Riccarton Rd poses danger for cyclists

Riccarton Rd is the worst stretch of road for cyclists getting knocked off their bikes by motorists opening their car doors.

Latest figures show nine of the 74 cyclist/door crashes in Christchurch happened on Riccarton Rd between Clyde Rd and Clarence St.

Three cyclists were seriously injured.

University of Otago prevention researchers have created a cyclist/door crash Google map with New Zealand Traffic Crash Reports from 2007-11, to highlight problem areas throughout Christchurch and the country in a bid to look at and consider solutions to make streets safer and convenient for all road users.

Minor injuries, serious injuries and deaths are highlighted.

There have been 245 reported cycle/door injuries in New Zealand.

About 20 per cent of these resulted in serious injuries and two died.

Men had the highest number of reported cyclist/door collisions with 165 injuries while women had 80.

University of Otago Injury Prevention Research Unit director Professor Hank Weiss said the interactive map, which appears to be the first of its kind to cover an entire country, will also let cyclists and safety advocates see where the local dooring hazard areas are.

"We can look at what kind of solutions can make these streets safe and convenient for all road users. While this may involve compromises, we need to pay special attention to the vulnerability of cyclists who wish to ride in safer environments."

Researchers hope the tool will help city planners and traffic engineers identify streets and connected routes that have high numbers of injuries resulting from "dooring" type collisions.

The study found that by displaying incidents on a map specific crash patterns can be looked at.

https://blogs.otago.ac.nz/ipru/research/cyclistdooringmap