Posting near misses presents a distorted view of the cycling

Commuting, Day rides, Audax, Incidents, etc.
mnichols
Posts: 1465
Joined: 22 Apr 2013, 4:29pm

Posting near misses presents a distorted view of the cycling

Post by mnichols »

I'm on a number of cycling facebook pages and forums, and I'm concerned by all the posts and coverage of near misses and road rage incidents

I think it presents a very negative, unbalanced view of cycling that can only discourage people from getting on a bike

I've cycled 2,300 miles in the past 30 days, and have had no near misses, or road rage incidents, but I have had lots of people come up to me in cafes and start conversations about my bike and where I am riding, offer support and encouragement or tell me about their cycling experiences

There are thousands, tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of cars and lorries that wait patiently for me, share the road, or overtake me between every negative incident, but if you read the posts, pages and watch the youtube videos you would think everyone hates cyclists and is trying to kill us - my anecdotale stats don't bear this out

People don't post about people waiting patiently, letting us pull out or just sharing the road, but we do seem to share every negative incident and this presents a distorted view of cycling. Shouldn't our goal be to encourage more people on to bikes, or at least present a balanced view of the risk
User avatar
mjr
Posts: 20308
Joined: 20 Jun 2011, 7:06pm
Location: Norfolk or Somerset, mostly
Contact:

Re: Posting near misses presents a distorted view of the cyc

Post by mjr »

mnichols wrote:People don't post about people waiting patiently, letting us pull out or just sharing the road, but we do seem to share every negative incident and this presents a distorted view of cycling. Shouldn't our goal be to encourage more people on to bikes, or at least present a balanced view of the risk

I do sometimes post about motorists doing nice things, but bad news gets more eyeballs. This isn't just cycling - contemplate the number of bad news and good news shows on TV, or compare the number of social network groups about good parking to all the "Parking Like A..." ones.

Yes, we want to encourage more people on to bikes, but we have the slightly-conflicting aim of wanting Road Justice, so we do need to present a balanced view and not just be all "Everything Is Awesome" when it isn't.
MJR, mostly pedalling 3-speed roadsters. KL+West Norfolk BUG incl social easy rides http://www.klwnbug.co.uk
All the above is CC-By-SA and no other implied copyright license to Cycle magazine.
iviehoff
Posts: 2411
Joined: 20 Jan 2009, 4:38pm

Re: Posting near misses presents a distorted view of the cyc

Post by iviehoff »

mnichols wrote:I'm on a number of cycling facebook pages and forums, and I'm concerned by all the posts and coverage of near misses and road rage incidents
I think it presents a very negative, unbalanced view of cycling that can only discourage people from getting on a bike

How has the railway industry achieved its very low accident rate? By being focused on "nearly" accidents, what they call "accident precursors". They recognise that there are random factors affecting whether an "accident precursor" turns into a real accident or not, and a high incidence of "accident precursors" inevitably turns into a high rate of accidents. For example, to use a road example, if a vehicle goes around a blind bend on a narrow road too fast to stop if there is something coming the other way at just the wrong moment, it gets away with it except on those occasions when there is something coming the other way at just the wrong moment. This is a random factor, so there is a conversion rate of such an "accident precursor" into actual accidents which reflects the occurrence of that random factor, the other vehicle being in just the wrong place at just the wrong time.

Thus it is good practice to focus on "nearly" accidents, because there is a conversion rate of nearly accidents into deaths. It is only by getting the "nearly" accidents down that the actual accident rate will come down.

Nothing happened in 2,300 miles over 30 days? Are you talking about being on a cycle tour in locations selected for being pleasant cycling?

