A safety framework for discussing motorcycle safety

[Berries]

90%, that an interesting view. Made me pause and think for a bit. I'm not sure it is as high as 90% but I agree with the idea that a lot of the time, no the vast majority of the time, we can be in control of what happens. It grates that we might need to give way or make room for other road users when we have the right of way etc, but I'd rather be alive grating my teeth and letting a few choice words escape than be dead or seriously injured.

90% was a rough figure I just pulled out of my arse after 15 years of crash scene investigation and crash data analysis. I just wanted to flag that in many cases where the other party caused the crash the rider could have done something to avoid the incident. Like you say, no point being in the right as you are stretchered away with a leg missing.

Are you suggesting that training other road users is a waste of time, or is your view that yes train other road users to watch, look be aware etc, but let's not fool ourselves that this is a panacea for correcting current wrongs.

By all means train them to look for bikes etc, but 'we' have to acknowledge that sometimes they won't see us even if they think they have tried.

So to make things safer for riders when other traffic screw up it would mean riders having to travel well below the speed limit so they have plenty of time to avoid the mistake of the other vehicle.

Of course you could just ride around in your own little world and expect everyone else to do the right thing. Personally I expect them to do the wrong thing. Cover your brakes, position yourself accordingly. Basic riding skills I would have thought.

[GrayWolf]

hahahahhahaha. you don't know much about dem trains, huh?
and your elected government sold the rail network.... to the fucken strayans. it's largely in disrepair.
as has been otherwise pointed out: the logistics of loading and unloading trains for shit isn't practical. economoneyically speaking.

do you buy shit? i bet you do. know how that shit got to where you bought it? bet ya dont.
but bet you can guess, it wuz trukz oi.

Looks in wallet for company ID.. Ooo look, Locomotive Engineer. yup as normal, your absolutely right, I know nothing about them!!!......... I just drive the things!

Secondly the Aussie's dont own the network any longer, to paraphrase you, "get up to date man".... It's called KIWIRAIL for a reason. $100's of millions have been spent on replacing rolling stock and infrastructure upgrades / replacement in the last few years.

[GrayWolf]

Lets not have facts get in the way of a good rant aye...

Under 50Max the overall vehicle length is increased by several metres which reduces the tarmac loading. The whole reason 50max was approved was there were already plenty of operators exceeding 44ton on regular basis with no problems bar the fines.

All of the HPMV approved units should track no worse than previously approved max length designs. Swinging wide on most state highways is purely operator error/discretion 99% of the time. Like any industry there will be a few bad eggs out there.

Even in England and Europe where there are awesome rail networks, huge amounts of freight still travel by truck, what does that tell you?

So the trucks will be several meters longer, but you see no difference in the tracking?

Maybe you personally are a good driver. There are plenty of instances where I or my YL have driven/ridden over the 'Taka's and been confronted by a truck across the centreline to negotiate the tight bends. I believe there has been mention of this in other threads (historically) as well.

Well there's a good role model to follow... if we all break the law often enough (excess loading) we can get it changed.... Well I have to apologise to the rabble rouser's then I guess..... they have it right, lets all break the law and get it changed!!

I agree with your assessment of road/rail shifting of freight in city environments... Sadly like here, England disposed of huge chunks of rail land where the goods yards and sidings used to be. They have hamstrung themselves by that act of yore. However, it's interesting that in Wellington BOTH Toll and Mainfreight have their depots right next to the Rail Freight yard.

[george formby]

An idea I heard from a talkback host years ago was that you had to ride a motorbike for the first 2 years before getting your car license. What your girlfriend is now aware of proves the idea as being a good one. Plus of course all the loonys would kill themselves off before being able to get in a car where they are far more likely to kill others.

Many years ago a British MP suggested exactly that become law. Didn't get much traction.

[MrKiwi]

Unless the political masters of the policy makers change their bias nothing will change. They determine the policy objectives.

