CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Topic: Another cycling death on Scotland's roads

CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Topic: Another cycling death on Scotland's roads http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Topic: Another cycling death on Scotland's roads en Mon, 18 May 2026 12:27:53 +0000 steveo on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=3#post-190056 Thu, 04 Jun 2015 09:07:12 +0000 steveo 190056@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ With out annoying video adverts. <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-32999770" rel="nofollow">http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-32999770</a> le_soigneur on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=3#post-190032 Wed, 03 Jun 2015 19:11:07 +0000 le_soigneur 190032@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ Well she's been remanded pending sentencing on dangerous driving so the judge seems to have her number. <a href="http://news.stv.tv/tayside/1322251-julie-watson-who-killed-alistair-speed-on-a91-in-fife-deleted-phone-call/">This</a> & <a href="A drunk driver knocked down a five year old boy after running a red light in West Lothian. Hayley Walker injured the boy on Stoneyburn Main Street">this</a> recent cases do not inspire confidence though Nelly on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=3#post-190031 Wed, 03 Jun 2015 18:52:03 +0000 Nelly 190031@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ She should go to jail for a long, long time. Probably won't though. chdot on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=3#post-190030 Wed, 03 Jun 2015 18:48:13 +0000 chdot 190030@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <a href="http://news.stv.tv/tayside/1322251-julie-watson-who-killed-alistair-speed-on-a91-in-fife-deleted-phone-call/" rel="nofollow">http://news.stv.tv/tayside/1322251-julie-watson-who-killed-alistair-speed-on-a91-in-fife-deleted-phone-call/</a> chdot on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=3#post-124266 Sat, 07 Sep 2013 14:26:54 +0000 chdot 124266@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <a href="http://www.thecourier.co.uk/news/local/fife/fife-cycling-community-pays-tribute-to-gentleman-alistair-speed-1.128080" rel="nofollow">http://www.thecourier.co.uk/news/local/fife/fife-cycling-community-pays-tribute-to-gentleman-alistair-speed-1.128080</a> Better class of on-line commenters in Fife. Morningsider on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=3#post-124245 Sat, 07 Sep 2013 12:09:35 +0000 Morningsider 124245@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ @Kaputnik - you have a PM. Instography on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=3#post-124244 Sat, 07 Sep 2013 11:12:07 +0000 Instography 124244@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ @kaputnik The Transport Scotland Data for 2010 - 2011 suggests a modal share increase from 0.8% of all journeys to 1.3%. I would take this with a massive pinch of salt and statistical error, as I don't seriously think that cycling increased by 62% in Scotland in that time. Knowing where the data comes from you'd be right to have it appropriately seasoned. You would create a 0.5% increase in cycling by including an extra 75 cyclists in the sample. But since the selection of households and adults within households is random, the odds of doing that are pretty low. You need to keep finding cyclists and not finding non-cyclists. Like tossing a coin and getting a long run of heads. Theoretically possible but unlikely. Also, the inherent bias in household surveys runs against the types of people more likely to be cyclists (males, aged under 50, in employment). Still, you could discount about half of the increase as potentially sampling error. Personally, I never report data with decimal places at all - it implies a level of precision that just isn't there - so for me the 0.8% and 1.3% would both be 1%. No change. Can't think what more your graphic needs. It's Government data. It's been through the internal QA processes and published. There's no arguing with it. Agree with Morningsider but happy to help in any way, including stumping up for some printing / postage. kaputnik on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=3#post-124242 Sat, 07 Sep 2013 11:10:34 +0000 kaputnik 124242@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ @Morningsider if you can point me in the direction of the cycling budget figures for those years in the graph then that would be swell. KarenJS on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=3#post-124239 Sat, 07 Sep 2013 11:05:30 +0000 KarenJS 124239@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ As long as you go when the building is open I imagine you would be able to hand them into reception, assuming this is what the postmen/women do. I'd be happy to help but am away for the next couple of weeks if it were to be done sooner than later. Maybe at same time send the postcards to newspapers? Morningsider on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=3#post-124234 Sat, 07 Sep 2013 10:39:00 +0000 Morningsider 124234@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ If you are trying to make an impact on politicians then don't worry about statistical detail, obviously make sure the numbers are correct - but don't worry about showing a graph with a trend line of increasing cyclist carnage and another showing a relatively static number of cyclists (TS figures for number of trips by bike show a drop, figures for total distance cycled show and very small increase as a proportion of total trips). I would say that is all the detail you need - anything more is liable to confuse them. I would try and hang this on the forthcoming draft Scottish budget myself (due out in the next week or so). You could add a third