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# If people are too scared to bike, that's a safety problem
- URL: https://pedantic.bike/if-people-are-too-scared-to-bike-thats-a-safety-problem/
- Published: 2026-10-06T18:52:52.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-06T18:52:52.000Z
- Author: Darren Buck

*Hello friends, welcome to the first edition of my newsletter! Every week (or two, or three), I will share whatever is on my mind – with as much brevity as I can – about active and sustainable transportation, Federal transportation policy, research, or more general urban planning. If you appreciate it, I would be very grateful if you would share my newsletter with your networks. Let's get into it!*

Xennials, cast your mind back to [this scene we watched](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqjQDP9KX6E&ref=pedantic.bike) (and sighed despondently to) in our stuffy cubicles from the 1999 movie "Office Space." Two cocksure management consultants ("the Bobs") inform their client that a longtime unwanted employee had actually been laid off long ago, wasn't told, and had only continued in pay status because of a payroll glitch. Rather than properly dismissing that employee, they firmly and earnestly assert that they took the low-friction route and "went ahead and fixed the glitch."

![](https://static.klipy.com/ii/d6b0ce929193df3c242ac34b5654d2ce/ab/42/82ZcFPqH.gif)

Bicycling feels a bit like the "glitch" in the Vision Zero/safe system street safety conversation. One is obviously too many, but fewer people (relative to walking or driving) are seriously injured or killed riding a bicycle on America's streets, so bicycling-specific countermeasures are treated as a lower safety priority. Lack of exposure – few people riding bikes relative to other modes – is rightly identified as the major contributing factor. And we know that perception of safety is the driving force behind many Americans deciding to just drive instead.

Enlightened safety practitioners and communities look a step beyond, and use predictive analyses to try to stack the deck for preventing the next serious or fatal bicycle crash. But it is a difficult exercise when that denominator – exposure, participation, volume, however you want to refer to it – is so low. Crashes can appear random, with few reliable correlates, especially in the built environment. Without enough predictive power in our analyses, the countermeasures we deploy may forever chase that randomness.

Because the only[ measure of success on American streets is the body count](https://bsky.app/profile/tomflood.bsky.social/post/3mwvibixuas2s?ref=pedantic.bike), when bicyclist fatalities and serious injuries trend down, the temptation is to declare that the mission is accomplished. But if we do not address that many people choose not to bicycle at all because they fear for their safety, we have only "fixed the glitch." People will continue to opt out, and [bicycling is too beneficial](https://www.redbull.com/us-en/biking-benefits?ref=pedantic.bike) to society to allow it to "just work itself out naturally."

The systemic bicycle safety problem is revealed by that minuscule denominator. The most effective predictive safety analysis is the one that concludes that the majority of the network is unsuitable for bicycling for most people. That is the systemic safety problem that we need to solve for bicycling. The lasting solution is planning and implementing a connected, comfortable, and direct network of facilities suitable for all ages and abilities of riders. 

We can look to peers who came to that conclusion long before us. The Netherlands stressed a systemic-scale approach in its concept of [sustainable safety](https://mobycon.com/updates/sustainable-safety-the-dutch-approach-to-safe-road-design/?ref=pedantic.bike). Similarly, in Australia and New Zealand, the [Movement & Place framework](https://www.pedbikeinfo.org/downloads/International%20Study%20Findings%5FSummaryBrief.pdf?ref=pedantic.bike)\* for classifying the street network emphasizes the need to create networks for all modes throughout.

Outside of street safety, we see plenty of examples of where others have accepted the premise that a low perception of safety hindering participation is a safety problem. Within commercial aviation, launching people at high speed into the sky inside a pressurized metal tube [must be perceived as safe](https://nbaa.org/news/business-aviation-insider/2025-09/perception-is-reality-why-its-important-to-show-your-dedication-to-aviation-safety/?ref=pedantic.bike). Within transit, the Trump Administration's emphasis on making systems ["family-friendly" through increased policing](https://www.transit.dot.gov/about/request-information-family-friendly-transit-data-initiative?ref=pedantic.bike) is problematic in myriad ways, but both [the Administration](https://x.com/SecDuffy/status/1906744257798439373?ref=pedantic.bike) and [the industry](https://www.smartcitiesdive.com/news/transit-safety-security-apta-usdot/831176/?ref=pedantic.bike) assert that perceived safety impacts ridership, and so they consider it a safety problem.

The way forward is seen clearly in Somerville, MA (the city bordering my home of Cambridge). They inspired this post with their commitment to and [success with achieving a Vision Zero](https://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Society/2026/0811/traffic-safety-somerville-vision-zero?ref=pedantic.bike) that [does not passively "fix the glitch"](https://www.somervillema.gov/news/somerville-reinforces-commitment-safer-streets?ref=pedantic.bike) by leaving bicycling a low-participation mode only for those who are savvy, risk-tolerant, or without any other options. Instead, [outcomes are improving for everyone](https://www.brooklineinsights.com/transportation/hd03i59hhi1jxi36fzaj5a7tovz9l2?ref=pedantic.bike), *including those who might not have been riding a bicycle because of safety concerns*.

[![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/8e/d4/8ed4fcf6-4e0f-4048-902a-9149956c9e47/content/images/2026/10/-span-style-font-size-16px-somerville-s-recent-vision-zero-efforts-improved-bicycling-safety-as-ridership-increased-by-11-from-2014-baseline-levels-and-crashes-decreased-by-36-span-.png)](https://www.brooklineinsights.com/transportation/hd03i59hhi1jxi36fzaj5a7tovz9l2?ref=pedantic.bike)

**Click through on the image for the full Brookline Insights article, and access to this and other data on Boston region safety and transportation.*

The Vision Zero goal to deliver a system that does not maim or kill people is an ambitious one. But Somerville shows us that adding a broader definition of "street safety" can help achieve Vision Zero, rather than work against it. So let us assert as a practitioner community that if people are too scared to bike, that's a safety problem. Implementing connected networks of bicycling facilities suitable for all ages and abilities will address that safety problem, and help us achieve Vision Zero.

\* *There's a much fuller publication that resulted from a study tour that I helped organize back in my FHWA days, that goes into detail about lessons-learned from Australia and New Zealand. That document has apparently been removed from the internet by Seans Duffy and McMaster as* [*a part of their continued purging of USDOT resources that they do not like*](https://www.npr.org/2026/07/16/nx-s1-5893672/dot-bike-lanes-speed-cameras-safety-measures?ref=pedantic.bike)*.*

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