Bicyclists = Statistics

http://www.iihs.org/iihs/topics/t/pe...facts/bicycles

"Each year about 2 percent of motor vehicle crash deaths are bicyclists. In a majority of bicyclist deaths, the most serious injuries are to the head, highlighting the importance of wearing a bicycle helmet. 1 Helmet use has been estimated to reduce the odds of head injury by 50 percent, and the odds of head, face, or neck injury by 33 percent. 2 Twenty-one states and the District of Columbia have helmet use laws applying to young bicyclists; none of these laws applies to all riders. Local ordinances in a few states require some or all bicyclists to wear helmets. The odds that a bicyclist will wear a helmet are 4 times higher after a helmet law is enacted than before a law is passed. 3 Helmets are important for riders of all ages, not just young bicyclists. Eighty-six percent of bicyclist deaths are persons ages 20 and older. During the past few years, no more than 17 percent of fatally injured bicyclists were wearing helmets.

The following facts are based on analysis of data from the U.S. Department of Transportation's Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS).

Posted February 2016."

Let the arguing begin.
Cheers

On Sunday, April 10, 2016 at 7:11:24 PM UTC-5, James wrote:

I don't suppose there was any indication of the offender in each of the
collisions?

Does the person who causes the accident effect the results? A cyclist can be riding on the correct side of the road and hit from behind. Or a cyclist can be riding on the wrong side of the road and hit head on. In one instance the cyclist is at fault and the other he is not. Other than the accumulative force from the head on accident instead of the from behind accident, I doubt the injuries are affected at all by who caused the accident or is liable. I've been involved in bike accidents where I was not responsible. I was hit by a car. And another where I caused it. I rode off the edge of the road or rode into a ditch. In both cases I was glad I had my helmet.. In neither did my head or helmet care who caused the accident. Paying medical bills and court cases later it did matter who caused the accident.



In Australia there have been several studies that find the motorist at
fault about 80% of the time.

Of course there is no campaign to "fix" that problem. Instead shift the
onus of "safety" to the victim.

--
JS

On 11/04/16 10:47, wrote:
On Sunday, April 10, 2016 at 7:11:24 PM UTC-5, James wrote:

I don't suppose there was any indication of the offender in each of
the collisions?

Does the person who causes the accident effect the results? A
cyclist can be riding on the correct side of the road and hit from
behind. Or a cyclist can be riding on the wrong side of the road and
hit head on. In one instance the cyclist is at fault and the other
he is not. Other than the accumulative force from the head on
accident instead of the from behind accident, I doubt the injuries
are affected at all by who caused the accident or is liable. I've
been involved in bike accidents where I was not responsible. I was
hit by a car. And another where I caused it. I rode off the edge of
the road or rode into a ditch. In both cases I was glad I had my
helmet. In neither did my head or helmet care who caused the
accident. Paying medical bills and court cases later it did matter
who caused the accident.


Does wearing a helmet prevent collisions?


In Australia there have been several studies that find the motorist
at fault about 80% of the time.

Of course there is no campaign to "fix" that problem. Instead
shift the onus of "safety" to the victim.


--
JS

On Sunday, April 10, 2016 at 7:06:18 PM UTC-7, James wrote:
On 11/04/16 10:47, wrote:
On Sunday, April 10, 2016 at 7:11:24 PM UTC-5, James wrote:

I don't suppose there was any indication of the offender in each of
the collisions?

Does the person who causes the accident effect the results? A
cyclist can be riding on the correct side of the road and hit from
behind. Or a cyclist can be riding on the wrong side of the road and
hit head on. In one instance the cyclist is at fault and the other
he is not. Other than the accumulative force from the head on
accident instead of the from behind accident, I doubt the injuries
are affected at all by who caused the accident or is liable. I've
been involved in bike accidents where I was not responsible. I was
hit by a car. And another where I caused it. I rode off the edge of
the road or rode into a ditch. In both cases I was glad I had my
helmet. In neither did my head or helmet care who caused the
accident. Paying medical bills and court cases later it did matter
who caused the accident.


Does wearing a helmet prevent collisions?

Yes. I wore a helmet today and did not have a collision. QED.

-- Jay Beattie.

On 4/10/2016 9:06 PM, James wrote:
On 11/04/16 10:47, wrote:
On Sunday, April 10, 2016 at 7:11:24 PM UTC-5, James wrote:

I don't suppose there was any indication of the offender
in each of
the collisions?

Does the person who causes the accident effect the
results? A
cyclist can be riding on the correct side of the road and
hit from
behind. Or a cyclist can be riding on the wrong side of
the road and
hit head on. In one instance the cyclist is at fault and
the other
he is not. Other than the accumulative force from the
head on
accident instead of the from behind accident, I doubt the
injuries
are affected at all by who caused the accident or is
liable. I've
been involved in bike accidents where I was not
responsible. I was
hit by a car. And another where I caused it. I rode off
the edge of
the road or rode into a ditch. In both cases I was glad I
had my
helmet. In neither did my head or helmet care who caused the
accident. Paying medical bills and court cases later it
did matter
who caused the accident.


