Motorcycle Deaths and Cycle Involved Accidents - An Upward Trend, But Why?

Indeed, I've noticed a number of pedestrian, bicycle, moped, and motorcycle accidents in our local paper in the last year or so. But the question is why? That is to say; why is this happening in our nice suburban city with big cross walks, golf cart sized bike lanes, and ultra wide driving lanes? Why would this be happening when everyone is driving a newer model car with better brakes, good visibility, and at a time when there are fewer cars on the road perhaps due to increased fuel costs? Well, let's talk about that shall we?

You see, it's not just happening here but throughout the country. There was an interesting feature on ABC News in Los Angeles (KABC 7) on October 29, 2012 "Motorcyclist deaths in California on the rise," which stated that out in CA there has been a 20% increase, most of which in intersections, and that this ends a previous four year decrease until now.

In my opinion this is due to high fuel prices + too many people text messaging while driving, a deadly combo. Some might say that my summation is to generalized, but consider that people are too stressed, easily distracted by their personal tech devices, and more and more people are using alternative transportation strategies due to the high cost of gasoline. Somewhat of a perfect storm, kind of like Hurricane Sandy which by the way helped to increase the price of fuel on the East Coast even more.

It seems even though there are laws against using your cell phone or text messaging while driving, people still do. I can tell you I haven't gone even across town without seeing at least two people violating those rules in the last year. We want people to ride their bikes more to prevent diabetes, that saves us money on health care, but not if they get run over, smushed, scraped off the pavement, and are taken to the hospital in an ambulance.

In many regards this gets back to why people don't want to drive a small car. If they do they save gasoline, but they might also get creamed by a 6000 lb. SUV. As a motorcyclist and bicyclist these things really concern me. I wish people would pay more attention and we could all pay less in insurance costs. I feel sorry for all those folks who commute now on bicycles and motorcycles to save money, as now they are risking their lives every time they get onto the road. Okay so, please consider all this and think on it and drive responsibly.

Lance Winslow has launched a new series of eBooks on the Mobile Auto Services Business. Lance Winslow is a retired Founder of a The Oil Change Guys, a Nationwide Franchise Chain, and now runs the Online.