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If you had to guess where close to half of all bicycle-vehicle collisions happened, what would you say? According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, it’s intersections. Specifically, signalized intersections in urban areas.
This stat made recent research from the Oregon State University College of Engineering, published in Accident Analysis & Prevention , about three different intersection treatments particularly interesting. “Our study was motivated by the fact that cyclists are overrepresented in certain crash outcomes at signalized intersections in Oregon,” Logan Scott-Deeter, one of the study’s authors, tells Bicycling . “Because of this, the Oregon Department of Transportation is investing in the evaluation and adoption of treatments to promote bicyclist safety at signalized intersections.”
According to the researchers,“Bicyclist safety at urban intersections is a critical element for encouraging an increase in bicycle commuting,” and while progress has been made in developing roadway designs that increase bicyclists’ safety, not much data has been collected comparing and contrasting the effects different treatment types have on riders and rider behavior. Video player poster image Researchers examined three different types of intersection treatments for the study: a “mixing zone,” a bicycle signal, and a “bike box.” Mixing zone
A mixing zone occurs when a bike lane simply disappears shortly before an intersection and turns into a shared lane from which a vehicle can turn right, usually marked by “sharrow” on the asphalt. In this treatment, different modes of traffic go from being guided to use separate parts of the roadway to jockeying […]
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