Evidence

Various information having to do with cycling.

• Traffic Violence
• Headphones
• Hi-Viz
• Helmets
• Costs & Economy
• This & That

 

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Traffic violence:

UK…

• UK Traffic Collision Statistics (.gov.uk collection)
• UK Transport Statistics (Department for Transport)
  • 2014: Reported road casualties in Great Britain provisional estimates: Apr to Jun 2014
    • 10 per cent rise in the number of cyclists killed or seriously injured (KSI) in the year to June 2014.
    • 3,380 child pedestrian causalities already this year
    • “Longer-term trends reveal that cyclists are the only class of road users among whom there has been a rise in serious injuries and fatalities when comparing data for the year to June 2014 against the 2005-09 average, up by 40 per cent.”
    • (the above quotes from road.cc article analysing the DfT evidence)
  • 2013: Reported road casualties Great Britain: annual report 2013

Cities and Counties…

• Hampshire Traffic Collision Statistics
• London Severe Crashes 2006 to present [map] (spreadsheet compiled by Olaf Storbeck)

Articles…

• Sustrans: Britain’s roads “aren’t safe enough”, cyclist casualties climb 10 per cent in 2013

• London 5-13 November 2013: 6 cyclists were killed in London in a 2 week period
  • Q: Should we be surprised that this happens at some point in recent history?
  • A: “the chance of getting at least 6 deaths in any 2-week window over 8 years is estimated to be 2.4%. For whatever reason, this is therefore a surprising cluster.”
  • Analysis is HERE.

 

• Sanders, Rebecca L., 2014. Perceived traffic risk for cyclists: The impact of near miss and collision experiences. Accident Analysis & Prevention, Volume 75, February 2015, Pages 26–34
  • Perceived traffic risk is not monolithic: certain dangers are more worrisome.
  • Worries about traffic negatively influence non-regular cyclists’ decision to ride.
  • Regular cyclists bicycle despite frequently worrying about certain traffic dangers.
  • Both collisions and near misses influence cyclists’ perceptions of traffic risk.
  • Near miss data may be critical to understanding traffic risk for cyclists.

 

• Understanding Uncertainty: Fatality risk on Boris-bikes?
  • 23,000,000 cycle hires in London (December 2010 to 7 July 2013)
  • 1.5 miles cycled per hire
  • equals 34,000,000 miles cycled
  • DfT: 22 people riding bicycles killed per billion km (620,000,000 miles) in 2011
  • equals 28,000,000 miles cycled before expecting a fatality
  • Thus not surprising there was a fatality (30% chance that it would have taken this long)

 

• Influence of road markings, lane widths and driver behaviour on proximity and speed of vehicles overtaking cyclists. (pdf)
  • Shackel, S. C. and Parkin, J. (2014). Accident Analysis & Prevention, 73. pp. 100-108. ISSN 0001-4575
  • Increased passing distances were found where there were wider or dual lane roads, and in situations where oncoming vehicles were further away and not in a platoon.
  • In mixed traffic conditions, cyclists will be better accommodated by wider cross-sections, lower speed limits and the removal of the centre-line marking.

 

• Local authority highways maintenance funding: 2015/16 – 2020/21
  • “England’s local road network is one of our most highly valued infrastructure asset, at around £400 billion. Maintaining them so that they are safe, serviceable and reliable is vital to the economy and the social well-being of communities.”
  • “The Department considered whether cycling and walking should form part of a maintenance challenge fund and there was considerable support for this idea from cycling groups and the general public. We therefore recognise that we could consider including an element of funding for cycling and walking within a proposed Challenge Fund or alternatively reflect them within the revised funding formula.”

 

• Nevin,R. 2000. How Lead Exposure Relates to Temporal Changes in IQ, Violent Crime, and Unwed Pregnancy.  Environmental Research, Volume 83, Issue 1, May 2000, Pages 1–22
  • BBC: Did removing lead from petrol spark a decline in crime?
    • “Studies have shown that exposure to lead during pregnancy reduces the head circumference of infants. In children and adults, it causes headaches, inhibits IQ and can lead to aggressive or dysfunctional behaviour.”
    • “If you want to understand the causes of crime – and be tough on them – you need to start with lead, says Dr Bernard Gesch, a physiologist at Oxford University who has studied the effect of diet and other environmental factors on criminals.”

 

• Scandinavian and Dutch lessons in childhood road traffic accident prevention
  • Avery, J.G and Avery, P.J, (1982). BMJ 1982;285:621
  • Note corrections to figures 8 and 9 HERE.

