I really didn’t want to rubbish Britain’s greatest ever racing cyclist (and my ex-club mate) yet again. But he made some interestingly mistaken remarks last year about London’s bike hire scheme which have not been reported so widely, and which refer to some fundamentals about safety on the road, so do take a look.
In 2011 Bradley Wiggins was interviewed about the Barclays Bike Hire Scheme. His comments about the users of the scheme were disparaging: “(they)…can’t even ride a bike for a start…create more danger on the road…drivers get frustrated,…not wearing helmets…a disaster waiting to happen. But what do I know…” “Not a big fan of them (the Barclays hire bikes)?” (Interviewer) “Not really, no”.
The Barclays Bike Hire Scheme has a record which has just been analysed by Transport for London. The operator (Serco) is able to give very good data about the number of trips, and also has what appears to be better reporting of casualties than the police with STATS 19 forms.
The findings of this analysis are quite remarkable. They show that:
“Looking only at those SERCO reported Cycle Hire collisions that are consistent with the STATS 19 reporting, in the first year of operation of Cycle Hire there were 7 collisions involving personal injury per million Cycle Hire bicycle journeys. By severity of injury, this breaks down as 5 slight and 1 serious injury collision(s) per million Cycle Hire bicycle journeys.”(My emphasis).
And that by comparison, for all pedal cycles:
”… there were 21 collisions involving personal injury per million pedal cycle journeys in Greater London in 2010. By severity, this breaks down at 19 slight and 3 serious injury collisions
per million pedal cycle journey stages. “(My emphasis)
per million pedal cycle journey stages. “(My emphasis)
The bike hire cyclists are typically unhelmeted, include tourists and others unfamiliar with central London’s roads – and are three times less likely to be injured per trip than other cyclists in London as a whole. Now, there is a cautionary note: these are preliminary statistical analyses only by TfL. There are various factors which need considering, such as the relative length of trip by hire bike as opposed to other cyclists: this seems to be much shorter by hire bike users.
Furthermore, these people who “can’t even ride a bike for a start” are far, far less likely to get injured using a hire bike in London than people like Bradley Wiggins racing in the Tour de France. As discussed, in this year’s race, riders were some hundreds of times more likely to become what is defined as Seriously Injured per hour cycled than a typical London cyclist. And all without the problems of danger from motorised traffic. Indeed, shortly after making these remarks last year, Bradley Wiggins withdrew from the Tour de France after he came down in a crash – missing out on what could have been his first Tour victory.
Of course, this year’s race was particularly notorious for crashes – but the fact remains that by any measure, cyclists like Wiggins have been dozens, if not hundreds of times more likely to get hurt in crashes without motor traffic near them than typical London cyclists, and even more so than hire bike users.
WHY?
This is the big question. The answer lies in considering the adaptive (compensatory) behaviour of road users to the perceived danger around them.
Professional racing cyclists:
Professional racing cyclists wear helmets; have carefully honed expert bike handling skills and a great deal of experience of racing in a variety of weather and road conditions, and use specially prepared bicycles and other equipment. They also have expert medical attention close at hand. As has been pointed out with helmets the wearer adapts to the (actual or alleged) safety benefits of the helmet by changes in the levels of care they take when cycling.
There are ample grounds for suggesting that this applies to the other measures taken. Even traditional “road safety” researchers accept that where there is immediate feedback – such as with the high quality braking systems of a top class racing bike – the “safety benefit” (the braking system) will “tend to be consumed as a performance benefit”. The same should apply with all
the other “safety measures” which are part of the modern pro racing cyclist’s life.
the other “safety measures” which are part of the modern pro racing cyclist’s life.
Of course, it might be argued that cycle racing has always been a high risk activity, and that the safety measures (helmets, bike handling skills, backup medical care etc.) are not responsible. But are they actually reducing the chances of ending up injured? After all, despite the high risk nature of such a sport, there is an inherent desire to not get injured as this can cut the chances of success in a career which is only a few years long.
An interesting insight was suggested by Chris Boardman after the worst crash on the 2012 Tour de France, allegedly involving Alessandro Petacchi taking off and handing his shoe covers to his domestique (team helper). Boardman suggested that the lack of attention was due to the road being straight and without perceived obstacles – “Maybe they should have put some bends in it there…”.
Barclays Cycle Hire Users:
My evaluation of bike hire users is that they are more likely to be tourists (and have a carefree attitude), not wear helmets, and I would suggest that they are less likely to be aware of the road environment in central London. This adds up to what, on a more impressionistic basis, I have been told by (albeit unscientifically selected) motorists. That is, they are seen as a significant hazard compared to other cyclists.
