Protected bicycle lanes - separated from traffic by physical barriers like parked cars, a curb, landscaping or posts - may make cyclists feel safer and encourage more people to ride, but they vary in terms of the buffer they provide. Some leave cyclists more vulnerable to injury than others.
Overall, street-level protected bike lanes are high risk for injury, while conventional bike lanes — separated from traffic by painted lane markings, but without physical barriers - are less risky, possibly because they are often installed on safer roads to begin with.
Protected bike lanes raised from the road are the safest.
Those are the highlights of a new study that looked at how bike lane design impacts safety.
The report, released on Thursday by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, a nonprofit financed by the insurance industry, looked at the injury risks associated with different types of cycling infrastructure and suggested ways to make riding safer. Research was conducted in collaboration with George Washington University, Oregon Health and Science University and New York University.
The study comes at a time when cycling fatalities are on the rise. Bicyclists’ deaths have increased 25 percent since reaching their lowest point in 2010, according to the study.
When researchers compared the likelihood of having a crash or fall on a major road with no bike infrastructure to two-way protected bike lanes, the risk was much lower on lanes on bridges or raised from the road like those within green ways than on lanes at street level.
