Motorcyclists Deaths’ Rise by More Than 6 Percent

[fwtcc]

You'll have that..

[Fergus]

The 100,000 miles in that quote should actually be 100,000 vehicles registered per the document in that link.  And deaths per vehicles registered still doesn't really show what's happening. 

The article says
"Per 100,000 registered vehicles, fatality rate for motorcyclists (59.53) in 1999 was 3.6 times the fatality rate for passenger car occupants (16.41).  Per vehicle mile traveled in 1999 [for the 100,000 registered vehicles], motorcyclists (23.4) were about 18 times as likely as passenger car occupants (1.3) to die in motor vehicle traffic crashes."
I added the stuff in the []. I read the per VMT with respect to the 100k registered bikes...

[akmnstr]

In my real job I work with data and conduct statistical analysis in order to make inferences about the natural world.  In my field
there is standard of rigor that applies to the interpretation of data.  In the context of my professional experience I have to say that
you can infer very little with the data quoted here.  All we can say is there more motorcycle deaths than there were before.  We can't blame the squids or the old harley riders.  What we need to be able to make some inferences is some comparable standard.  Here is a simple example: Deaths are up 50% and ridership is 50% in the last 10 years.  Now is this all we need to say riding is no more dangerous than it was 10 years ago?  No, we still need to know the numbers of miles ridden.  If the number of miles ridden each year per rider has doubled than we could conclude that riding is now safer in spite of
the higher death rate.  On the issue of age, we would need to be able to compare the age structure of the dead riders to the age structure of the overall group of riders.  If we had those data we could conduct some statistical tests and begin to make some inferences about riding. 

[COWBOY]

These statistics are potentially misleading.   
A 6.6% growth in the number of deaths is significant if the rate of increase is less than 6.6%

If the overall growth of ridership in terms of miles ridden has increased more than 6.6% than it's a net decrease in motorcycle deaths per usage.  And we know there was an increase in motorcycle usage. 

My thoughts exactly. 

So I looked up some info and decided to do the math.

There are no current estimates from sources for the number of riders for 2007.  I was able to find a FHWA number for 2006. Therefore, I used the 2006 numbers all the way around, assuming the 75% growth in ridership used by the NHTA.

1997   deaths 2,116   riders   3,600,000  fatality rate:  .059%
2006   deaths 4,810   riders   6,200,000  fatality rate:  .078%

A higher percentage of riders are dying today than 10 years ago it appears.  If that's true then it should be a concern for the riding community and biking industry.

As far as the argument over licensing.  I'm a big libertarian and don't believe it's the governments role to protect you from yourself.  I do believe it is the governments role to help ensure you don't harm everyone else though.

Licensing is just common sense.  Can you buy an earth mover if you have the cash?  Yup.  Can you operate it legally or insure it without the proper license?  NOPE.  Training and education are something that should be expected and required - not hoped for.  It's that way for everything from a fork lift to a Semi.  Why should bikes be exempt from that or cars for that matter? 

Driving is not a right in this or any country it is a privilege.  One that can be revoked for any of a number of reasons and is on a daily basis.  If you're fighting this battle to maintain your "rights" = you've already lost.


FYI here's the NHTSA source document for the article
http://www.nhtsa.dot.gov/portal/site/nhtsa/menuitem.6a6eaf83cf719ad24ec86e10dba046a0/

[ducatiz]

Licensing is just common sense.  Can you buy an earth mover if you have the cash?  Yup.  Can you operate it legally or insure it without the proper license?  NOPE.  Training and education are something that should be expected and required - not hoped for.  It's that way for everything from a fork lift to a Semi.  Why should bikes be exempt from that or cars for that matter? 

Driving is not a right in this or any country it is a privilege.  One that can be revoked for any of a number of reasons and is on a daily basis.  If you're fighting this battle to maintain your "rights" = you've already lost.

bravo, well stated