As one experienced driver told me: “When I come back to London I see all those Boris bike users. They haven’t got the first idea …they’re all over the place. I make sure I give them a wide berth” (my emphasis).
This is what Wiggins refers to as “drivers get frustrated”, but is precisely what contributes to the significantly lower chances of becoming a casualty. There are, no doubt, plenty of other reasons why this occurs: we don’t know exactly what differences there are in terms of routes taken, age distribution, weather conditions etc. There always are these unknown variables which exist when it comes to looking at what leads to people becoming hurt or killed on the road.
The point is that, yet again, we have evidence of adaptive behaviour by road users, in this case motorists. It backs up the evidence for Safety in Numbers (SiN) and the need to get more people cycling, certainly where there are already significant numbers of cyclists and lower motor speeds, to reduce the chances of cyclists being hurt or killed.
“What do I know?”
What Bradley Wiggins knows is how to be the most successful British racing cyclist ever. Like so much of “road safety” culture and ideology, everything he has said on the safety of cycling has been, more or less, a complete inversion of reality:
- The people who “can’t even ride a bike”, unlike Wiggins and what we club cyclists called “proper cyclists” are far, far more likely to go uninjured than him.
- The people who “don’t even wear helmets” may be less likely candidates (in official “road safety” terms) for wearing them than car occupants and have an extremely low chance of injury in the first place. The evidence from real world population studies for the benefits of them wearing helmets is at best minimal, probably non-existent and maybe even negative.
- The people who may get “drivers…frustrated” are responsible for more careful driving in the vicinity of cyclists. Furthermore, pandering to what motorists may or may not feel is a classic piece of cyclist subservience.
- The “disaster waiting to happen” is a success story compared to other cyclists’ experience in London, and far, far more than that of cyclists like Wiggins.
None of this, of course, indicates a need to let up in the struggle to reduce danger on the roads in London and elsewhere – quite the contrary. We don’t even have a proper metric for cyclist safety (at the very least using casualties per journey/distance travelled) agreed by the powers that be. The need to reduce danger at source is not even properly on the agenda of the official bodies concerned with safety on the road.
What it means is that we have to know the full story when the media decide to comment on cyclist safety after the next collision occurs which is deemed newsworthy. With Barclays Bike Hire usage past the 14 million trips mark there is due to be a fatality in the next few years, and the steady drip of a dozen slight and one serious injury every million trips will continue. All of this needs to be understood in the context of what leads to people – in this case on bicycles – being hurt or killed on the road: I hope to have illuminated this in the last few articles.
What can Wiggo do?
Wiggo mask
But let’s end on a note of how we could work with Bradley Wiggins to reduce danger to cyclists and make those responsible for it accountable. Bradley Wiggins is likely to be earning a justifiably large amount of money. A contribution to bodies working to reduce danger on the road to cyclists and others: RoadPeace, See Me Save Me, the London Cycling Campaign in his home city, CycleNation, ourselves, not mention the Cyclists’ Defence Fund, could all do with funding for office expenses and assistance in campaigning. And while he’s working out how his thoroughly deserved earnings should be allocated, he could start off with the profits from selling the Porsche (if he still has it) and drive something slower.
How about it Brad?
The TfL report is here:
Estimates of collision rates for Cycle Hire bicycles and all pedal cycles
This brief note presents calculations of cycling collision rates for Barclays Cycle Hire bicycles and for all pedal cycles, in order to assess whether cycling by Cycle Hire bicycles is relatively safer than cycling more generally.
Summary
In the first year of operation SERCO reported 6.2 million Cycle Hire bicycles hires or journey stages and 79 collisions involving personal injury, equivalent to 13 collisions involving a Cycle Hire bicycle per million Cycle Hire journeys. Of these collisions 41 were matched with the STATS19 log of all pedal cycle collisions reported to the Police, generating a STATS19 consistent Cycle
Hire bicycle collisions rate of 7 per million Cycle Hire journeys in the first year of Cycle Hire. In comparison, for all pedal cycles there were 4,156 collisions involving personal injury in 2010, equivalent to 21 collisions per million for all pedal cycle journey stages in Greater London. Based on a consistent STATS 19 definition of personal injuries, cycling by Cycle Hire bicycles is 3 times safer (or relatively less risky) than cycling more generally in London.
Hire bicycle collisions rate of 7 per million Cycle Hire journeys in the first year of Cycle Hire. In comparison, for all pedal cycles there were 4,156 collisions involving personal injury in 2010, equivalent to 21 collisions per million for all pedal cycle journey stages in Greater London. Based on a consistent STATS 19 definition of personal injuries, cycling by Cycle Hire bicycles is 3 times safer (or relatively less risky) than cycling more generally in London.
