http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress Encouragement, Education & Advocacy for Bicycling in the Real World Thu, 24 May 2012 02:02:01 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.2 Encouragement, Education & Advocacy for Bicycling in the Real World Commute Orlando no Encouragement, Education & Advocacy for Bicycling in the Real World http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/wp-content/plugins/powerpress/rss_default.jpg http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/category/bicycle-statistics/ http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2010/05/07/its-not-an-accident-%e2%80%94-part-2/ http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2010/05/07/its-not-an-accident-%e2%80%94-part-2/#comments Fri, 07 May 2010 11:51:51 +0000 Keri http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/?p=7682 What does this chart tell you?]]> http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2010/05/07/its-not-an-accident-%e2%80%94-part-2/feed/ 20 http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2010/04/18/why-do-they-do-this/ http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2010/04/18/why-do-they-do-this/#comments Mon, 19 Apr 2010 02:17:30 +0000 Keri http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/?p=7456 This rider doesn’t start out against traffic, but he swoops to the opposing lane just before the intersection. He is lucky the car entering the intersection from his left was not turning right, or it is likely he would have been hit. Riding against traffic accounts for 45% of bike-v-car crashes in Orlando. The majority of those are intersection crashes because the bicyclist comes from an unexpected direction. Wrong-way riding is a bad decision caused by incorrect mapping of cause and effect. Despite the numerous conflicts people experience from this behavior, they don’t connect the dots. Why? And how to we change that?]]> http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2010/04/18/why-do-they-do-this/feed/ 22 http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2010/01/13/mr-bicycle-good-press-for-safe-cycling/ http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2010/01/13/mr-bicycle-good-press-for-safe-cycling/#comments Wed, 13 Jan 2010 22:52:33 +0000 Keri http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/?p=6133 Go grab your copy! It’s a collector’s item, you know. If you just can’t wait another second. You can read it online. Asked about how to counter the fear and scary statistics, Mighk said: Quite frankly, the best way to convince people is to get them out riding on the road and get them riding the right way, and then they find out that, hey, this works. And so, Mighk took Orlando Weekly reporter, Lindy Shepherd for a ride through downtown. Here she is having a great time on Robinson, in the rain, no less: And grooving down Orange Avenue: And I couldn’t resist this shot of Mighk posing for the cover photo:]]> http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2010/01/13/mr-bicycle-good-press-for-safe-cycling/feed/ 7 http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2009/12/13/newspaper-coverage-did-not-accurately-reflect-real-risk/ http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2009/12/13/newspaper-coverage-did-not-accurately-reflect-real-risk/#comments Sun, 13 Dec 2009 21:55:26 +0000 Eric http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/?p=5820 The title is the conclusion from a study. Until we get the media on board they will undo anything we try to do. Title and abstract follows. Newspaper framing of fatal motor vehicle crashes in four Midwestern cities in the United States, 1999–2000 S Connor and K WesolowskiDepartment of Pediatrics, Case Western Reserve University and Community Safety and Resource Center, Rainbow Babies and Children’s Hospital, Cleveland, Ohio, USA. Email: smc3@cwru.edu Abstract Objective: To examine the public health messages conveyed by newspaper coverage of fatal motor vehicle crashes and determine the extent to which press coverage accurately reflects real risks and crash trends. Methods: Crash details were extracted from two years of newspaper coverage of fatal crashes in four Midwestern cities in the United States. Details and causal factors identified by reporters were compared to data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) using odds ratios and two tailed z tests. Results: Papers covered 278 fatal crashes over the two year period, in contrast to 846 fatal crashes documented in FARS. Papers assigned blame in 90% of crashes covered, under-reported restraint use and driver’s risk of death, failed to reflect the protective value of restraints, and [...]]]> http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2009/12/13/newspaper-coverage-did-not-accurately-reflect-real-risk/feed/ 4 http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2009/11/21/combinations-cause-crashes-situational-awareness/ http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2009/11/21/combinations-cause-crashes-situational-awareness/#comments Sun, 22 Nov 2009 02:35:41 +0000 andrewp http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/?p=5671 As I swerved to miss the pedestrian — who had stopped, started, turned, and then walked backwards at the intersection all without seeing me approach — I had all my attention on making sure I did not startle (or hit!) the person right in front of me. What I forgot was to watch for turning cars.  And there was one.  Since both of us (the car driver and me) were watching the wayward pedestrian, we both didn’t see each other entering the intersection.  Thankfully, we both were operating at such slow speeds that each was able to stop way before any crash would have occurred. But this event triggered a thought in my head:  I didn’t see the car because all my attention was on the pedestrian.  I wonder how many crashes are due to situations where there are more than two events happening at the same time? Crash Statistics Mighk has presented us with some wonderful crash statistics that breaks down bicycle crashes into nice categories.  But the categories are one-event situations (ie riding without lights, riding on the wrong side of the road).  I’m guessing (I hope Mighk will chime in on this) that it’s difficult to present this data [...]]]