Wednesday 21 December 2011

Considerate Cycling 7

I had a momentary flash of insight on Monday. It followed a relatively successful navigation of a route along Bristol's Malago Greenway, as suggested in TravelBristol's "Cycling. 10 Short Leisure Routes Around Bristol, Between 2 & 16 Miles". I was surprised and pleased to find that direction signs were plentiful and that most of them could be seen and read as I cycled along. It wasn't very scenic and a lot of the journey was on ordinary streets or low-grade shared footpaths but I did get to see some interesting bits of Bristol that I would otherwise have missed.

At the end, near a B&Q superstore, a shared cycle and pedestrian path set off towards new housing south of Hengrove Way. Its start was hidden by parked vehicles:


The continuation of the path beyond those miscreants was also serving as a car park: 




But that wasn't surprising. Cars, lorries and taxis regularly park on cycle paths in Bristol. It was only as I set off homewards and noticed, again, how tricky some of the barriers, crossings and shared paths were that the flash of insight came. It's so obvious it's hardly worth mentioning.

The fact is that cycling provision in English cities is designed for expert adult cyclists. The route I had been following used signposts to help me weave a way through busy streets, on, alongside and across some very busy roads. It took me through barriers that needed deft bike handling and it demanded careful attention to lots of conflicts with pedestrians, emerging driveways and motor vehicle traffic.

The booklet I was using lists the Malago Green Way route as Level 2 ("slightly more experienced cyclists"). Level 1 is for "all users including inexperienced or beginner cyclists" and there are two such routes included. Both of these include sections that few parents would be happy for children under 12 to use, and both would present problems for genuinely novice adults. I don't know if there are standards for judging such things, but as an ex-teacher and a father of five, that's my opinion.

Perhaps what the authors of the guide really mean is that these routes would be suitable for beginners with a more experienced guide who had scouted the routes in advance. That would make sense.

In the meantime, cycling to school remains rare - especially for primary pupils. Cycling for fun means taking children to off-road sites. The roads and highways are for confident and experienced adult cyclists. It's not surprising that a lot of children and less confident cyclists just use footpaths - without any awareness of traffic conventions or regulations.

The irony is that expert and confident cyclists have already learned to cope without cycle lanes, ASLs, shared pathways and toucan crossings. What I observe is that a lot of them ignore the specialised facilities and simply use "desire lines" that go from their A to their B with an optimum combination of efficiency and safety.

The courageous Council of the future will build cycle-only routes that enable primary school children to cycle to school without any contact with cars or lorries and without parental supervision. That's when the revolution will have taken place.








Sunday 11 December 2011

Considerate Cycling 6

Two things came to my attention today. The first was a 2010 US National Safety Council research paper. Understanding The Distracted Brain considers evidence relevant to a discussion of using a mobile phone while driving. Published last year it concluded that use of a mobile phone (even hands free) creates so much cognitive distraction for a driver that delayed response and reaction times are likely. A range of studies reviewed by it suggest that drivers might be subject to a maximum level of attention, beyond which the ability to make and act on urgent decisions can be impaired. Braking and keeping in lane, for example are both adversely affected by mobile phone conversations

The second thing was Diamond Geezer's blog that reported new signs being put up at the notorious Bow Roundabout in London. They include this one.

copyright diamond geezer


Together, the report and the blog prompted me to return to the data on attributions made in police reports mentioned in Considerate Cycling 5 . They prompted me to reconsider how much the "failing to look" reported by police or the "sorry, mate I didn't see you" (SMIDSY) syndrome might simply be a consequence of what the mobile phone researchers found: normally competent people driving or riding over the limit of their cognitive capacity to stay in full control.

Contemporary roads, especially in and around cities have become much more complex, and more kinds of attention seeking signs and road markings are appearing. As well as the longwinded and somewhat existential message of the notice in Diamond Geezer's lovely snap, notice that there is also a prominent advertisement for Bacardi Rum and three other road signs. (You might need to go to his Flickr account to see the larger versions.)

On top of all the other novelties and complexities, The Department for Transport last year gave the go-ahead to local authorities to start using more road signs in local contexts without the strict controls that have reduced the range of messages and without the legal procedures that have made putting them up more costly. So it looks as though more, and more idiosyncratic, signage is coming our way soon.  There will be a lot of people who simply don't know what these signs mean.

I wonder if anyone knows of more specific evidence relevant to my hypothesis? The hypothesis is that there comes a point where signs and markings stop being helpful and start being part of the problem. That point would be a function of the variety, number, novelty and complexity of the signs . Road layouts need to be well designed, and part of the design would call for optimum signage with minimal clutter.

This looks a bit abstract. What would you do once you had seen it?





I suppose the lack of gravity in space would make cycling easier though.