Sent from my LG-P768 using Tapatalk

You're absolutely right, but I'm bloody minded so having a sensible framework/strategy to promote is helpful. I don't work in the system anymore, but I worked in it long enough to know you can chip away at this from both ends, the pollies and the officials. The pollies are usually unreliable, inconsistent and respond to where they get their votes from. We're not a big enough sector to be a threat.

That doesn't mean we should not continue to try. BRONZE has done some good work in the past and not doubt will do more. I can do my bit from another angle/user group. The more different groups chipping away at this the more likely we might make some small gains.

I may be totally wrong, but humour me anyway

[Reckless]

You're absolutely right, but I'm bloody minded so having a sensible framework/strategy to promote is helpful. I don't work in the system anymore, but I worked in it long enough to know you can chip away at this from both ends, the pollies and the officials. The pollies are usually unreliable, inconsistent and respond to where they get their votes from. We're not a big enough sector to be a threat.

That doesn't mean we should not continue to try. BRONZE has done some good work in the past and not doubt will do more. I can do my bit from another angle/user group. The more different groups chipping away at this the more likely we might make some small gains.

I may be totally wrong, but humour me anyway

Great to see someone is carrying the flag and putting his energy where his Keyboard usually is?
Unfortunately most of us are busy carving out a living to be to effective? I tried with Mag but it didn't work I'm sad to say.
Sounds like you know your stuff Good on you Mr Kiwi!

We're not a big enough sector to be a threat.

If we where really organised and together we could we be?? Is there enough Bikers In NZ?
5000 bikes did make an impression after all we at least made to big of a noise to be ignored?
I'm very sure we have been played again with these announcements being to close to the elections to have time to respond to?

I'm getting the Vib if anyone had a good basis for us to go forward with, an organisation could get a good following.
Take up the challenge the force is strong in you

[swbarnett]

Experience is just practising the same old mistakes over and over.

So noone can ever learn anything just by doing it?

How do you think the first motorcyclists learned to ride.

[BlackSheepLogic]

So noone can ever learn anything just by doing it?

How do you think the first motorcyclists learned to ride.

From some noob with a book.

[R650R]

So the trucks will be several meters longer, but you see no difference in the tracking?

I agree with your assessment of road/rail shifting of freight in city environments... Sadly like here, England disposed of huge chunks of rail land where the goods yards and sidings used to be. They have hamstrung themselves by that act of yore. However, it's interesting that in Wellington BOTH Toll and Mainfreight have their depots right next to the Rail Freight yard.

3m is not a lot when a combination is already 20m to start with. If you look at the newer units the last axle group is set forward slightly so more rear overhang.
Toll put some cameras on their trucks and even filmed them from various angles.

Yes the railheads. Land is at a premium these days, look how much land they occupied back when we were a small nation and freight volumes were much lower. And the Britain you speak of was prob only 20-40 million people, not the 60+ million it is now. Toll is the leftovers from the state rail companies previous incarnations, tranzlink, NZRail etc... Mainfreight has always been an astute player and bought land in right places, they use rail far more than people realise. We live in a just in time environment these days though, products need to be moved as soon as they are made and supplies must arrive as soon as they are needed. To have the extra storage space to allow for rail lead times is just not economically feasible these days.
It would be fun if someone sold a toy trainset that replicated the true amount of space needed for the shunting yards, they'd be no room left in the shed/hobby room to add the fancy model houses and rivers etc....

[swbarnett]

From some noob with a book.

Huh? There was noone to write the book befor the first motorcyclists.

[buggerit]

Looks in wallet for company ID.. Ooo look, Locomotive Engineer. yup as normal, your absolutely right, I know nothing about them!!!......... I just drive the things!

Secondly the Aussie's dont own the network any longer, to paraphrase you, "get up to date man".... It's called KIWIRAIL for a reason. $100's of millions have been spent on replacing rolling stock and infrastructure upgrades / replacement in the last few years.

Are the Chinese locos still restricted on how far they travel from the Hamilton repair shop?