> http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2009/11/21/combinations-cause-crashes-situational-awareness/feed/ 19 http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2009/09/01/10-huh-dont-fall-for-it/ http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2009/09/01/10-huh-dont-fall-for-it/#comments Tue, 01 Sep 2009 17:14:45 +0000 Keri http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/?p=4556 Cite a study saying cyclists are only responsible for 10% of crashes and you might as well light a match to a field of tinder. The bike-advocacy community wants nothing more than to prove motorists are the culprits most of the time. A recent article regarding a Toronto crash “study” has ignited a new wildfire of exuberant victim-hood. Despite a correction printed on the original article, the misinformation continues to be spread as validation of what most cyclists desperately want to believe. Ed CycleDog Wagner has done some digging to find the source of the dubious information. Please read his article in the Examiner, and pass it on. Komanoff’s study – if that’s the right word for it – is available on the Cars Suck website. A reasonable person would be hard pressed to expect unbiased, objective information from an organization with such a name, and in fact, Komanoff’s study is little more than an anti-motoring diatribe laced with emotionally loaded phrases. For that matter, the study itself is called Killed by Automobile. If you really want to read it, follow this link to Cars Suck, then click on Research/Killed by Automobile. Please wash your hands afterward. This is a [...]]]> http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2009/09/01/10-huh-dont-fall-for-it/feed/ 17 http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2009/07/03/is-this-psa-any-good/ http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2009/07/03/is-this-psa-any-good/#comments Sat, 04 Jul 2009 01:53:06 +0000 Eric http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/?p=3963 Several years ago, the NYC Pedestrian Safety Council produced cartoon ads that appeared frequently on TV in the NYC area. The ads urged children to “walk at the green, not in between” which worked well enough in NYC, since they have short blocks in a grid pattern and almost every intersection has traffic lights. But what I don’t think the NYC people knew or cared about was that the same TV stations that aired those PSA’s reached out a hundred miles in all directions  to  millions more people that didn’t live in NYC, and out in the hinterland of suburbia, in upper New York State, Long Island, New Jersey and Connecticut where green traffic lights (never mind pedestrian signals) were few and far between. This gave license to motorists to mow down pedestrians by being able to say, “See, they didn’t walk the distance to the light (and that could be miles), so they are wrong to try and cross there. Walk at the green, not in between” I am totally serious that this argument was and is still being  made. Even today you will hear “Cross at the green, not in between” used as a defense (or more likely [...]]]> http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2009/07/03/is-this-psa-any-good/feed/ 25 http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2009/06/25/what-did-you-learn/ http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2009/06/25/what-did-you-learn/#comments Thu, 25 Jun 2009 05:41:24 +0000 Keri http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/?p=3934 “Good judgment comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgment.” Did you see the Weekly article “How I got Hit“? I’ve been meaning to get to this for 2 weeks, but I’ve been busy with work… and I was grumpy. I’m still busy and grumpy, but I can’t let this go any longer. The quote above has been attributed to dozens of people. Whatever its origin, it is a quote that every pilot can recite. I got my private pilot’s license in 1996. I worked at it harder than I did on my college degree, probably because it meant more to me than my college degree. More than any other education, flight school shaped my thinking about actions, reactions, judgment, consequences and personal responsibility. One of the key things I learned in flight school is to identify the chain of events and decisions that lead to a crash. We would look at crashes and talk about how they happened and how they could have been avoided. It’s a whole lot less painful to learn from someone else’s judgment errors than your own! The thing that is drilled into a pilot’s psyche is that the PIC (pilot in command) is responsible [...]]]> http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2009/06/25/what-did-you-learn/feed/ 29 http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2009/06/11/unsafe-roads-for-cyclists/ http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2009/06/11/unsafe-roads-for-cyclists/#comments Fri, 12 Jun 2009 01:49:02 +0000 andrewp http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/?p=3820 Before anyone checks, I’ve probably used the same term before, but I think it’s time cyclists examine the term “unsafe” when we talk about roads… and quit using it. A better term would be “risky,” but not for the reasons you might think. Risk is created by behavior. Some risk can come from the behavior of others. But  crash statistics support that the risk is often perpetuated by the behavior of the cyclists themselves. It’s about the people, not the roads. A few weeks ago, Mighk Wilson surveyed a small group of vehicular cyclists about their mileage and number of crashes. In his post, he also calculated an estimate of how often a car might pass the cyclist.  His conclusion:  huge numbers of cars pass without incident or accident — your crash risk is quite low.  It’s valuable to note that most of the cyclists who responded feel comfortable and confident on their bikes, and have ridden many miles on roads that the average person might consider “unsafe” for cyclists. Other Internet research (for instance, here) concludes that, in general, riding a bike is much less risky than riding in a car. So overall, we could conclude that roads are not [...]]]> http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2009/06/11/unsafe-roads-for-cyclists/feed/ 47 http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2009/06/02/direct-them-here/ http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2009/06/02/direct-them-here/#comments Tue, 02 Jun 2009 12:29:00 +0000 Mighk http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/?p=3664 I’ve gotten the question (or argument) so many times.  Variations on “Why do you insist on bicycling on the road?…You have no business being on the road…blah blah blah.” So I’ve put all my answers together in one place.  Point your browser to: http://mighkwilson.com/benefits/why-bicyclists-use-roadways/ If you bookmark it you can then easily reference it and paste it into e-mails, forums, etc.]]> http://commuteorlando.com/wordpress/2009/06/02/direct-them-here/feed/ 9