Does wearing a helmet prevent collisions?


In Australia there have been several studies that find
the motorist
at fault about 80% of the time.

Of course there is no campaign to "fix" that problem.
Instead
shift the onus of "safety" to the victim.



Of course, and leg injuries too. There's data for that as
long as you merge correlation with causation. Helmets have
obvious value in some incidents and are negligible in others
but no one's opinion of their utility will change by
anything written here.

--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org/
Open every day since 1 April, 1971

On Mon, 11 Apr 2016 12:06:12 +1000, James
wrote:

On 11/04/16 10:47, wrote:
On Sunday, April 10, 2016 at 7:11:24 PM UTC-5, James wrote:

I don't suppose there was any indication of the offender in each of
the collisions?

Does the person who causes the accident effect the results? A
cyclist can be riding on the correct side of the road and hit from
behind. Or a cyclist can be riding on the wrong side of the road and
hit head on. In one instance the cyclist is at fault and the other
he is not. Other than the accumulative force from the head on
accident instead of the from behind accident, I doubt the injuries
are affected at all by who caused the accident or is liable. I've
been involved in bike accidents where I was not responsible. I was
hit by a car. And another where I caused it. I rode off the edge of
the road or rode into a ditch. In both cases I was glad I had my
helmet. In neither did my head or helmet care who caused the
accident. Paying medical bills and court cases later it did matter
who caused the accident.


Does wearing a helmet prevent collisions?


In Australia there have been several studies that find the motorist
at fault about 80% of the time.

Of course there is no campaign to "fix" that problem. Instead
shift the onus of "safety" to the victim.


There was a study done in Los Angles county by the California Highway
Patrol, in 2012, that showed during the year of the study, that of all
bicycle-auto collisions, for which cause could be determined, the
cyclist was at fault approximately 60% of the time. I also read a
review of the study in a cycling magazine in which the author said
something like "I was surprised, I had assumed it would be 50/50", or
words to that extent.
--

Cheers,

John B.

On Monday, April 11, 2016 at 1:14:39 PM UTC+1, AMuzi wrote:
On 11/04/16 10:47, wrote:

Does wearing a helmet prevent collisions?

Of course, and leg injuries too.

It would be quite possible to prove this with statistics. It would even be respectable statistics if you could first prove that helmets are likely to be worn by responsible citizens more likely to obey all the laws and be careful riders. Then you could assume that they would get into fewer accidents and to the extent that leg injuries featured in the total number of accidents where cyclists were at fault, leg injuries would be reduced by helmet-wearing. Whether this would be a significant fraction would depend on a) to what extent motorists rather than cyclists actually cause cycling accidents (wide variety of opinions and small study results in the text I snipped -- thanks fellows)§, b) the incidence of leg injuries within total injuries, and a huge number of possibly lesser, possibly equally important considerations like the width and condition of the roads which would clearly be a factor in the separation between automobiles and bikes and also on the possibility of evasive action by cyclists.

On the other hand, in the unlikely event that the Krygowski baldie rearguard is right and a helmet increases reckless risk-taking by cyclists, the same argument can be made in reverse. Nobody will believe you, but the statistics to a sophomore will look the same -- statistics really is an art more than a science, and depends hugely on experience rather than merely the technical ability to manipulate the numbers. Which is why the statistically incompetent continue to make their risible arguments. Note that this paragraph doesn't necessary imply that the hypothetical statement in the first par is correct; we don't have good numbers to prove it either way.

There's data for that as
long as you merge correlation with causation.

Paleoclimatologists, the high priests of the idiots I normally shorthand as global warmies, have made that sort deliberately dishonest statistics "respectable" to the sort of intellectually inferior cyclists who really believe they make a difference to air quality (go plant trees, morons), to mouthfoamers on the social media, and to the President of the United States, who was educated at not one but two Ivy League colleges.

Helmets have
obvious value in some incidents and are negligible in others
but no one's opinion of their utility will change by
anything written here.

Actually I'm not so sure. I get the odd letter from people who say, "I used to think you were a lying asshole but I've changed my mind about helmets/global warming/DDT on hand of experience/my brother in law who has a PhD in math and works for the Census thinks you're God/falling off my bike and not scarring my beautiful face/sometimes even good reasons." This is usually followed by a statement that reduces to, "But I'm not saying so in public because everyone is against you and I don't want to be ostracized." If one person takes the trouble to find a way to write to me (the fiultra1 address I use to write to RBT is a spam trap I never open), you can bet you house there's a hundred more who think the same but can't be bothered.

--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org/
Open every day since 1 April, 1971

Andre Jute
My mind has been open every day since about seven months before I was born.

On Monday, April 11, 2016 at 1:15:42 PM UTC+1, John B. wrote:

There was a study done in Los Angles county by the California Highway
Patrol, in 2012, that showed during the year of the study, that of all
bicycle-auto collisions, for which cause could be determined, the
cyclist was at fault approximately 60% of the time. I also read a
review of the study in a cycling magazine in which the author said
something like "I was surprised, I had assumed it would be 50/50", or
words to that extent.
--

Cheers,

John B.

