Projected fall for US bike fatalities
The AMA says recent accident report is "encouraging news" but short on hard dataAccording to a report released on May 6 by the Governors' Highway Safety Association (GHSA), for the second time in five years motorcyclist fatalities are projected to decrease, reports the American Motorcyclist Association (AMA).
Highway Safety North's Dr. James Hedlund, a former senior official with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, authored the Spotlight on Safety report, which projects motorcyclist fatalities will total 4610 for 2013, compared to 4957 reported in 2012. The figures equate with a drop of seven per cent.
Compared with the first nine months of 2012, motorcyclist fatalities decreased in 35 states and the District of Columbia, increased in 13 states, and remained the same in two, the report states. All 50 states and the District of Columbia provided preliminary motorcycle fatality counts for the first nine months of 2013, according to the GHSA press release.
The GHSA also reported 4469 motorcycle fatalities in 2009, which represented a dramatic 16 per cent decline from 2008.
"The decline in rider fatalities is encouraging news, particularly during Motorcycle Awareness Month when so many motorcyclists are riding," said Wayne Allard, AMA vice president for government relations.
"We hope that these reported declines signal a positive trend in rider safety on the nation's highways but the Spotlight on Safety report is short on hard data regarding the factors contributing to the decline. That is why the AMA is helping fund a comprehensive study of the causes of motorcycle crashes."
The motorcycle crash causation study is being conducted at the Oklahoma Transportation Center, an independent and well-respected research facility at Oklahoma State University in Stillwater, Oklahoma.
Funding for the study comes from the AMA, the Federal Highway Administration and the NHTSA. A final report is expected in 2015.
The last major motorcycle crash study was completed in 1980; it provided a wealth of data that has been used to develop training and strategies to help keep riders safer on the road. In the decades since, the traffic environment has changed enormously, prompting the AMA to begin campaigning for a new study several years ago and leading to the Oklahoma research.
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