Certainly some people do have distorted views of cycling. I suggested to a fit and healthy neighbour he could cycle the 2km to the station and thus avoid the parking charge and scramble to get into the car park before it filled up. "Cycle down our road? he complained, "it's a death trap." But actually it is a road specifically sought out as a cycling route by many leisure abd commuting cyclists because it is a relatively quiet country lane. Yes, it is used as a bit of rat run in the rush hour, but we are only talking about something like a car per minute. Yes, it has some blind bends and narrow bits and a couple of short steep hills, and bits without streetlights or footway, but that is the nature of many of the relatively quiet country backroads that cyclists seek out.
robing
Posts: 1359
Joined: 7 Sep 2014, 9:11am

Re: Posting near misses presents a distorted view of the cyc

Post by robing »

Partly agree. I have had incident free rides, but there's nearly always at least one close pass caused by someone being impatient and trying to overtake at a pinch point. I don't let it affect my rides. So far I've been lucky.
mnichols
Posts: 1465
Joined: 22 Apr 2013, 4:29pm

Re: Posting near misses presents a distorted view of the cyc

Post by mnichols »

iviehoff wrote:How has the railway industry achieved its very low accident rate? By being focused on "nearly" accidents, what they call "accident precursors".


This is a really interesting and valid point, but that sounds like a structured and methodical appproach that leads to an outcome. Where as what I see on the forums and on facebook is just "Guess what happened me.." with no process, structure or outcome

iviehoff wrote:Nothing happened in 2,300 miles over 30 days? Are you talking about being on a cycle tour in locations selected for being pleasant cycling?

It was a self planned, self supported end to end of America, from Canada to Mexico, using whatever roads where available, often freeways, sometimes interstates and busy roads. Every day we were warned to be careful and that the roads were too dangerous for cycling, but 3 of us did the whole thing and 2 more did about 1,100 miles, so we did over 9,000 miles without incident.

Whilst I accept that this was in America, I have had similar experiences all over Europe and in the UK.
22camels
Posts: 302
Joined: 21 Sep 2013, 8:15pm

Re: Posting near misses presents a distorted view of the cyc

Post by 22camels »

Statistics of low incidence events is highly susceptible to bias.

A lot depends on the rider. I am sure I could increase my rate of near misses tenfold by modifying my behaviour. I feel I''ve had enough near misses that I've acquired the defensive reflexes to avoid them but this has taken me years. Somebody less experienced or with a different risk appetite (which includes also choosing the roads one rides on) would have a different view of cycling safety. There is also luck involved.

Yet good cycling infrastructure should not require experience and strive to make cycling safe to all - on the other hand no infrastructure improvement (that I would want) could have averted my only serious near miss this year down a narrow winding single track country lane with one vehicle passing every ten minutes.

I totally agree about the distorted view - yet with any risk perception there is a fine balance to be struck, and in the end it's up to the individual to process this mass of over-information that hits us every day.
irc
Posts: 5192
Joined: 3 Dec 2008, 2:22pm
Location: glasgow

Re: Posting near misses presents a distorted view of the cyc

Post by irc »

iviehoff wrote:How has the railway industry achieved its very low accident rate?


By running very few movements on tracks with no other users. Though going by fatalities by distance travelled bus and coaches are safer than rail though.

http://cyclinginfo.co.uk/blog/2437/cycl ... transport/
eileithyia
Posts: 8399
Joined: 31 Jan 2007, 6:46pm
Location: Horwich Which is Lancs :-)

Re: Posting near misses presents a distorted view of the cyc

Post by eileithyia »

viewtopic.php?f=7&t=70689

Trouble is we do not notice all the vehicles who pass us with all sorts of consideration, we always remember the close passes / close shaves. On a recent ride with my son we had this conversation as he muttered about a close pass, i reminded him the ride generally had not been that bad as what about all the drivers who had given him loads of room.

I often look at posted videos of 'close passes' and maybe it is because of my commuting into a busy city, but i often feel i have different concept of what constitutes a 'close pass'.

What usually bothers me most is the near miss where i nearly get squished at a junction and the situation is usually salvaged by a loud alarmed shout and an avoiding maneouvre on my behalf... I can think of a large number of incidents over 30 years where I have had to do this.
I stand and rejoice everytime I see a woman ride by on a wheel the picture of free, untrammeled womanhood. HG Wells
pwa
Posts: 17371
Joined: 2 Oct 2011, 8:55pm

Re: Posting near misses presents a distorted view of the cyc

Post by pwa »

I sort of agree with the OP. My own experience on the road is almost all positive, with few "incidents". Anyone new to cycling would have second thoughts if they looked at this forum. I am conscious of the fact that many people have city cycling as a major part of their cycling world, and I don't. That may explain my more positive outlook. But if we want people to join us, cycling our roads, we should present a more rounded picture with the good stuff shouted about too.
Psamathe
Posts: 17650
Joined: 10 Jan 2014, 8:56pm

Re: Posting near misses presents a distorted view of the cyc

Post by Psamathe »

22camels wrote:Statistics of low incidence events is highly susceptible to bias. ...