Monday 5 December 2011

Considerate Cycling 5

Safe At Any Speed?



Is Bristol any safer than anywhere else for cycling? How could it be made safer? These are questions that provoke interesting discussions,  but they are also of that irritating kind that can't be answered before you know who is asking, what they really want to know, and what use they intend to make of the answers once you've worked them out. It is also worth saying that the more certain we are of the correct answer, the more likely we are to be wrong.

Understandably, cycling casualties have been in the news. London has suffered a series of fatalities that had been predicted and that could have been avoided. Not many weeks ago the Department for Transport issued data for 2010 that showed UK cycling casualties overall had risen, despite other categories showing improved figures. That was disappointing after we had got used to numbers edging downwards every year.

Change in casualty rates for cyclists in the UK 1994-2010
Pedal cyclists
1994 – 1998
average
2009
2010
Percentage
change over
1994 – 1998
average
Percentage
change from last
year
Killed
186
104
111
-40
+7
Seriously injured
3,546
2,606
2,660
-25
+2
Slightly injured
20,653
14,354
14,414
-30
0
All casualties
24,385
17,064
17,185
-30
+1
Department for Transport (2011)

In a country of 62,300,000 (mid-2010) the increase in cycle casualties is a tiny fraction.  But each single digit is one whole person. And just when we thought things were getting better for cycling, doubts have been raised about the trend. The data show other road-users on a continuing downward pattern of casualties. It's very disappointing that while more cycling overall has done wonders for the well-being of cyclists, the genreal health improvements have not gone alongside continuing reductions in casualty reports.

I was interested to see how we were doing in Bristol. I approached Bristol City Council's Strategy and Programmes Team from Transport Service and they very kindly sent me several sets of printouts from their road traffic incident data for the three years up to the end of August this year. In conjunction with the finely-detailed maps at Explore Bristol I was able to get a good feel for the scale and nature of our problems. All that follows is inevitably my own interpretation.

Whatever ever else I might claim, I know enough about collecting, analysing and interpreting data to know that "evidence" never confirms our simple assumptions and "the facts" have a tendency to lose their clarity when we look more closely at them and consider things like how the data were collected in the first place and how words like "slight" or "serious" are defined in principle and used in practice.  So don't spend  too much time unpicking details – the patterns and the big picture are what I was interested in. These are the things that you can't see at all from your own bike or footpath, things that you can't know through anecdotes.

Between September 1st 2008 and August 30th 2011 there were 805 Police reports of bicycle-related accidents in Bristol. There would have been another set of casualties or bumps that weren't recorded but what we do know is that police reports show the following:
  • 3 cyclists (all adults of 16 or over) were reported to have died;
  • 102 (of whom 10 were children) were listed as injured seriously enough to need in-patient treatment and;
  • 686 (47 children) were recorded with injuries that were classified as "slight".
The cyclist figures  compare with pedestrian figures of:
  • 13 fatalities (2 of whom were children);
  • 103 seriously injured (22 children) and;
  • 580 slightly injured (137 children) in the same period.
A crude average gives 1 cyclist death and 4 pedestrian deaths per year in Bristol over the three years in question. For serious injuries the figures are 34 per year for cyclists and the same for pedestrians. Slight injuries average out at 228 for cyclists and 193 per year for pedestrians.

The tables and graphs that follow show us that pedestrians suffer more fatalities than cyclists, but have comparable numbers being injured. In relation to age it shows that people of 16 or above are much more involved than children in cycling causalities whereas among pedestrians the injuries among the under 16 are relatively more common. We also see that males are much more numerous among the casualties. They might be more likely than women to cycle, but their record as pedestrians is almost as bad. The figures in these tables are derived from data provided by Bristol City Council and have not been independently checked, so they might be subject to my own errors.

Cyclist and pedestrian casualties by age in Bristol September 2008-August 2011

Pedal cyclists
Pedestrians
Totals
Under 16
16 and over
All Cyclists
Under 16
16 and over
All Pedestrians
Fatal
0
3
3
2
11
13
16
Seriously injured
10
92
102
22
81
103
205
Slightly injured
48
638
686
137
443
580
1266
All casualties
58
733
791
161
535
696
1487
(based on data provided by Bristol City Council 2011)




Cyclist and pedestrian casualties by sex in Bristol September 2008-August 2011

Pedal cyclists
Pedestrians
Totals
Female
Male
All Cyclists
Female
Male
All Pedestrians
Fatal
0
3
3
2
11
13
16
Seriously injured
20
82
102
39
64
103
205
Slightly injured
142
544
686
222
358
580
1266
All casualties
162
629
791
263
433
696
1487
(based on data provided by Bristol City Council 2011)




