same
direction, however. Perhaps this is because the motorist
is moving at a higher rate of speed than at an intersection.
In about half of such crashes, the motorist overtakes
the bicyclist from behind. In the other half, the
bicyclist takes a right or a left turn into the path
of the motorist.
Safety measures for the prevention of these and
other common crash scenarios are presented in the
Rules of the Road section,
Three major studies assign the fault in bicycle-motor
vehicle crashes to the bicyclist and/or motorist,
but with vastly different results. One study found
that motorists are at fault in 60 percent of such
crashes and bicyclists in only 17 percent. Another
study, focusing on crashes involving children, finds
that 80 percent of such crashes are the fault of
the bicyclist.
In the face of such varied results, it is apparent
that bicyclists and motorists alike share the responsibility
for bicycle safety.
Click here for more information about bicycle crash
scenarios nationwide.
Click here for more bicycle crash data for Minnesota. |
