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Cyclists in high-vis (CC licensed image by garryknight)Mandatory hi-vis had no influence on number of cyclists involved in collisions according to Italian study
An Italian study has taken a look at “the role of conspicuity in preventing bicycle–motorized vehicle collisions.” Put another way, researchers looked at whether legislation demanding that cyclists wear high-vis had any impact on safety. They found that it did not.
BikeBiz reports that data on the monthly number of vehicles involved in road crashes during the period 2001–2015 were obtained from the Italian National Institute of Statistics.
Results revealed that legislation demanding that cyclists wear high-visibility clothing did not influence the total number of cyclists involved in road collisions and nor did it affect the number of collisions involving cyclists as a proportion of all vehicle collisions.
“The introduction of the legislation did not produce immediate effects, nor did it have any effects over time,” concluded the researchers.
They did however concede that they had not taken account of the extent to which hi-vis laws were being adhered to by cyclists, writing: “Lack of knowledge on how the law was introduced, the degree of enforcement by the police, and behavioural changes in response to the law makes it difficult to attribute the lack of effect on bicycle crashes.”
A study carried out last year by the Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust and Nottingham University found “increased odds of a collision crash” among cyclists who wear reflective clothing.
The researchers suggested that riders who believe they are more conspicuous may adopt more exposed positions on the road, before going on to point out that the results “should be treated with caution” as they were based on only 76 accidents.
In contrast, a larger study in Denmark, involving nearly 7,000 cyclists, found cyclists suffered 47 per cent fewer accidents causing injuries if a bright yellow jacket was worn.
2013 research from the University of Bath and Brunel University found that no matter what clothing a cyclist wears, around 1-2 per cent of drivers will pass dangerously close when overtaking.
Alex has written for more cricket publications than the rest of the road.cc team combined. Despite the apparent evidence of this picture, he doesn't especially like cake.
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138 comments
That proves it then.
1. Hi-viz might be a 'good idea', but there are loads that are orders of magnitude better.
2. One death per 30 million miles does not a dangerous activity make.
I think we've all agreed that we agree on the main points, and agreed to disagree on the finer details.
My work here is done
My point that I was trying to demonstrate and have healthy discussion with Rich_cb was my reluctance to accept that the wearing of yellow reduced the liklihood of having a PIA by a third. That is all, no more, no less. I realise that Rich has a far more analytical intelligence than I do and I am genuinely interested in this article. The study was for wearing a yellow jacket. I have doubts that blindly following the results of the study is a good thing.
For example (and I know that this is a very weak analysis and anecdotal) I have just got back from a ride with friends in the South Downs. One of the group was wearing hi-vis yellow and one was wearing bright blue. Seeing as Rich mentioned the car (actually taxi firm) study in singapore about yellow and blue vehicles, I thought that it might be fun to see which one I thought stood out best against the backdrop of the South Downs hills, daffodils, primroses etc. Without a doubt the blue one stood out the most. Now was this just bias, a misconception, an un-scientific and narrow study on my part? Probably but who really cares? Now, when the summer arrives and some of those same hills are covered in Rape crops, is the yellow or blue jacket going to be more visible. You make up your mind. I go back to post 1 (again agreed to be anecdotal) where I said that it does not matter what colour I wear, if it is reflective etc. and changing mentalities not the colour of the cloth.
I wholeheartedly agree that it is a responsibilty of mine to make myself as visible on the public highway as I can. I do this by wearing what I consider to be bright clothing during the day, reflectives (including full reflective rucksack for commute) at night, and use daylight flashing lumens. The only thing that I cannot physically do is make myself as big as a car.
You will have to excuse me if I am still dubious about wearing a yellow jacket as was done in this study. Finally Rich_cb, thank you for entering the discussion and putting over your points so eloquently and I feel that it was healthy and I understood other peoples points of view as well as yours and learned from it. I will still be wearing red though ;0)
Thank you to Rich_cb for the most reasoned, collected, non-inflammatory, cogent set of answers to serious questions on any thread I've seen ever.
