TheWashCycle

Safety in Numbers, Chicken and Egg

I was looking at this post on Streetsblog about the safety in numbers rule and I got to this part

Do more people on bikes cause cycling to become safer, or does safer infrastructure attract more people to bike? There’s no conclusive evidence either way, but the answer is probably a mix of both. Safer infrastructure entices more people to ride, and more people riding instill greater awareness on the part of motorists and increase the demand for safer infrastructure.

What would be useful for answering cause and effect would be data from some place where cycling numbers changed suddenly, faster than infrastructure let's say. Something like a long-term transit strike, or a fashion-induced bike boom, or even perhaps an oil crisis would be a way to change the number of people cycling without any other variable to point to (except maybe fewer cars in the last example). Then we could know if more cyclists cause safer roads OR if building safer roads leads to more safety and more cyclists (or both as streetsblog asserts). If that's a reasonable premise than this

The report noted that Korea’s cycling fatality rates were greater than what its biking rates would suggest. Researchers speculated that might be due to a rapid recent growth in cycling. Perhaps, they write, “neither cyclists nor other transport participants have had time to assimilate each other’s presence.”

Might also indicate that getting more people to bike doesn't do much to make roads safer. Which would mean that if you want to make roads safer, you have to actually go out and do that. And then you'll get more cyclists. 

 

Alexandria’s first Eco-Counter to be installed on the Mount Vernon Trail

From the last BPAC meeting agenda:

The City received approval from the National Park Service to install a bicycle and pedestrian counter along the Mount Vernon Trail just north of Slaters Lane. The City will install this equipment, which has already been installed in Arlington, when a warm weather window occurs

Here are some interesting things about Eco-Counters, with more here.

• Arlington has 35 infra-red counters with inductive loop (infra-red counts everyone, inductive loop counts cyclists). All but one are Eco Counters.
• Ultimate goal is to have all this information in a clearinghouse at Council of Governments or Portland State University.
• Peak of 10,000 cyclists and pedestrians crossing Key Bridge daily though average is around 6000.
• For a separate bike and ped count, costs around $6,000 a unit.
• They require maintenance if spiders build a nest. (WC: !)
• VDOT state funding has been used for video counters.
• New River Valley using three counters.
• Alexandria noted Myovision is easy to set up and inexpensive and they also have EcoCounter, but [needed] approval from NPS to install on Mt. Vernon trail.
• Strava data i sself-selecting group focuses on recreational rides. Can provide node wait times,view actual path of travel (desire lines). Costs around $18K for data for state.
• True count data—represents everything that passes a given point.
• App data also exists(i.e. San Francisco, Charlottesville).
• Bluetooth data—tracked data, tells how long it took to get from one point to another, volumes.

And completely unrelated

Some form of cycle track will be used on Virginia Capital Trail in the City of Richmond along Dock Street.

Trailers, Child Seats and Helmets

Here's a 2000 study someone posted on twitter about "Injuries Associated With Bicycle-Towed Child Trailers and Bicycle-Mounted Child Seats" which is the first I've ever seen on the subject.

When compared with bicycle-mounted child seats, there were fewer reported injuries to children associated with the use of bicycle-towed trailers. Motor vehicle involvement and need for hospital admission were similar among injured children in both groups, and the head or face was the most common site of injury. These data imply that ongoing surveillance efforts to identify injuries associated with use of bicycle-towed child trailers are warranted and that bicycle helmets should be worn by children riding in bicycle-towed child trailers and in bicycle-mounted child seats.

the annual injury rate [ related to bicycle-towed child trailers] can be estimated as 0.2 per 100,000 children younger than 5 years. The annual injury rate for bicycle-mounted child seats is estimated at 1.3 per 100,000 children younger than 5 years. 

The reasons for more bicycle-mounted injuries are feet in the wheels, and falls from the bike. I feel like with our bike-mounted seat the kids can't get their feet in the spokes if they tried to.

I'd been told that inside the roll cage of a trailer, kids don't really need a helmet. And when I look at the types of injuries kids sustained I can see why I was told that.

Contusions or abrasions were the most frequent injury: this was the diagnosis in 5 (83%) of the injuries related to bicycle-towed child trailers and for 20 (47%) of the injuries associated with the use of bicycle-mounted child seats. Lacerations accounted for 1 (17%) of the injuries among those in bicycle trailers and for 2 (5%) of those in bicycle-mounted child seats. Nine children (21%) with injuries related to bicycle-mounted child seat use had fractures.