Data and Table
The Cycle Hire scheme was launched on 30 July 2010. A full year’s of collisions and cycling data is available for the scheme for its first year of operation (30 July 2010 to 29 July 2011) and for the calendar year 2011. Collisions data for all pedal cycles is also available over these periods. However, cycling data for all pedal cycles in Greater London is available only by calendar year, with the latest year being 2010. The latest cycling journeys and collisions data is presented in the table below.
Bicycle journeys and collision: Cycle Hire Bicycles and All Pedal Cycles
| Hires/Journey stages |
All injuries |
Slight injuries |
Serious injuries |
Fatalities | |
| Bicycle journey stages: |
|||||
| Cycle Hire bicycles, Year 1 of scheme |
6,236,002 | ||||
| All pedal cycles, 2010 |
197,100,000 | ||||
| Bicycle collisions involving personal injury |
|||||
| Cycle Hire – Serco definition, Year 1 |
79 | 70 | 9 | 0 | |
| Cycle Hire – STATS 19 definition, Year 1 |
41 | 33 | 8 | 0 | |
| All pedal cycles – STATS 19 definition, 2010 |
4,156 | 3,649 | 496 | 11 | |
| Collision Rates (per million journeys) |
|||||
| Cycle Hire – Serco definition, Year 1 |
13 | 11 | 1 | 0 | |
| Cycle Hire – STATS 19 definition, Year 1 |
7 | 5 | 1 | 0 | |
| All pedal cycles – STATS 19 definition, 2010 |
21 | 19 | 3 | 0.1 |
Source:
ACCSTATS, SERCO (MIS Query), Travel in London 4
ACCSTATS, SERCO (MIS Query), Travel in London 4
SERCO, the operator of the Cycle Hire scheme, records and defines slight and serious injuries independently (and differently) from the Police under the STATS19 framework for logging casualties on all of the road network. TfL has match SERCOs records of Cycle Hire injuries against the STATS 19 log to create a series which is consistent with the latter, and therefore consistent with pedal cycle casualties more generally.
Looking at the data that is available it is therefore possible to compare collisions for the first full year (from 30 July 2010 to 29 July 2011) of Barclays Cycle Hire with the 2010 data for all pedal cycle collisions in Greater London. While these periods do not overlap completely, they represent the latest full year’s of data that is available.
Barclays Cycle Hire collision rates
The Barclays Cycle Hire scheme was launched on 30 July 2010. Over the 12 months to 29 July 2011 there was a total of 6.2 million ‘hires’ or journey stages on Barclays Cycle Hire bicycles recorded by SERCO, the scheme operator. Over this first year SERCO reported 79 collisions involving personal injury (70 slight injuries and 9 serious) using Cycle Hire bicycles. There were a further 119 collisions reported to SERCO that did not involve any personal injury[1]. Therefore according to SERCO’s definitions of injuries, in the first year of operation there were 13 collisions involving injury per million Cycle Hire journeys. By severity of injury, this breaks down as 11 slight and 1 serious injury collision(s) per million Cycle Hire journeys. No fatalities were reported involving Barclays Cycle Hire bicycles in the first year of the scheme.
Looking only at those SERCO reported Cycle Hire collisions that are consistent with the STATS 19 reporting, in the first year of operation of Cycle Hire there were 7 collisions involving personal injury per million Cycle Hire bicycle journeys. By severity of injury, this breaks down as 5 slight and 1 serious injury collision(s) per million Cycle Hire bicycle journeys.
All pedal cycle collision rates
TfL’s Travel in London 4 (2011) reported 540,000 pedal cycle journey stages in 2010 on an average day in Greater London based on the London Travel Demand Survey augmented by automatic and manual counts data. Annualis ing this daily figure generates 197 million pedal cycle journey stages in the capital in 2010[2]. The STATS 19 dataset reported a total of 4,156 pedal cycle collisions in 2010 in Greater London (3,649 slight and 496 serious injuries, with 11 fatalities)[3]. Therefore, for all pedal cycles there were 21 collisions involving personal injury per million pedal cycle journeys in Greater London in 2010. By severity, this breaks down at 19 slight and 3 serious injury collisions per million pedal cycle journey stages.
[1] As reported to the SERCO call centre either by Cycle Hire users or SERCO operational staff [2] Includes trips made on Barclays Cycle Hire bicycles which represent approximately 3% of all trips [3] Includes Cycle Hire bicycle injuries consistent with the STATS 19 definition
UPDATE August 11th 2013. A young French woman Philippine De Gerin-Ricard was killed in July when she was run over by a lorry whilst cycling on a “Boris Bike” in Aldgate, the first person to die when using a hire bike. the most recent figures I have for the number of journeys made by hire bikes is 22 million.
Road Danger Reduction Forum 