Peter Rosenfeld
Wed, 17 Jul 2002 14:16:47 -0700
> > I think that "perceived" might be the right characterization of the "dooring problem". > > What is the empirical evidence, from Philadelphia or beyond, that establishes a nexus between bike lanes located in the dooring zone and injuries to cyclists. > Santa Barbara - Their statistics showed that in 1974, before many bike lanes had gone in, that dooring accounted for 7.29% of car/bike collisions. Now, after over 2 decades of lane building, including many door zone lanes, car/bike collisions account for 16% of collisions. Not proof, but trend. But the proper way to look at it is from a traffic engineering point-of-view: 1. there is the facts that riding in a narrow lane between traffic and frequently opening car doors is likely to cause dooring. Riding outside this zone will not result in dooring. 2. dooring is a leading casue of car/bike accidents in city centers. A number of studies are available. The San Francisco Bike Plan used a study showing "dooring" was responsible for 22% of all car/bike collisions in that city, the largest single category. (This percentage is obviously going to vary city to city by the amount of parallel parking that they have) Combining #1 and #2 would indicates that riding in the door zone will result in a significant number of car/bike accidents ( in urban areas with parallel parking). This logically implies that door zone bike lanes are not a good idea if one's goal is safety. Frankly, I don't know what more one should want. From an engineering point of view, that says these lanes are a bad idea.It needs to be proved, instead, that door zone bike lanes don't cause a problem rather than the other way around as they are illogical. Generally, the burden of proof is on the outlandish idea, not the sensible idea. I would like empirical evidence that these lanes make bicyclists safer. AFAIK - Philadelphia has not done a study of how the lanes are affecting traffic accidents, other than to look at the general trends. I doubt are even keeping accurate records on bike accidents that don't result in death. -Peter Rosenfeld ---- You are receiving this because you are subscribed to the Bicycle Coalition of the Delaware Valley list named "bike." To subscribe or unsubscribe or for archive information, see <http://www.purple.com/list.html>.