Quite simply, Rich_cb didn't push any case for mandation of hi-vis (thanks BTBS), and hasn't evens suggested that it should be the focus of efforts in reducing accidents (thanks Fluffy kitten, Pushing 50, and Davel) but has simply said that there is good science to suggest that the wearing of hi-viz yellow has an effect in reducing accidents to individual cyclists. This is a simple, demonstrable point.
DO go out there and campaign for higher driver awareness (start with compulsory lights on bikes and all vehicles in day or night time), but don't waste your time trying to make people look more carefully - it makes no difference;
DO go out and encourage as many people as possible to take up cycling as a means of recreation and transport;
DO foment for safer infrastructure design
DO chase your local MP to enshrine cycling and other non-motorised transports in the same cocoon of self -righteous entitlement currently enjoyed by most drivers
DO protest, campaign, march, peacefully obstruct, educate and positively facilitate all efforts to raise our collective safety
but in the same way as you might eat 5 helpings of fruit and veg each day, or take your folic acid, or pop an aspirin as a prophylactic against heart disease, DON'T decry the efforts of those who seek to augment our individual safeties with such methods as recommending the wearing of Hi-Vis, helmets, bells or neck mounted air bags with the argument that there is more should be done in other directions. There is always more that can be done, generally on a community level, but this should not distract from the importance of taking your own individual safety to heart, and making the best decision you can based on the available evidence
I agree largely with that. I think one point misses the mark by some way. The encouragement of cyclists to wear PPE creates the impression of a dangerous activity. One of the main reasons given for people not taking up cycling is their impression that it's dangerous. Good luck 'persuading as many people as possible' to take up cycling.
But my main problem is, the stuff you mention is not happening proportionately, is it? The best-selling rags in this country don't print an article about a cyclist being killed on page 4, quoting a lawyer saying that the cyclist wasn't wearing a helmet or fluorescent green, then fills the rest of the paper with the reasons drivers actually kill cyclists. PPE and victim-blaming is being given damagingly disproportionate attention, and used as a shitty stick to beat cyclists and those who might become cyclists.
I don't know what Rich_cb does with the rest of his time, but the odds are that he doesn't spend a proportionate amount of the time that he spends on here obsessing over PPE doing all the other stuff you mention.
In a nutshell, "fuck hi-viz til the stuff that will actually kill you is sorted". Which could be the tagline of the enormous engineering firm that I worked for.
Of course it's more nuanced than that. The studies he's quoting have, of course, been done. I disagree with a lot of the leaps he then makes. But it's a propaganda war. If you're going to get a message over on the ADD, binary world of the Web, I'd much rather it was that, than 'oh, but hang on, hi-viz has been proven to be effective in a set of conditions which you will never find yourself riding in'.
In the same way that Rich_cb isn't arguing for compulsory hi-vis, I haven't seen anyone arguing for a ban on it. I have seen arguments for why it's advantages might be overstated and for why there are counter-intuitive arguments as to why hi-vis may have negative and unintended consequences.
There's the argument to suggest that the more ubiquitous hi-vis is, the less effective it becomes.
Then there's how, much like with helmets, the perception for the need to wear PPE makes cycling seem far more dangerous than it actually is.
Or how about how it perpetuates a victim-blaming culture that absolves drivers of some or all of their responsibility to drive with due care and attention.
So while we can all agree that it is a matter of personal choice, that choice should where possible be made with as much information as possible.
Stupid malfunctioning browser = double post.
[Maybe I'll eventually think of something else to say here. Just have to wait for someone to say something I disagree with.]
But Rich_CB has consistently gone on about high-viz and pushed people to use it, he clearly is on the team of those promoting it, why else does he keep banging on about it?
And the analogy with '5 fruit and veg a day' doesn't make any sense at all. In what way are the two issues supposed to be analogous? In your 'fruit and veg' analogy, what's the parallel for bad-driving or poor road design? You seem to be equating human action and choices with the facts of natural processes. Doing the usual thing of treating drivers and road-planners as if they aren't moral agents but just aspects of the natural world that can't possibly change.