[Urano]

Teach riders to expect that it is going to happen and it won’t matter if it does. I’d suggest that at least 90% of crashes involving motorbikes were avoidable by the rider, including a large proportion of those where the car driver was deemed to be at fault.

of course riders have to prepare for the worst case scenario, but you have to consider a pair of problems:
1- "we" are not better than "them", because usually "we" are also "them". considering bikers as an "elite" is a very typical psychological error, but the truth is that there's a whole bunch of idiots traveling on two wheels too, and aside from idiots there's a whole bunch of people who is possibly riding his bike on friday evening after work, tired, exhausted by the last discussion with his boss, and missing the road sign.
2- even if you're best of the best, there's something that rows against you, which i call "the road errors rules".
it says: "everybody make mistakes". i stick to the idea that if others users are better trained it would be better for me too.
3- the "who cares about drivers training" attitude could be a very bad road to go down to. the result, i'm afraid, would be something similar to "who cares about riders, avoiding me it's THEIR job"...

So you don't think bigger fines/penalties would work as an incentive towards road safety? If that is the case we can forget about things becoming safer for us then.

no.
and it's something proven by the very few analysis of police enforcement activities results.

what i really think is that using an engine driven vehicle is often considered a constitutional right, but i have no knowledge of a single country which states in its constitution that you have to.

the incentive toward road safety would be better made by serious considerations about licensing.
unfortunately this would mean politicians would loose a lot of votes, so they'll never do that...

She freely admits this mind set is like night & day compared to how she used to perceive her place on the road.

exactly.
that's why i think licenses should be incremental: to own a license you must earn the previous level one first.
moped>bikes>cars>truck>buses>trailers

If motorcyclists want to be as safe as being in a car buy a car.

and the "there's nothing to be done, if it's my turn nothing can save me" it's another psychological attitude that needs to be worked off.
it's true that "safety is not the equivalent of risk free", but this shouldn't be an excuse not to put any effort in order to increase our safety.

So noone can ever learn anything just by doing it?
How do you think the first motorcyclists learned to ride.

almost.
you can learn something from "zero point" all by your own, but this usually takes about four times the time, and your preparation is always very "shallow".
this is because from a low level ability you can't judge your errors, and tend to reproduce them constantly until something happens to make them pop out.
but it's not guaranteed that they'll pop out without hurting you.

learning from others' experience is the very basis of ours success as species on the planet.
imagine being born in a empty house and never see anyone in your life: you'll have to learn by yourself that fire burns, scissors cut, how to use the fridge...

why would you do that? because you don't want to let go some of your hybris and say "teach me"? bad choice...

[BlackSheepLogic]

Huh? There was noone to write the book befor the first motorcyclists.

A minor technicality like this would not have been an impedance.

However, back to Jame's point that experience in just practicing the same old mistakes - Our graduated licensing system seems to be at least partly based on the concept that experience is a key component in becoming a better rider/driver.

[george formby]

Some interestin points Urano, particularly the learning from experience. It all depends on the experience & the individuals ability to survive it or learn from it.
Also nobody is perfect, so true. A higher percentage of switched on road users would have an immeasurable effect of not producing statistics.


Another angle I have been thinking about, baring in mind that separate road user groups have limited visibility & political sway, is making the powers that be come clean on there intentions for traffic safety.
I feel that the emphasis on speed enforcement & shock advertising does not improve safety overall but is intended to limit the severity of accidents.
We have no limitation regardless of speed.

It's late and I'm tired but I guess the simplest way to describe what I'm thinking is do the Government, Police, NZTA etc work to a short term median strategy based on a spread sheet? If so can this be proven? If they really do believe that current measures are purely in the interest of road safety & current spending on speed cameras, advertising, road maintenance etc, is the very best option for improving safety & lessening the number of accidents overall then can that be proven?
If the first option is true it can be changed, if the second option is true it can be improved.

[Berries]

I feel that the emphasis on speed enforcement & shock advertising does not improve safety overall but is intended to limit the severity of accidents.

The official view these days is that crashes are inevitable, people will always make mistakes, but the severity of the crash can be reduced by a combination of safe speeds, safe roadsides, safe road users and safe vehicles. That last one pretty much knackers motorbikes if you ask me.