Originally Posted by
I-Like-To-Bike
But as previously pointed out this study also gathers zero data on seveity of injuries incurred (or not) by the cyclists in accidents. Evaluating relative " safety," "risk" or "danger" ( all the same thing) cannot be done credibly without evaluating the severity of the various accidents.
Only if risk/safety/danger is measured as the avoidance of any accident/mishap (regardless of consequences) do such "crash rates" have any alleged meaning. Of course such an evaluation of "relative safety" would count as equal, skinned knee/scratched paint/no injury accidents with fatalities and catastrophic injuries. Let me know when you can find a safety professional (or any professional) who would endorse or rely onsuch a scheme of measuring and/or mitigating risk/safety/danger for any environment.
Yes, I agree that "risk" needs to consider both likelihood and severity. But the challenge is that any given car/bike collision mode (such as a right hook) can have a wide variety of severities (from simple road rash to death). It's likely that the hit from behind crashes are going to have a higher severity on average compared to other collision modes, but I don't believe the crash data are detailed enough to make those kinds of distinctions. In practical terms as an individual cyclist, the best I can do is to make the shortcut assumption that all car/bike crashes could have a high severity, and ride in a way to minimize my chance of being in a car/bike crash.