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Headphones

I want deaf people to feel the joy that cycling brings. I also want people who are driving their car to be able to enjoy listening to the radio. That said, I don’t cycle with headphones because I’m too scared of idiot drivers on the road and I want to be as prepared as possible to escape from them when they overtake me on blind corners, for example. Alas, it seems some our (over?) Lords still prefer to play the blame the victim game: Lord Scott of Foscote.

• Cycling’s Sensory Strategies: How Cyclists Mediate their Exposure to the Urban Environment
  • Katrina Jungnickel, Rachel Aldred; Mobilities Vol. 9, Iss. 2, 2014 pages 238-255
• Cyclists with iPods hear the same as motorists listening to nothing (BikeBiz)
• The Sounds of Science (Beyond the Kerb)
• Should cyclists be allowed to listen to music? (Telegraph)
  • “The idea of cyclists riding along while plugged into an iPod may seem instictively dangerous, but there is little evidence to suggest it increases the risk of accident.”
  • “The problem for the argument to ban the bands is that there’s currently zero evidence to suggest that riding with music increases your risk of harming yourself. In fact, research that has been done around the topic suggests quite the opposite could be the case.”
• Alternatively, you could turn your buttocks into a speaker system.

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Hi-Viz

What colour car do you drive or ride in?

• Black cars ‘more likely to be involved in crashes’ (Telegraph)
  • “A study over 20 years has concluded that black cars are 47 per cent more likely to be involved in road [crashes]”
• An Investigation into the Relationship between Vehicle Colour and Crash Risk
  • Newstead, Stuart, D’Elia, Angelo, Monash University Accident Research Centre, Report No.263, May 2007
• High vis clothing doesn’t make cars pass you more safely, says new study (BikeBiz)
  • Walker, I., Garrard, I. and Jowitt, F., 2014. The influence of a bicycle commuter’s appearance on drivers’ overtaking proximities : an on-road test of bicyclist stereotypes, high-visibility clothing and safety aids in the United Kingdom. Accident Analysis and Prevention, 64, pp. 69-77.
• Department for Transport has not consulted on making it mandatory to wear HiViz clothing on bicycle or car.

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Helmets

If you want to wear a helmet then go right ahead. Will you wear one whilst doing the gardening? Having a shower? Going for a walk? Driving along in a car?

• Drivers overtaking bicyclists: Objective data on the effects of riding position, helmet use, vehicle type and apparent gender.
  • Walker, I. (2007).  Accident Analysis and Prevention, 39, 417-425.
  • Instructions: Make your own overtaking sensor
  • “Drivers passed closer to the rider the further out into the road he was”
  • “Drivers also tended to pass notably closer to the rider when he wore a helmet than when he did not”
  • “Professional drivers of large vehicles tended to get particularly close when passing”
  • “When the experimenter was wearing a wig, so that he appeared female to drivers approaching from behind, passing traffic gave significantly more leeway”
  • “Drivers passed closer earlier in the day…there seem to be differences between morning and evening rush-hours”
  • “Research suggests that drivers tend to believe helmeted cyclists are more serious and less likely to make unexpected moves”

• Cycle Helmets – an overview (with numerous linked articles)

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Costs & Economy

• Cycling receives 0.71% (yes, less than 1 per cent) of Department for Transport spending
  • £1.37 per person in UK spent on average over the 5 financial years 2010-2014
  • The Get Britain Cycling inquiry recommended a spend of £10, rising to £20, per person
  • The campaign group Stop Killing Cyclists demands £46.80 per person sustained over the next 5 years, so the UK can catch up to The Netherlands
  • UPDATE: the additional funding announced on 27 November 2014 actually DECREASES the amount the UK spends per person on cycling by 10p to £1.27. See article HERE.

 

• Studies say investment in cycling would save NHS billions
  • Aldred, R., 2014. Benefits of Investing in Cycling. British Cycling
    • “Investing in cycling will generate benefis for the whole country not just those using a bike to get around.”
  • Lovelace, R., Woodcock, J., 2014. Modelling uptake of cycling and associated health benefits.
    • the NHS would benefit from savings of £25 billion over the next three and a half decades

 

• Reports from the Committee on the Medical Effects of Air Pollutants (COMEAP)
  • long-term exposure to air pollution: effect on mortality (2009)
  • “We are left with little doubt that long-term exposure to air pollutants has an effect on mortality and thus decreases life expectancy.”
  • mortality effects of long-term exposure to particulate air pollution in the UK

 

• Economic case for the cycle ambition grants
• • Value for Money Assessment of Cycling Grants (DfT November 2014)
  • Benefit of building space for cycling far outweighs cost, says DfT (road.cc):
    • “the return on money spent on cycling varied from just above 2:1 to a whopping 35:1”
    • “the average benefit is expected to be around £5 for each pound spent”
• Europe’s cycling economy has created 650,000 jobs
  • ECF. Cycling for Growth

