Are the safety stats misleading ?

[kingrollo]

I’m not sure how you get to that conclusion?

It was only a tentative conclusion - hence the '?'

 

[kingrollo]

[QUOTE 5098040, member: 9609"]so do you believe the stats that show there is only one injury of any severity whilst cycling for every 200,000 miles ridden?

I have no idea if cycling is safer or more dangerous that it was years ago, I suspect more cyclists protect themselves better now with brighter clothing, lights, and helmets etc, but that may or may not of been outweighed by busier roads and a more hostile attitude from drivers? My beef is with the stats that just don't seem to add up to the real world. Just follow CC, 1000 regular posters? and not a week goes by without one of us coming a cropper. that would suggest a 1:20 chance of some sort of cycling related injury this coming year (1:40,000 miles?)

I suspect the big anomaly in cycling stats is the amount of miles that are claimed to be ridden. Unlike cars/waggons etc where mileage can be fairly accurately calculated, cycling miles can't. Loads of people who ride a bit in the summer then probably claim to ride most weeks.[/QUOTE]

I had my own incident with a car in November. Thankfully I wasn't hurt. I suffer with anxiety and depression anyway. Pretty much as above I read the stats, but then that doesn't ring true in the real world. 3 cyclists have been killed since September in and around where I live and work. 2 of those casualties are roads I use regularly.
Youre point about miles travelled is good one - not something I have thought of - I wonder if now we have strava could we get more accurate stats from that in future ?

 

[srw]

[QUOTE 5098040, member: 9609"]so do you believe the stats that show there is only one injury of any severity whilst cycling for every 200,000 miles ridden?[/QUOTE]
The stat is one reported injury per 200,000 miles. That will exclude most of the minor things we all get from time to time - ankles bashed against pedals, bruise from coming off on ice or gravel, cut finger while fettling - which are of no real relevance to any risk assessment.

 

[Fab Foodie]

It was only a tentative conclusion - hence the '?'

But based on which data? That posted here suggests the opposite, a small rise in injury for a large rise in cycling.

 

[kingrollo]

But based on which data? That posted here suggests the opposite, a small rise in injury for a large rise in cycling.

Based on the many reasons posted that the stats are out of step with real world.

 

[MontyVeda]

Based on the many reasons posted that the stats are out of step with real world.

I'm racking my brains trying to think of a recent cyclist death locally... and in over 40 years, I've never had a cycling incident worthy of reporting to the police or a trip to A&E... so my 'real world' is different to your 'real world'.

 

[kingrollo]

I'm racking my brains trying to think of a recent cyclist death locally... and in over 40 years, I've never had a cycling incident worthy of reporting to the police or a trip to A&E... so my 'real world' is different to your 'real world'.

Of course it is. As I posted earlier I was hit by a car in November - and there have been 3 cycling deaths where I live and work since September. I am not expecting you to replicate that.

 

[mjr]

Of course it is. As I posted earlier I was hit by a car in November - and there have been 3 cycling deaths where I live and work since September. I am not expecting you to replicate that.

With only something like 110 cycling deaths a year nationally, it's unusual to have 3 nearby. Is it an area that's especially busy like London or shoot for cycling like the West Midlands?

 

[kingrollo]

With only something like 110 cycling deaths a year nationally, it's unusual to have 3 nearby. Is it an area that's especially busy like London or shoot for cycling like the West Midlands?

Yeah, you got it - West Midlands !

 

[machew]

https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2010/01/30/numbers_dont_always_tell_the_whole_story.html

 

[Siclo]

I've a question with the injuries per x number of miles thing. The number of injuries comes from hospital records, where does the mileage come from?

 

[mjr]

I've a question with the injuries per x number of miles thing. The number of injuries comes from hospital records, where does the mileage come from?

I think the number of casualties usually comes from police records, not hospitals (I think I've written about that above) and I think the mileage most often comes from the National Travel Survey - but basically dig into any time someone mentions cycling casualty rates per mile and they should be able to tell you where they're getting the mileage from.

There are often problems with using the NTS for cycling estimates, both due to the small sample size and classifying journeys where you used something else for a greater distance as "train" or "car" or whatever and ignoring the cycling in some measures BUT those problems are pretty consistent over time, so you can compare the casualties per mile over time and between areas unless told of a method change which means you shouldn't.

 

[mjr]

For example, the latest https://tfl.gov.uk/corporate/publications-and-reports/travel-in-london-reports (number 10) says on page 57 that their cycling mileage is taken from the London Travel Demand Survey. If only more local government collected such detailed data. Norfolk has been decommissioning their counters recently, so we're going from poor data to less of it!

 

[Siclo]

Thanks @mjr

 

[jefmcg]

The injury stats come from NHS records. It’s part of the standard reporting primary and secondary care are required to make. The data is very patchy.

That has to be true. The average copper is not known as a diagnostician, so won't be able to record a serious injury.