As far as I know, helmets aren't designed to prevent contusions, abrasions or lacerations. 

Arlington Unveils the first Bikeometer east of the Rockies

Yesterday, Arlington unveiled their Bikeometer located along the Custis Trail near the intersection of Doom. 

The Bikeometer in Rosslyn is the first in the United States that is not on the West Coast. It provides a highly visible, engaging and fun view of the volume of bike usage on the Custis Trail in Arlington. Ride past the Bikeometer and notice the daily bike count tick off another digit and acknowledge another car-free trip in Arlington County. The information displayed is real time and also includes month and year to date data.

Expect to see some big numbers as the year goes on since the Custis trail accommodates around half a million bike trips per year!

Arlington County Board Chair Jay Fisette pulled the ribbon off with a Capital Bikeshare bike. 

When bicyclists collide with motor vehicles, multiple factors contribute to the severity of injuries

Important results:

Although previous research has shown that bike lanes reduce the number of bike-motor vehicle accidents, “our findings show that bike lanes or paved shoulders by themselves do not significantly reduce the severity of injuries sustained by cyclists when they crash with  motor vehicles,” 

Key factors affecting severity of injury are:

•  
  • alcohol use by either the cyclist or the motor vehicle driver
  • riding in darkness, even with streetlights
  • posted speed limit

 

Take the Washington Bike Survey - It's for science!

Researchers at Portland State University would like to invite you to participate in their national study of protected bike lanes.  They are asking bicycle riders in six cities across the county to share their experiences riding on protected bike lanes in their cities. In particular, in Washington DC, they are looking for feedback about your experiences on the L Street cycle track. 

After conducting targeted "intercepts" of bicyclists on L Street (you may have received a postcard invitation from them already), they are now opening the survey up to get as much feedback as possible.  You can take the survey by going to this website:

http://tinyurl.com/DcBikeSurvey

The survey should take about 10-20 minutes, and will give them valuable insight into what makes a good protected bike lane.  They ask that all surveys be completed by November 30th.  They’ll be sharing feedback, including what works and what doesn’t work, with the District Department of Transportation, and with a national audience. 

Your participation in the survey is voluntary. We will protect the confidentiality of your individual survey responses. If you have concerns or problems about your participation in this study or your rights as a research subject, please contact the Human Subjects Research Review Committee, Office of Research and Strategic Partnerships, Market Center Building Suite 620, Portland State University, 503-725-4288 / 877-480-4400. If you have any questions about the study, contact us at 503-725-2875 or[email protected].