I would agree.

I do think that public posting of near misses on the internet will create a very false impression of how dangerous cycling is and will discourage some from taking it up.

However, that does not mean research into near misses should not or cannot be carried out. In the example of the rail industry above, I doubt they just posted their near misses for everybody to read, but rather submitted them (privately ?) and researched into why and what could be done to improve. So in the case of cycling, maybe best to have cyclists post details of near misses to some organisation who carry out the research as to why and improvements who DoT (and others) might listen to. That way we can learn and improve without presenting cycling as a high risk activity.

Ian
User avatar
mjr
Posts: 20308
Joined: 20 Jun 2011, 7:06pm
Location: Norfolk or Somerset, mostly
Contact:

Re: Posting near misses presents a distorted view of the cyc

Post by mjr »

Psamathe wrote:So in the case of cycling, maybe best to have cyclists post details of near misses to some organisation who carry out the research as to why and improvements who DoT (and others) might listen to. That way we can learn and improve without presenting cycling as a high risk activity.

www.nearmiss.bike
MJR, mostly pedalling 3-speed roadsters. KL+West Norfolk BUG incl social easy rides http://www.klwnbug.co.uk
All the above is CC-By-SA and no other implied copyright license to Cycle magazine.
Ben@Forest
Posts: 3647
Joined: 28 Jan 2013, 5:58pm

Re: Posting near misses presents a distorted view of the cyc

Post by Ben@Forest »

22camels wrote:A lot depends on the rider. I am sure I could increase my rate of near misses tenfold by modifying my behaviour. I feel I''ve had enough near misses that I've acquired the defensive reflexes to avoid them but this has taken me years...


This is true but not always going to help. This morning, riding on a long, straight lit 30mph street I signalled right and came out into the middle of the lane. From the engine note behind I could tell the car behind me wasn't slowing down, I didn't start to turn and sure enough he overtook me, which doing the speed he was I rather he did than squeezed on the inside. About 100 yds later now onto an unlit 60mph a van in a layby, with lights off, suddenly executed a 180 degree turn with no signal. By slamming on the brakes I didn't hit him (or he didn't hit me). Through experience and listening I could avoid the first incident, I think if I'd been 10 yds further down the road I couldn't have avoided the second, it was sheer luck the driver, who obviously didn't check his mirror, didn't cause an accident.

But I rode the next 25 odd miles with no safety issues. And at the weekend I did a 60 mile ride with no problems. How does two potential incidents in 100 yds work out statistically?
22camels
Posts: 302
Joined: 21 Sep 2013, 8:15pm

Re: Posting near misses presents a distorted view of the cyc

Post by 22camels »

I don't know but I am in the same boat as the OP on this one - all these incidents that you hear about happening to others somehow don't seem to affect me very often. Yet I think it's good that these incidents are publicised because the more people are aware of the risks, the safer the roads will become, eventually. The negative perception of cycling is a relatively small price to pay - after all, cycling is on the rise anyway, at least in this country.
User avatar
simonineaston
Posts: 8003
Joined: 9 May 2007, 1:06pm
Location: ...at a cricket ground

Re: Posting near misses presents a distorted view of the cyc

Post by simonineaston »

mnichols wrote:I'm on a number of cycling facebook pages and forums, and I'm concerned by all the posts and coverage of near misses and road rage incidents...
I never read 'em, - I don't see the point. It's not that I don't have sympathy for the missee - of course I do - but what's to be gained from posting them apart from the poster feeling a little bit better about the incident after posting - hopefully - otherwise there really isn't any point!
It's not as if posting about these events means they're all captured somehow and used as any sort of meaningful data... neither do they serve as a useful warning to anyone in particular.
No offence meant to any of the missees...
S
(on the look out for Armageddon, on board a Brompton nano & ever-changing Moultons)
Post Reply