Highways authorities should appoint a motorcycle champion tasked specifically with safe road design for bikers, according to the European Road Assessment Programme (EuroRAP).
A new EuroRAP report highlights a lack of attention to safe road infrastructure for motorcyclists, and calls for new and immediate guidance on crash barrier design. New guidance should give engineers clear direction on where motorcycle-friendly systems should be incorporated at new sites, and where existing sites should be reviewed. Road safety: UK should have a ‘motorcycle champion’
Highways authorities should appoint a motorcycle champion tasked specifically with safe road design for bikers, according to the European Road Assessment Programme (EuroRAP).
A new EuroRAP report highlights a lack of attention to safe road infrastructure for motorcyclists, and calls for new and immediate guidance on crash barrier design.
New guidance should give engineers clear direction on where motorcycle-friendly systems should be incorporated at new sites, and where existing sites should be reviewed. It cites a ‘decision tree’ approach used in the Netherlands as a good example. Hitting a crash barrier is a factor in 8-16% of rider deaths, and riders are 15 times more likely to be killed in a collision with a crash barrier than a car occupant, the report reveals.
Highways authorities could address these issues by appointing motorcycle champions. Such a measure would introduce a cultural change to the way in which risk is viewed from a road authority perspective.
John Plowman, chairman of the EuroRAP motorcycle safety review panel, said: ‘Engineers are having to make life and death decisions on the basis of inadequate guidance. We must fill the gaps in our understanding of barrier design and location. Existing standards and guideline for road infrastructure – and barriers in particular – need to be changed.’
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