Wednesday Afternoon Commute - Everything is safer than cycling

Good afternoon

• The DC Council considered the Bicycle Safety Amendment Act of 2013 today.
• The push is on to further limit sidewalk cycling. “We understand that there are concerns with sidewalk bicycling, but we think that sidewalk riding is normally a problem where there is not a space in the roadway that bicyclists perceive as safe,” said Shane Farthing, executive director of the Washington Area Bicyclist Association. Jeanne Mallett is really worked up about sidewalk cycling. 
• Crowd-sourced bicycle maps of cities, including DC. 
• ANC 3D should support bike lanes on New Mexico Avenue. 
• DC Bike Party organizer's bike stolen before 1 year anniversary ride (this Friday).
• Long Bridge Drive, which will feature bike lanes that might some day connect Arlington to the MVT, might finally be ready for construction. 
• Centerville Football coach is either wrong, or misquoted "Haddock said the highest rate of concussions in youth sports occurs in girls soccer, and the highest rate of concussions in the United States stems from bike accidents." He's talking about NUMBERS, not rates and not at the high school level. Either way, it's deceptive to try and cast football as less of a concussion risk than cycling. The numbers are higher because far more people participate in those sports. Concussion rates for football are the highest in all high school sports. I'm unaware of any data on concussion rates for cycling, but I'd be stunned if they're higher for cycling than for football.  While there are twice as many bike-related concussions per year than in football, there are far fewer people playing football than biking (for starters, almost no women play). 
• Speaking of failing to consider the denominator. Here's someone arguing that Mixed Martial Arts fighting is safer than cycling because more people die while cycling. He also fails to consider the benefits of cycling - everything looks bad when you only consider the costs [Thousands of people contract sexually transmitted diseases each year? Well, I guess it's cold showers for me from now on.] "Is it all so simple that we can just ignore the hard numbers behind these two activities and two data sets?" he asks. Apparantly, it is.  By his logic it's safer to play Russian roulette than bike, because fewer people die doing it. [I don't have an opinion on MMA and whether it should be legal or not, but casting Citibike as dangerous or biking as more dangerous than fighting without using all relevant data is bad form]. 
• Friends of the Capital Crescent Trail are back to pushing the idea that light rail near high schools is dangerous - because two men who were too old to be in high school were hit by a different kind of train at a time of day when high school students would not be at school. But there is no reason to fear roads near schools. None at all.
• "The Montgomery County Planning Board approved the facility plan for the North Branch Hiker-Biker Trail on June 27"
  • The south end of the proposed trail will connect to the existing Lakeside Trail located on the east side of Lake Frank within Rock Creek Regional Park and will continue north to connect with Muncaster Mill Road and cross at the Emory Lane intersection. The trail then will use the Emory Lane Bikeway and cross the Intercounty Connector Bikeway to the ICC bridge over the North Branch of Rock Creek. The proposed trail will go under the ICC bridge and connect to a future hard surface trail, which will be constructed by the developer of the Preserve at Rock Creek and will be dedicated along with parkland to the Department of Parks. The developer-built trail will end at Bowie Mill Local Park.
  • There was a suggestion to connect the trail to two local, dead-end roads, but residents of those roads didn't want the trail connections. “Connecting the trail is important to the Olney community, as it is a missing piece of a larger network, said association President Barbara Falcigno. “GOCA feels the master plan alignment that keeps the trail within the natural area is preferred over directing users onto roads.”
  • "The resolution also stated that GOCA feels the trail route should stay off area roads such as these which do not have a shoulder or sidewalk, which could make it unsafe for users."
• "The 2013 Giro di Coppi bicycle race will take place in the Sugarloaf Mountain region beginning at 9 a.m. Saturday"
• At least he wasn't on the sidewalk. 

Monday Afternoon Commute - Paradox

Good afternoon

• Reminder: Meeting tonight on Wisconsin Avenue sidewalks. 
• Minneapolis studies bicycle crashes in the hopes of reducing them "What's very clear from the Minneapolis data is that while riders and motorists may share in the fault for collisions, they don't come close to sharing equal suffering. Bicyclists sustained some type of injury in nearly 9 out of 10 car-bike accidents, while the city found no record of motorists being injured at all. Meantime 1 in 5 crashes result in a hit-and-run, and drivers are almost always the ones who flee the scene." The study also upheld the more cyclist=fewer crashes paradox.

Wednesday Afternoon Commute - Uphill

Good afternoon

• If you want a bike friendly DC, getting involved in the DC's effort to create a comprehensive transportation plan will give you a chance to make that happen. "residents who support improving transit, walking, and bicycling will have to speak up. We'll have to participate at the February 9 meeting and at future events in person and online. "
• CaBi is options: “I’m looking forward to the bike share coming to Bethesda,” he said. “Then I don’t have to deal with the delays of the Red Line. I’d rather pay bike share than Metro. At least I can get to work on time.”
• Picture of the Met Branch Trail at Silver Spring Transit Center from above in this post by antibozo.
• One BRAC transportation success: the construction of new bike paths and sidewalks. "I know that doesn't sound like much but it is a lot," Montgomery County BRAC Coordinator Phil Alperson says. "There are hundreds of people who are now commuting to the Navy by bike or walking who didn't do that before." 
• Lance, Lance, Lance, Lance, Lance (I used to work in the hotel where that interview happened, BTW). 
• Biking uphill is satisfying and connectivity does boost mode share. 

The 10 most crash-prone intersections for cyclists

DDOT released some crash statistics from the period 2008-2010 and this is the first post based on that data. First up is the 10 most crash-prone intersections. I'm chosing not to use the word "dangerous" because that involve knowing the seriousness of the crash and the amount of traffic at that intersection. These counts are probably more indicative of places where there are many cyclists than places that are "dangerous". 14th Street has many of the top 10, but it also has bike lanes that attract a lot of cyclists.