That's a very poor analogy indeed. Almost dishonest, even.
Given the anti-cyclist mentality of some drivers, I'd be concerned hi-vis would mark me out as a target to hit as opposed to a person to avoid.
I think the best, and at the same time worst argument for wearing hi-vis (and helmets) is that if you're KSI'd, the driver will have a better chance of having to face some kind of realistic justice and their insurance company may pay out a more realistic amount of compensation.
We live in a car-centric society in which the police investigating, the CPS prosecuting, the magistrates/judge presiding and the jury deciding will more than likely be drivers and less than likely be cyclists. As such they already have a bias as they consider how easy it is to make a split-second mistake and how it could just as easily have been them on trial.
We know that if a cyclist is killed in broad daylight from crushing abdominal injuries, it will be noted at the scene and brought up at trial as to whether they were wearing hi-vis and a helmet. This gives many the excuse they're looking for to aquit, or at least to soften the sentence to the point of being no more than a slap in the wrist.
Rich, as I have said before I am not a colour scientist and I appreciate the argument that you put forward about hi-vis, however this study of 7000 was for one coloured jacket only. As I have also said my colour of choice is bright red. I am wondering if the same results would have been found for bright red, day glo orange, shocking pink, electric blue. If the same results would be assumed, then surely more work needs to be done on the Danish experiment? I also accept the point that a previous poster alludes but would hate to wish for. What is the driving mentality differences between U.K. and Danish motorists and should the same study be done here?
In an ideal world we'd have a similar study for every colour and piece of equipment (even helmets...) in every country.
Unfortunately we're very unlikely to get anything approaching that so as you said we have to make assumptions.
Cycling is more common in Denmark than the UK so drivers will be more used to looking for cyclists at junctions etc.
The country has approximately the same latitude as the UK so day length etc will be roughly equivalent.
The findings were so significant that even if a jacket was only half as effective as the one studied it would still be worthwhile wearing it.
When I say opinion take that as; if I am wearing yellow, red, black, white, blue, green etc.
I know that yellow is considered the brightest (although as stated I am not a colour scientist) however a cyclist wearing any of the other colours imaginable is still generally visible from a long way off.
If I go back to the original article, are the counter studies from Bath and Nottingham and Italy not valid?
I look forward to your education.
If you are just attempting to put forward a scientific argument on numbers alone then yes, the Danish did a comprehnsive job. However I am still to be convinced that the element of luck,circumstance and misconception was taken out of the equation. Humans are easily manipulated, especially by numbers, statistics and rules.
Can I please make this clear. I am not against people wearing hi-vis for their perception of added safety. I am looking at this with a clear and unbiased view and cannot (at the moment) understand why it is, that no matter what I wear, how I ride etc. that wearing yellow (the colour of the jacket concerned) is going to change the opinion of (possibly) the majority of drivers towards me whilst I ride on the public highway.
A large enough RCT should minimise the effects of chance and statistical analysis will be used to confirm this has taken place.
Of the other studies, the Italian study didn't look at the effect of hi vis itself, just the effect of the law.
The Bath study didn't look at collisions, just close passes and the other study was far smaller and a case control study.
These are widely accepted to produce poorer quality evidence than RCTs especially when small.
Yes, the Danish study is statistically well done, but I would have thought that hi-vis wearing In Denmark was so unusual that it was bound to catch drivers’ eyes and so lead to better safety figures. The study needs replicating in a situation where hi-vis is much more common, and possibly therefore more easily ignored: i.e the UK.
Thinking about it, it seems to me that the choice of what questions to ask is not a neutral, scientific one, it depends on what sorts of studies the political context makes possible. The social sciences are intrinsically political, for that reason, and hence are always limited in how truly 'scientific' they can be.
Bias is not the word you are looking for. Experience is. Please read post 1 again. Your bias towards regarding this report as carte blanche evidence that wearing hi-vis will reduce your risk of a multiparty accident by 1/3 is somewhat flawed.
Maybe it is time for us all to start leaning up against lampposts.
Bias is the exact right word.
Anecdotes and opinion are not reliable sources of evidence.
