In both rural and urban areas, motorcycle casualties are caused by a variety of factors which revolve around engineering and planning, coupled with behaviour, skills and attitudes among motorcycle and other road users. Compared to car users, motorcyclists are particularly vulnerable mainly due to the relative exposure to the external environment.
Motorcyclists are also increasingly vulnerable in the urban environment compared to cyclists. This is in part due to the high consideration and support given to cyclists in transport plans, with accompanying social acceptability, and special measures such as access to priority areas which helps to reduce cyclists’ vulnerability.
Action should therefore be taken which addresses the following key factors:
• Rider behaviour
• Rider skills
• Rider attitudes
• Rider and driver training
• Driver behaviour
• Driver skills
• Driver attitudes
• Traffic engineering and design
• Transport planning as it relates to vulnerable users
• Training infrastructure, particularly post-test
• Enforcement
• Attitudes to motorcycling among non-motorcyclists
• Attitudes to motorcycling among transport experts, planners and road safety officers
• Levelling the policy playing field between bicycles and motorcycles in areas of shared vulnerability.
What Is Not Appropriate Action
In 1981, the then government took punitive action to reduce casualties by making access to motorcycles and scooters much more complex and costly (1981 Transport Act). These measures were directed at the pre-test phase of riding, with the main effect being to discourage people from riding motorcycles in the first place. Post-test opportunities were not explored (thus failing to address improvements of existing rider skills) and no effective education of other road users took place. Options for reducing vulnerability by effective transport planning and integration were also not considered.
In other words, the effect of the 1981 Act was to reduce access to motorcycling, but do almost nothing to make motorcycling safer for those who either still rode, or were newly qualified riders under the new licensing regime.
The 1981 Act also had other unforeseen effects:
• Lack of activity in dealing with the real causes of incidents, coupled with a lack of a coherent post-test infrastructure led to a repeat of 1970s motorcycle safety concerns once motorcycling became popular again in the 1990s, particularly among leisure riders.
• As an ‘orphaned’ form of transport in policy terms, motorcycles were poorly placed to provide an alternative to the car once traffic congestion had reached unsustainable levels – a huge policy opportunity was missed.
• Unaddressed, 1960s and 1970s attitudes, to motorcycles as ‘dangerous’ and ‘anti-social’ led to institutionalised negativity towards motorcycling as a transport mode. Motorcycling was shut out in policy terms with little done to improve safety in a sustainable way beyond tinkering with pre-test licensing arrangements. Proposals designed to reduce motorcyclists’ vulnerability have been misinterpreted as measures to encourage motorcycling and often ignored. Road safety opportunities have been lost.
• Lack of policy support for commuter/practical motorcycling contributed to 1990s increases in motorcycling which were focussed on the leisure sector. This was in part because there was little incentive for manufacturers to focus marketing efforts on the utility sector.
The result of this is that a mode of transport which should now be playing a key part in the Government’s transport strategy has remained undeveloped in policy terms and users left vulnerable. Poor public attitudes towards motorcycling sustained by negativity from transport experts and in transport planning and road safety departments at all levels. This has sustained an image of motorcycling as a risky and dangerous activity.
In summary, punitive action taken by government merely to reduce motorcycling through making access more costly and complex will not address underlying road safety issues, will not reduce motorcyclists vulnerability and will not lead to longer term sustainable road safety among motorcycle users. This is one reason why the European approach to licencing directives, plus the UK interpretation of licence testing requirements, has been such a matter of concern.
Appropriate action should take the form of an extensive package of measures which integrate to form an overall motorcycle safety framework with clear targets, not only for casualty reduction, but also for the implementation of measures which reduce vulnerability and change attitudes.
It should be accepted that the motorcycle safety situation is due to a combination of factors which go beyond the rider and the machine and are in a large measure the result of nearly 30 years of a poor strategic approach to motorcycling safety and policy issues.
Measures should as far as possible be taken in partnership with motorcycling stakeholders, particularly the motorcycle industry and police. However, there are areas where government should accept that it has a key role to play and provide decisive leadership.