 

• Cycling England and Bikeability budgets
  • Ahead of the 2015 general election, the Conservative party published a document which claimed that, if elected, a Labour government would, at a cost of £63m, resurrect ‘Cycling England’ which the coalition government shut down on 1 April 2011.
  • Two written answers in the House of Lords on 6 January 2015 were used to back up the claim:
    • Answer: Cycling England [£63m in 2010/2011]
    • Answer: Cycling: Training (Bikeability) [£11.7m in 2014-15; and £11.9m in 2015-16]
    • Also reference: Cycling England Mid-Term Review 2008/9 – 2010/11 (pdf)
  • The implication is that the government has reduced spending on cycling, as if that is a good thing!, from £63m to about £12m
  • This is disingenuous.
  • In November 2014 the deputy PM stated that the current government had “more than doubl[ed] funding for cycling to £374 million in 2011 to 2015”
  • “Cycling England did not cost £63m to run – it had an operational budget of less than £200,000 per year and, via experts, advised the Department for Transport on how to spend its cycling budget” (reference: BikeBiz)
  • The rest of the Cycling England budget was spent in ways similar to today; just that now a politician gets to claim the credit for handing out the cash!
  • Bikeability training was first funded in 2006 and continues to this day:
    • An FOI about the budgets and grants: Bikeability (cycle training) budgets
    • A report by Steer Davies Gleave: Bikeability Delivery Statistics Note and Summary (pdf)

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This & That

• Slaying the myths (CTC)
• Jaywalking: How the car industry outlawed crossing the road (BBC)
• Roads Were Not Built For Cars (Carlton Reid)
• Car ownership (DfT statistics)
• Cycling & Walking Delivery Plan (DfT, consultation closed 13 Nov 2014)
  • (blog article: DfT’s Cycling Delivery Plan doesn’t deliver)

• Trip Predictions from 2015 to 2014 (DfT, 24 Nov 2014):
  • Walking trips per person: DECLINE from 307.4 to 290.2
  • Cycling trips per person: DECLINE from 22.1 to 20.5
  • Bus trips per person: DECLINE from 86.3 to 64.0
  • Rail trips per person: DECLINE from 24.4 to 23.7
  • Car passenger trips per person: DECLINE from 231.8 to 211.8
  • Car driver trips per person: INCREASE from 447.6 to 507.0

 

• Testing some Logic (Beyond the Kerb blog): “Our default position is one of freedom of movement and a lack of regulation. What we regulate is the potential to do harm.”
• What’s wrong with modelling the ‘worst case’ — Rachel Aldred

Cycle Lanes…

Robert Goodwill Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Department for Transport on 10th March 2015 (see context HERE): The implementation of the provisions for civil enforcement of mandatory cycle lanes in Part 6 of the Traffic Management Act 2004 would result in the installation by local authorities of camera-based systems to identify contraventions by motorists. Such changes would not be introduced without first consulting with motorists, cyclists and local authorities to establish the merits, or otherwise, of increasing camera-based enforcement. Those powers will not be implemented in this Parliament.

Pavement Parking…

Living Streets – ‘Protect our Pavements’ campaign:

Pavement parking is a pain for everyone, but it’s particularly an issue for those with mobility problems, parents with pushchairs and older people, who may fear leaving their homes as they feel unsafe. As well as making it difficult for people to use their streets, it can also cause substantial damage to pavements. This costs councils tens of thousands of pounds each year to repair.

Robert Goodwill Parliamentary Under-Secretary Department for Transport on 10th March 2015 (see context HERE):

In London there is a general ban on parking on the footway. In the rest of England there is no such prohibition but traffic authorities have wide-ranging powers to prevent people parking on the pavement and my Rt Hon Friend the Minister of State for Transport, Baroness Kramer, wrote to all English traffic authorities on 27 June 2014 to remind them of this.

Baroness Kramer Liberal Democrat 13th October 2014 (see context HERE):

I wrote to all English Traffic Authorities on 27 June 2014 to remind them of their existing, wide-ranging powers to prevent people from parking on the pavement where it is a problem. We have also published a range of guidance documents for traffic authorities highlighting the difficulties that pavement parking causes for pedestrians and detailing ways that it can be prevented. Her Majesty’s Government does not keep records of the total cost of damage caused by cars parking on pavements as this is matter for local highway authorities.

Guide Dogs – Minister for Transport responds to campaigners on Pavement Parking (11 September 2014)

We welcome the Minister’s response, however, both Guide Dogs and most local authority councillors (78% according to our survey) believe a nationwide law is needed in order to really tackle the problem.