More Bikes on the Road Mean Greater Safety, Not Less
Attention, all car-loving anti-cyclists who claim two-wheelers are making streets less safe: a recent study has found that the more bicycles there are on the roads, the less likely cyclists are to be injured by accidents. “It’s a virtuous cycle,” said Julie Hatfield, an injury expert from Australia’s University of New South Wales. “The likelihood that an individual cyclist will be struck by a motorist falls with increasing rate of bicycling in a community. And the safer cycling is perceived to be, the more people are prepared to cycle.”
Image credit: Ziko at Wikimedia Commons
What a crock of crap!
Obviously the people who did this study have never visited China.
Bicycle riders on the roads here are a menace. They ignore pedestrians, they weave in and out of traffic with disregard for their safety or that of others, they crash into each other, they do not follow any traffic rules, and if they do cause an accident they always lay the blame on the other guy.
Until western countries have the same number of reckless bicyclists on the road as cities in China do, this study is totally meaningless.