When Police record accidents their standard form has a long section on "contributory factors" with 76 factors organised in 9 categories (with "other please specify" as the 77th option). Each factor is attributed to one or more of the vehicles involved, so guesses can be made about whose "fault" the accident might be. But they would be guesses, and I would advise against trusting them. Looking at Bristol's analysis of which contributory factors are reported most frequently, the pattern jumps out very quickly. It's so marked that I suspect the process of filling in the form might contribute, a possibility given weight by the fact that slightly more than half of all the accident reports had no contributory factors listed at all. Nevertheless, the data that we have include two factors which, alone, account for a third of all the attributions: "Failed to look properly" and "Poor turn or manoeuvre" are mentioned 230 and 58 times respectively. Everything else shades off into insignificance, with "Cyclist entering road from pavement" making an appearance at the next level with nearly ten per cent of all identified factors and 18 citations as the first-mentioned factor. The table of factors that follows is listed in order of the number of times each was cited, regardless of its primacy in each report. Close examination will reveal those factors most often mentioned first. I feel the need to repeat an earlier warning - "blame" cannot be assigned on the basis of such a table. What we have here is an attempt to present an accurate record of the factors reported by police officers in one part of a standard proforma. Weather, visibility and road condition are reported under another heading.


Contributory factors listed in 353 accident report forms September 2008 - August 2011
Description
CF1
CF2
CF3
CF4
CF5
CF6
Count
%
Failed to look properly
122
72
28
6
2
0
230
28.4
Failed to judge other persons path or speed
15
35
13
8
3
2
76
9.38
Careless/Reckless/In a hurry
13
18
15
13
1
3
63
7.78
Poor turn or manoeuvre
40
11
4
2
1
0
58
7.16
Passing too close to cyclist, horse rider or pedestrian
9
7
8
5
1
0
30
3.7
Stationary or parked vehicle
5
10
6
6
2
1
30
3.7
Cyclist entering road from pavement
18
4
2
4
0
1
29
3.58
Travelling too fast for conditions
11
7
3
1
0
1
23
2.84
Disobeyed Give Way or Stop sign or markings
11
3
1
0
1
0
16
1.98
Vehicle door opened or closed negligently
9
5
0
1
0
0
15
1.85
Failed to signal/Misleading signal
6
5
2
1
0
0
14
1.73
Slippery road (due to weather)
10
1
0
2
0
0
13
1.6
Cyclist wearing dark clothing at night
2
3
4
4
0
0
13
1.6
Impaired by alcohol
7
3
2
0
0
0
12
1.48
Disobeyed automatic traffic signal
7
3
1
0
0
0
11
1.36
Loss of control
4
3
2
1
1
0
11
1.36
Illegal turn or direction of travel
7
2
0
0
1
0
10
1.23
Road layout (eg bend, winding road, hill crest)
2
3
3
2
0
0
10
1.23
Junction overshoot
5
2
2
0
0
0
9
1.11
Junction restart
4
4
1
0
0
0
9
1.11
Road layout (eg bend, hill, narrow road)
6
0
0
1
1
0
8
0.99
Following too close
3
4
1
0
0
0
8
0.99
Sudden braking
1
4
2
1
0
0
8
0.99
Inexperienced or learner driver/rider
1
1
4
1
1
0
8
0.99
Vehicle blind spot
1
4
0
2
1
0
8
0.99
Dazzling sun
5
0
1
1
0
0
7
0.86
Not displaying lights at night or in poor visibility
3
2
1
0
1
0
7
0.86
Rain, sleet, snow, or fog
1
1
2
3
0
0
7
0.86
Failed to look properly
2
1
2
0
1
0
6
0.74
Disobeyed pedestrian crossing facility
3
0
2
0
0
0
5
0.62
Distraction outside vehicle
2
1
2
0
0
0
5
0.62
Defective brakes
3
1
0
0
0
0
4
0.49
Illness or disability, mental or physical
3
0
0
0
1
0
4
0.49
Inadequate/Masked signs or road markings
3
0
0
0
0
0
3
0.37
Vehicle travelling along pavement
1
1
1
0
0
0
3
0.37
Distraction in vehicle
1
2
0
0
0
0
3
0.37
Vegetation
1
1
0
0
0
1
3
0.37
Swerved
0
2
0
1
0
0
3
0.37
Fatigue
0
3
0
0
0
0
3
0.37
Aggressive driving
0
1
1
0
1
0
3
0.37
Other
0
1
0
0
2
0
3
0.37
Driver using mobile phone
0
1
1
0
0
0
2
0.25
Buildings, road signs, street furniture
0
1
0
0
1
0
2
0.25
Dazzling headlights
0
1
1
0
0
0
2
0.25
Spray from other vehicles
0
0
1
0
1
0
2
0.25
Careless/Reckless/In a hurry
0
0
0
1
1
0
2
0.25
Poor or defective road surface
1
0
0
0
0
0
1
0.12
Traffic calming (eg speed cushions, humps, chicanes)
1
0
0
0
0
0
1
0.12
Temporary road layout (eg contraflow)
1
0
0
0
0
0
1
0.12
Defective lights or indicators
1
0
0
0
0
0
1
0.12
Wrong use of pedestrian crossing facility
1
0
0
0
0
0
1
0.12
Vehicle in course of crime
1
0
0
0
0
0
1
0.12
Inexperience of driving on the left
0
0
1
0
0
0
1
0.12
Dangerous action in carriageway (eg playing)
0
0
0
1
0
0
1
0.12
Emergency vehicle on call
0
1
0
0
0
0
1
0.12
 (based on data provided by Bristol City Council 2011)

