Keep in mind that inexperienced cyclists gain experience by being on the road. Keep their bikes parked in the garage, and they'll always be inexperienced cyclists.

Of all accident types, the "overtaking" accidents are the most likely to be fatal. So, if one looks only at total accidents, the seriousness of the overtake accidents will be under-represented. Of course, the true picture of accidents should look at fatal&serious plus minor (reportable?) accidents.

Another thing about the overtake accidents is that they become much worse at night (with poor lighting). Ride where the cars don't drive, and the invisible rider may survive with cars passing not seeing the person. Ride in the middle of where cars are driving, and the invisible rider at night becomes bug-splat on a bumper.

Here is a New York study in which only ONE fatality occurred inside a bicycle lane (out of 225 in the study), and only ten that were near a bicycle lane (including 3 that didn't include motor vehicles).
http://www.nyc.gov/html/dot/download...fatalities.pdf

It is hard to argue the dangers of the bike lanes when < 1% of the fatalities occur in bike lanes, and < 5% occur near the bike lanes.