people rarely post any comments here, as you know, but last night i wrote about my newfound BURNING DESIRE TO MOVE TO THE NETHERLANDS, because i watched this fantastic video of swarms of people peacefully and happily riding their bikes everywhere there, because that’s what they do in the Netherlands. kevin, being slightly less rash than me, looked into bike statistics online and is convinced that there are MORE bike accidents there than here.
this is what he wrote:
By Kev on Feb 20, 2011 | Here is some comparative info…..In 2008, a total of 27 bicycle riders were killed and 3,385 seriously injured in Illinois bicycle accidents.
In 2007, 189 people died in bike accidents in the Netherlands, about half of them hit by cars. Another 7,240 were injured badly enough to merit a trip to a hospital. Those numbers are from traffic ministry data released in April 2008.
But I had to say to this, hmmm, this doesn’t sound right to me. i replied:
By grace on Feb 20, 2011 | hmm, i don’t buy it. maybe it’s cause there are many many MANY more people riding bikes there. plus maybe somebody made up these statistics. i’m pretty sure they did. why would that website make it seem so good, then? idyllic. perfect in every way.
And then, this morning, there was a REPLY from the guy who made the video, a man from the Netherlands named Mark. i was delighted to find that he had statistics of his own!
By Mark on Feb 21, 2011 |
@Grace, great you liked my video!
@Kev are you implying cycling is more dangerous in the Netherlands by those numbers?Y ou seem to forget that in the Netherlands people make one million trips per HOUR.If you compare the figures as you should the story is like this:
“Cycling in the Netherlands is much safer than in the USA. The Netherlands has the lowest non-fatal injury rate as well as the lowest fatality rate, while the USA has the highest non-fatal injury rate as well as the highest fatality rate. Indeed, the non-fatal injury rate for the USA is about 30 times higher than for the Netherlands.
Injury rate per million km cycled:
USA 37.5; NL 1.4
Fatality rate per 100 million km cycled:
USA 5.8; NL 1.1?
From: Pucher, John and Buehler, Ralph (2008) ‘Making Cycling Irresistible: Lessons from The Netherlands, Denmark and Germany’.
http://policy.rutgers.edu/faculty/pucher/Irresistible.pdf
So there you have it. I’m going to be very busy packing stuff up to move to the Netherlands today. Also researching more about the country, which is right at the top of Europe, by the way, next to Germany and across from the UK. I’ve started reading many interesting facts about the netherlands on wikipedia, and will get back to you momentarily about what i’ve found.
ok then,
mrs. early morning netherlands-bound hughes.