It doesn't take a lot of reflection to recognise that most of the people we know never cycle, or cycle only infrequently. People who do cycle or who are considering cycling might wonder what the likelihood is that they might have some kind of bump. The data suggest that compared to other ways of travelling, bumps per mile are on the high side for bikes. In the South West region (see the table below) an odd Department for Transport measure shows over five thousand bumps for every billion miles travelled by cyclists. Only motor bikes have a worse prognosis in the South West, and only cyclists in London and the North West do worse for knocks than the South West.

Reported casualty rate per billion vehicle miles by region and road user type, England, 2010


Rate per billion vehicle miles

Region
Pedal
cycle
Motor
cycle

Car

Bus
Light
goods

HGV

All
North East
5,073
6,130
551
2,636
143
105
675
North West
6,479
6,875
592
2,286
104
82
712
Yorkshire and the Humber
4,957
6,716
660
2,751
115
101
764
East Midlands
4,832
6,758
576
1,944
125
83
655
West Midlands
4,901
6,065
552
1,234
118
82
626
East of England
3,400
5,876
500
869
98
95
567
London
10,211
9,548
839
3,654
207
131
1,450
South East
5,024
5,825
483
1,844
95
105
581
South West
5,350
4,711
470
1,144
82
94
567
England
5,638
6,610
561
2,072
113
94
694
Data from http://www.dft.gov.uk/statistics/tables/ras30055


The odd measure being used in that table needs a bit of cooling down I think, but the  differences are real and it does suggest that London has a much bigger problem than Bristol (or anywhere else). We need to note that a large majority of cycling casualiteies are "slight", and that they don't happen all that often, even to individuals who cycle quite a lot.


On a low-side estimate, I cycled about 50,000 miles on the roads of northern England between 1984 and 2010. In the process I suffered a number of small collisions and upsets. Maybe 4 or 5. One resulted in a very anxious motorist with a badly damaged car buying me a new bike and taking me home, more or less unhurt. A bruised rib, minor cuts and torn clothing resulted from others. One ended with a couple of stitches and a £25 fine for cycling without due care and attention (I had set off in the dark, head down, straight into the back of an unattended parked car). This was the one that would have appeared in national statistics: two stitches in A and E made the difference between it being recorded and not being recorded.

If we count Bristol's population at half a million and put bits of the data together then we can avearge out  one recorded cycling casualty for every 634 people and one pedestrian casualty for every 718 people over the last three years. To put that another way, if you know 315 people in Bristol, one of them has had a reportable cycling or pedestrian accident in the last 3 years.

Looking at some recent Department for Transport statistics, it looks as though I can do another  125,000 miles or so before I can expect another entry in the national traffic casualty lists, as long as I stay alert and keep an eye on tricky junctions in the rain after dark. The one thing that worries me about the apparent increase in the popularity of cycling is that not much is happening about all those junctions where traffic speed is such a threat. Another recent report puts traffic speed and difficult junctions as the main problems. The TRL summary report to the DFT, "Infrastructure and Cyclist Safety" says:

"Most cyclist injuries in multi-vehicle collisions take place at junctions. Reducing the speed of traffic through junctions appears to be an effective approach to reducing cycle casualties, and physical calming methods are a reliable means of achieving such a reduction."
 Infrastructure and Cyclist Safety (2011) TRL Report PPR 580

The same report is a bit chary of the piecemeal cycle lanes and other non-continuous facilites that British cities chose to provide: not because they aren't a great help, but because they keep (as it were) dropping the baby:
"Providing segregated networks may reduce risks to cyclists, although evidence suggests that the points at which segregated networks intersect with highways can be relatively high-risk, sometimes of sufficient magnitude to offset any safety benefits of removing cyclists from the carriageway."
ibid

Reference

Department for Transport (2011) Reported road casualties in Great Britain: annual report 2010 http://www.dft.gov.uk/statistics/releases/road-accidents-and-safety-annual-report-2010