Safety in Numbers.

This data is for a city half the size of Dallas (on about 35% of the land), that has a bicycle mode share roughly 5X bigger than Dallas. It's also the home to three downtown/in-town universities/colleges with 45,000 students.

The City of Dallas averages a little more than one cyclist fatality a year (at least one too many), with a mode share of permanent bicycle commuters below 1% (too low). The city in the chart averages about five fatalities a year, with a bicycle mode share of about 5% (comparing apples to apples). In-town areas are much higher, outlying areas much lower.

What does it all mean?

One of the problems with bicycle fatality numbers is their scarcity. Riding a bicycle has roughly the same risk of death as walking, per hour of exposure. Because it's not dangerous, making it seem dangerous requires the use of scare tactics. Now, I have been accused of employing scare tactics because I dare challenge the alleged safety improvements of bike lanes by pointing out the increased risk of of intersections and driveways, and the lack of any statistical evidence that in equal conditions, they afford any protection from the dreaded (rightfully) "bicyclists struck from rear by overtaking motor vehicle" accident type. But where were the cyclists who were struck from the rear when they were hit. In almost all cases, in or outside of a bike lane, they were on the far right side of the roadway. Allow me to quote a post from a different forum:

From a post by League Cycling Instructor Serge Issakov:

Here are 3 examples, all from just one day of this week (Tuesday, June 9):

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A cyclist fatality.

http://www.pnj.com/article/20090610/NEWS01/906100340/1006/NEWS01

"Elizabeth Dawn Allmon, 51, was riding west on the shoulder of U.S. 98 at 9:11 a.m. when she was struck from the rear by a car driven by Monica Frances Rothrock, 41, also of Navarre, according to the Florida Highway Patrol."

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Two cyclists killed in this one.

http://www.velonews.com/article/93223

According to a Highway Patrol report, Borland was driving the same direction as the cyclists on State Highway 51 in Sand Springs when she "swerved onto the south shoulder for unknown reason, striking the three bicyclists." The report said Borland continued on for another quarter mile before stopping.

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"Only" (relatively speaking) serious injuries, and the cyclist is expected to fully recover.

http://kohd.com/page/121875


Deschutes County Sheriff's Deputies say the driver of the pickup truck was reaching for his cell phone and glancing in his rear-view mirror when he drifted over the white line and into the bike lane hitting Yarbrough.


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Note that in just one day three bicyclists were killed nationwide, and one seriously injured, by the type of crash that I call, "inadvertent drift over stripe into unnoticed bicyclist in bike lane or shoulder"

That's about 1/2 of one percent of all bicyclists killed in a typical year, happening by this type of crash in just one day.
I've said it a few times before, but I'll say it again. This type of crash, and what cyclists can do to prevent it, needs a whole lot more attention.

Some argue that a daytime superbright blinky might help, but from what I understand about inattentional blindness, which clearly plays a role in some if not all of these cases, it can only be partially remedied by increasing "sensory conspicuousness" (like bright clothes, lights, etc.). The key is to become relevant to these drivers in order for them to notice you, and I know of no way to do that other than to be clearly in their path in front of them long before they get there (for the entire time they are approaching from the moment you become potentially visible to them).

Serge

The Dallas cyclist killed on Chalk Hill Road last week, the cyclist who died in Richardson on Arapaho Road last fall, the CBS golf commentator struck on Park Lane, Larry Schwartz (struck by a school bus in rural Collin County, and in whose memory the Ride of Silence was established) and the two cyclists killed in Grand Prairie last year near Joe Pool lake, all fit this pattern.

By all appearances, these victims were riding as near as possible to the right-hand edge in the classic "traffic fear" position. Many bicycle segregationists have been known to consider this as riding as a "vehicular cyclist." This misstatement of fact either reveals a lack of understanding as to what riding as a vehicle entails, or it is intentionally misleading.

Riding as a "vehicular cyclist" means accepting and exercising your legal right to the whole lane if it is less than 14' wide (and doesn't have a bike lane). It means taking a commanding position directly in the line of sight of motorists, and not riding in what is essentially a visible blind-zone to the far right, where distances and clearances are almost impossible for a motorist to judge. It means not inviting motor vehicles to pass you within inches of your bicycle, but to instruct them to pull out to pass.

It doesn't mean blocking traffic (no more than it would if you were driving any other slow moving vehicle in the roadway), but it does mean you have the right, and the responsibility, to operate your human-powered vehicle as a confident vehicle. To do so grants you more real safety and more real mobility than any other type of bicycle accommodation. Best of all, you can learn how to control your own safety on a bicycle in just a few hours. Although the data is sketchy and often unreliable, what we do have indicates that cyclists who truly ride in a vehicular manner experience far fewer crashes and collisions.

It's yours for the taking.