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Rules of the Road

 

CRASH FACTS

Minnesota | National

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.

 

 


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