It's bland, unresisting acceptance of this sort of "logic" by the dumber cyclists that make me want to scream and hit my head against a wall.

Chalo Colina used to point out that a) a motorist needs a license to use the roads while b) a cyclist does not and he concluded from that c) that a cyclist has a natural right to the road whereas a motorist doesn't.

This follows from natural justice. The motorist is sitting in a two ton protective metal projectile. The worst that happens to him in an impact with a cyclist is that his airbags might attempt to smother him, or his seatbelt might leave a small blood blister on his skin. Compare the cyclist, all exposed, likely to suffer serious abrasions at the lightest contact, broken bones, diabling breakages, possibly death.

It follows from natural justice that the duty of care falls to a greater extent on the person who can do another person the greater injury. This is the solid reasoning behind the Dutch laws that put the burden of proof in an accident on the motorist to prove that he was not careless or negligent when he hit the cyclist.

But idiots who write for cycling magazines* assume, on no evidence, that cyclists are to blame in at least 50% of cases. And social media morons like Slow Johnny accept that without argument. If that's what cyclists are really like, SUVs deserve to inherit cyclist-free roads, and will.

Andre Jute
Prove you have a brain by putting it in gear

*Here I exposed the outright fabricated lies of another cycling "journalist", Peter Frick-Wright: http://coolmainpress.com/ajwriting/a...piece-of-work/

On Monday, April 11, 2016 at 10:08:27 AM UTC-7, Andre Jute wrote:
On Monday, April 11, 2016 at 1:15:42 PM UTC+1, John B. wrote:

There was a study done in Los Angles county by the California Highway
Patrol, in 2012, that showed during the year of the study, that of all
bicycle-auto collisions, for which cause could be determined, the
cyclist was at fault approximately 60% of the time. I also read a
review of the study in a cycling magazine in which the author said
something like "I was surprised, I had assumed it would be 50/50", or
words to that extent.
--

Cheers,

John B.

It's bland, unresisting acceptance of this sort of "logic" by the dumber cyclists that make me want to scream and hit my head against a wall.

Chalo Colina used to point out that a) a motorist needs a license to use the roads while b) a cyclist does not and he concluded from that c) that a cyclist has a natural right to the road whereas a motorist doesn't.

This follows from natural justice. The motorist is sitting in a two ton protective metal projectile. The worst that happens to him in an impact with a cyclist is that his airbags might attempt to smother him, or his seatbelt might leave a small blood blister on his skin. Compare the cyclist, all exposed, likely to suffer serious abrasions at the lightest contact, broken bones, diabling breakages, possibly death.

It follows from natural justice that the duty of care falls to a greater extent on the person who can do another person the greater injury. This is the solid reasoning behind the Dutch laws that put the burden of proof in an accident on the motorist to prove that he was not careless or negligent when he hit the cyclist.

But idiots who write for cycling magazines* assume, on no evidence, that cyclists are to blame in at least 50% of cases. And social media morons like Slow Johnny accept that without argument. If that's what cyclists are really like, SUVs deserve to inherit cyclist-free roads, and will.

When it comes to road use in the US, there is no such thing as "natural justice." There are the state UVC rules and the common-law duty to exercise due care, which is an obligation owed by all road users. If a car is violating a law at the time of an accident, it is presumed to be at fault. Same goes with a bike. It doesn't make sense to presume that a driver who is following the law is at fault when he hits a bicyclist who launches off a curb (ala alley-cat bike messenger poseur) and gets whacked.

BTW, how does natural justice work for pedestrians who are hit by bikes -- or two bikes who hit each other or a bike that hits a car? I can't tell you how many times I've practically plowed into some dumb f*** pedestrian, many of whom make squirrels look rational. Do pedestrians have more natural justice mo-jo?

-- Jay Beattie.

On Sunday, April 10, 2016 at 9:06:18 PM UTC-5, James wrote:
On 11/04/16 10:47, wrote:
On Sunday, April 10, 2016 at 7:11:24 PM UTC-5, James wrote:

I don't suppose there was any indication of the offender in each of
the collisions?

Does the person who causes the accident effect the results? A
cyclist can be riding on the correct side of the road and hit from
behind. Or a cyclist can be riding on the wrong side of the road and
hit head on. In one instance the cyclist is at fault and the other
he is not. Other than the accumulative force from the head on
accident instead of the from behind accident, I doubt the injuries
are affected at all by who caused the accident or is liable. I've
been involved in bike accidents where I was not responsible. I was
hit by a car. And another where I caused it. I rode off the edge of
the road or rode into a ditch. In both cases I was glad I had my
helmet. In neither did my head or helmet care who caused the
accident. Paying medical bills and court cases later it did matter
who caused the accident.


Does wearing a helmet prevent collisions?


Does a collision always result in injury?






In Australia there have been several studies that find the motorist
at fault about 80% of the time.

Of course there is no campaign to "fix" that problem. Instead
shift the onus of "safety" to the victim.


--
JS