Post 1 is an anecdote. As evidence it's close to worthless.
Ask any engineering or construction grown-up: PPE is the last resort, the 'just in case' when everything else has been dealt with.
I'd agree that PPE is the last resort but unfortunately on an individual level that's where we are.
On an individual level what other resort do you have?
You cycle assertively and safely but that is absolutely no guarantee of avoiding an accident.
Well, I wonder whether you're devoting your time to the threats to our safety proportionately.
I have no idea what other Web debates or campaigns you might be involved in, and it's your time, and this isn't an attempt to guilt-trip or smother you any other way.
But if I spent, say, 1 hour espousing the virtues of cyclist PPE, I'd probably then feel the need to spend a couple of hundred hours campaigning for things that might actually make a noticeable difference, to our safety, like improvements in driving standard, or car-free zones, or more traffic cops, or strict liability, or the removal of useless and biased transport ministers, or proper infrastructure.
That's one available option as an individual.
[/quote] I'd agree that PPE is the last resort but unfortunately on an individual level that's where we are. On an individual level what other resort do you have? You cycle assertively and safely but that is absolutely no guarantee of avoiding an accident.
Correct; we agree. You ride assertively and safely but that is ablolutely no guarantee of avoiding an accident.
Also; we make ourselves as visible as possible with hundreds of lumens flashing and wearing bright colours (not neccessarily hi-vis) and this is also absolutely no guarantee of avoiding an accident.
So, what is the point? I try to do exactly what you try to do, and alert my presence to drivers (I tend to wear red (FYI)). Statistically, according to the Danish report, this should reduce the risk of me having a PIA by 1/3 (suggesting that bright red is as conspicuous a colour as bright yellow). I have not had a PIA for a dozen or more years even when I did not give thought to colour. The report is not scientific but based on maybes, perhaps and the luck and perception of the riders involved is it not?
This is a good example of a strawman.
Neither Rich_cb nor the Danish research nor anything I've ever read about hi-vis (or any kind of safety measure) claimed anything was a guarantee of avoiding an accident.
I got that straight from a Rich_cb comment
The report is scientific. It's about as scientific as it's possible to be when looking at hi vis.
Thankfully injuries in collisions with cars are rare (not rare enough granted) so you need to study a very large number of cyclists to determine if a particular intervention has an effect.
The Danish study looked at nearly 7000 cyclists over the course of an entire year. The vast majority of them had no accidents whatsoever but there was a big enough difference between the two groups to be able to show a beneficial effect from wearing a hi vis jacket.
Yes, it was 'scientific' within its terms, but, as with so much of the social sciences, its terms were so limited that it's hard to say what the results actually mean. All it says it what happens in terms of RTCs (not entirely sure I like the paper's use of the word 'accident') when existing cyclists within the existing population, with the existing context, voluntarily wear or don't wear, high-viz.
It says nothing about the effects (on total health outcomes, not just RTCs) of the authorities or anyone with any degreee of power or influence focussing on high viz or promoting it, or (worse) making it compulsory.
At most it's a bit of data to consider if you as an invididual are deciding whether you want to wear the stuff or not (I don't, and all the study tells me is that a lot more work needs to be done to make the roads safe, even in Denmark - which is not up there with the Netherlands in any case, as I understand it, and personally I think even the Netherlands doesn't go far enough).
It's not really that important an issue though, and I question why you put so much emphasis on it.
Rich, I see your unquestionable evidence but provide this:
The rate of fatal injury per 100,000 construction workers dropped from 2.12 in 2015/16 to 1.37 in 2016/17.
However, this was still well above the all-industry average for the latest year of 0.43
Hard hats and hi viz appears to make it more dangerous. FACT.
A helpful demonstration of your ignorance. Thank you.
Yeah but I'm not dead because I'm not wearing hi viz and a hard hat am I, therefore you are wrong.
I followed your methodology to the letter of the law. Find a big sample size, find something that shows a correlation to your own bias, correlate, present as irrefutable and attack with total stupidity anyone who points out the flaws...
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