Sitting at a stop light can often make a person on a bike feel like a sitting duck. Now a massive new study has been published that confirms why they often don’t regard traffic signs and signals (almost entirely there for the sake of cars).
More than 70 percent of the time, when cyclists break traffic laws, they do so because they feel they need to in order to stay safe. Drivers, meanwhile, break traffic laws at an equal or even higher rate, but do so most often (77 percent of the time) to save time.
Most of us (85 percent) are either entirely law-abiding or engage only in minor infringements, which the authors define as those of minimal risk or potential conflict with other road users. An example might be rolling a four-way stop sign when no traffic is present (a maneuver called the Idaho Stop, which is actually legal in that state).
The trove of data includes tidbits like how recreational riders break traffic laws slightly more than those who ride for “utilitarian” purposes; unregistered voters are (narrowly) the most flagrant rulebreakers; and unsurprisingly, that those who admit they have almost no knowledge of road rules are by far the most reckless.
The evidence seems to bear out what cyclists have long known about our behavior: We’re not trying to be jerks; we just want to get home without getting hit.