Via Bicycle Accident Attorneys
…
Who is at fault? Lets look based on the police reports and citations issued:
-No Violation issued to Cyclist: 27%! This means that 73% of the time when you are hit by a car you will be found in the wrong as having violated some traffic code.
-No Violation issued to Motorist: 55%! This means that only 45% of the time the driver will be found at fault.
Seems unbelievable and unfair doesn’t it? This begs that we look a little further.
What were the actions of the motorists? Cyclists? Fortunately we know. 35% of the time the motorist was going straight. Yep, a whopping 35% of the time a motorist simply was going straight and hit a cyclist. 53% of the time a motorist was either turning right or left. 12% of the time the motorist was doing some “other” thing or it was “unknown” as to what the driver was doing. Lets break this down a bit further. 482 bicycle crashes and in 216.9 of them the driver was found to be in some sort of violation (failed to yield – 16%; unknown -10%; inattention – 8%; other – 7%; speed to fast – 2%; disregarded signal – 2%). How is that a driver can be turning right or left in 255.46 (53%) of the 482 accidents and yet in only 216.9 total accidents they are found to be at fault? How is that the “Failed to Yield” or “Inattention” stats of a combined total of 24% of the violation collisions only account for 115.68 of the bicycle collisions? When in 35% of the collisions (168.7 wrecks) the driver was actually going straight and yet drivers were only cited for inattention 38.56 cases? This is really messed up.
…
Biking in Baltimore