One problematic thing about the data is that it often doesn't make sense. For one thing, there is no "type of collision" for hitting a cyclist. So it's always labeled as involving a pedestrian, such as "left turn hit ped" for example, which means a car hit a cyclist, not that a cyclist hit a pedestrian. In additon, sometimes the numbers don't add up. Some crashes involve 0 vehicles and 0 pedestrians. That doesn't sound like much of a crash. Others are labeled "left turn hit ped" but, elsewhere, as involving 1 vehicle and 0 pedestrians. So, there is some incomplete and inaccurate record keeping to work around. There are some crashes labeled as in the dark during daylight hours with clear skies. There are also a lot of crashes with a crash type of "other" or none. That's not real useful.

Another issue is that some terms of art are foreign to me. I'm not sure what a right angle crash is, for example.

My biggest conclusion from this is that filling in these crash reports is either too difficult for the average officer in the field, or isn't very important to them.

1. 16th, U and New Hampshire, NW - 7 crashes, 6 injuries. One crash was a cyclist riding on wet pavement who hit a stationary object.  Two of the other crashes were at night and one was at dusk.

Types of collisions: 2 left turn hit vehicle, 2 right angle, 1 side-swiped, 1 left turn hit ped and 1 other.

2. 39th, Wisconsin and Van Ness, NW - 7 crashes, 4 injuries. 1 hit and run.

Types of collisions: 2 rear end, 2 other, 1 side-swiped, 1 left turn hit vehicle and 1 parked car

3. 14th Street and Perry Place, NW - 6 crashes, 4 injuries. 3 hit-and-runs. 4 crashes at night.

Types of collisions: 2 left turn hit ped, 2 side-swiped, 1 right angle , 1 left turn hit vehicle

4. 14th Street and Rhode Island, NW - 6 crashes, 3 injuries. 2 hit and runs. 2 crashes at night and 1 in the rain.

Types of collisions: 2 other, 1 side-swiped, 1 right angle, 1 left turn hit ped, 1 parked car

5(tie). 7th and H street, NW - 5 crashes, 4 injuries. 1 crash involved a commercial vehicle. 1 crash at night and 1 at dusk.

Types of collisions: 1 other, 1 side-swiped, 1 straight hit ped , 1 left turn hit ped, 1 parked car

5(tie). 14th and Euclid, NW - 5 crashes, 4 injuries. 1 hit and run. 1 crash at night.

Types of collisions: 2 right angle, 1 rear end , 1 left turn hit vehicle, 1 other

5(tie). 14th and R Street, NW - 5 crashes, 4 injuries. 1 crash at night

Types of collisions: 2 other, 1 right turn hit vehicle, 1 right turn hit ped, 1 right angle

5(tie). 15th and K Street, NW - 5 crashes, 4 injuries. 1 hit and run. 1 Commercial vehicle. 1 crash in the dark (at 9:30 am?).

Types of collisions: 2 other, 1 right turn hit vehicle, 1 left turn hit vehicle, 1 side-swiped

9(tie). 14th and P Street, NW - 5 crashes, 3 injuries. 1 Commercial vehicle. 1 crash at night.

Types of collisions: 2 right angle, 2 side-swiped, 1 none

9(tie). 31st and M Street, NW - 5 crashes, 3 injuries. 1 crash at night.

Types of collisions: 2 other, 1 side-swiped, 1 straight hit ped, 1 parked car

9(tie). Georgia Ave and Barry Pl, NW - 5 crashes, 3 injuries. 2 hit and run. 1 crash at night.

Types of collisions: 2 side-swiped, 1 right turn hit ped, 1 right turn hit vehicle, 1 parked car

9(tie). Columbia Rd and Ontario Rd, NW - 5 crashes, 3 injuries. 2 hit and run. 1 crash at night. This is where the WABA office is.

Types of collisions: 2 side-swiped, 1 right turn hit ped, 1 right turn hit vehicle, 1 parked car

For those who are spatial thinkers, here's a map of these locations.

 
View crashiest intersections - cyclists in a larger map

All of these crashes (and it's more than 10 due to a tie for 9th) happened in NW. The most crash prone intersection outside of NW is at North Capitol and H Street (4 crashes, 4 injuries).

By quadrant the worst intersections are:

NE - Florida Ave and West Virginia Ave, NE - 3 crashes, 3 injuries

SE - 2nd and Independence Ave, SE - 2 crashes, 2 injury (though 12th and East Capitol had 3 crashes, 3 injuries)

SW - 7th and Independence Ave, SW - 2 crashes, 2 injury

7th and Florida NW stands out as well. It had 4 crashes with 3 disabling injuries. Few injuries are labeled as disabling and no other intersection had this many.

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