line to the graph showing the static/falling budget for cycling - might be worth getting the postcards to MSPs the day before Keith Brown makes his appearance before the ICI Committee (Transport) on the draft budget (possibly late September/October, gives a chance to work this up). Happy to help with any work on this. kaputnik on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=3#post-124233 Sat, 07 Sep 2013 10:29:55 +0000 kaputnik 124233@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ Does it have a letterbox in the front door? PS on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=3#post-124232 Sat, 07 Sep 2013 10:23:46 +0000 PS 124232@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ Easy enough to hand deliver to Holyrood and save on the postage, I'd have thought? kaputnik on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=3#post-124230 Sat, 07 Sep 2013 10:01:58 +0000 kaputnik 124230@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ I've hummed and hawwed about doing something similar for a while now. But I think with a little more work, and input from the statistically inclined posters of this parish, then this would make a pretty effective postcard to be mailed to every single MSP, with a short message on the back describing the trend and asking them to challenge the Transport Minister on his claims. I forget how much 2nd class stamps cost these days but it wouldn't be a massive whip-round to cover the postage costs. Printing costs on the likes of Vistaprint would be very low for a few hundred cards. chdot on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=3#post-124228 Sat, 07 Sep 2013 09:50:05 +0000 chdot 124228@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ "I'm always slightly uncomfortable with the focus on deaths anyway, so many lives are ruined through serious injury and trauma, it's almost like they're discounted and we only care about those who have died" Good point. I think one reason is that 'dead' is simple. SI much greater spread and - more to your point - recovery takes place at different rates and with different degrees of 'success' (a return to full health). 'We' know, just from people on CCE, that even complete physical recovery - bath/wine/time - can leave residual fear/unease/reluctance to cycle. ALL of which discourage cycling by individuals and the wider public. Perhaps even more useful than KSIs as they relate to 'random' events would be serious analysis of things like individual roads, junctions, speed, time of day, HGVs etc. Will the creation of Police Scotland make that easier/more likely to happen? 'Deaths' (and presumably SI) led to plans to spend billions on the A9. 'We' may argue that this is disproportionate. 'We' may be right. Can 'we' prove it? Does enough information exist - and is it public? KarenJS on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=3#post-124220 Sat, 07 Sep 2013 09:10:11 +0000 KarenJS 124220@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ Don't know much about statistics, but from what I do know it sounds like what it's showing is statistically significant and not an artefact of a small sample. I think basing it on all KSIs is correct and shows more impact. I'm always slightly uncomfortable with the focus on deaths anyway, so many lives are ruined through serious injury and trauma, it's almost like they're discounted and we only care about those who have died. Two thoughts regarding the graph: 1) if all the queries can be answered and it's sufficiently robust is there somewhere to present this more formally? Even an msp (thinking Alison Johnstone) bringing it to parliament? 2) would the press be likely to pick up on it given the obvious trend it shows in contrast to KBs earlier claims? I know very little about how either the parliament or press work, so may be barking up the wrong tree, but just seems like this is something that should be more widely publicised? Instography on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=3#post-124205 Sat, 07 Sep 2013 00:21:20 +0000 Instography 124205@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ This is population data so any question of sampling errors or statistical variability can be ignored. A dead cyclist is a dead cyclist. There's no probability that some of them might not be dead. There's no uncertainty to be taken into account. Between any two years you might consider large percentage changes as being an artefact of the small base - if there are only 10 cyclists in any year and one of them dies every year it'll look like at 10% death rate (which it is) but if in one year two die it'll look like at 100% increase but since there's nothing between 1 and 2 the increase is a partial artefact of the small base (even though the 100% increase is also true). What we see here is a continuous trend. Steady upward movement repeated year after year. This is no artefact. The politics of the deaths, for me at least, runs like this: I'm not interested in the base. At the behest of government (whether congestion, health, or whatever) or driven by economics, people are taking to their bikes. We can't be clear about the scale of the increase, I'll calculate the errors tomorrow, but it's there. Still, encouraged by government, people are cycling and increasing numbers of them are dying because of it. I don't care if the increase is in line with the increase in cycling, ahead of it or behind it. More people dying is not an acceptable price for the 'gains' from more people cycling. kaputnik on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=3#post-124197 Fri, 06 Sep 2013 22:59:27 +0000 kaputnik 124197@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ There's probably about 40x more people in cars than on bicycles (I'm pretty sure I see less than 1 cyclist for every 40 cars on the roads though!?) I'm not sure how we define the "road travelling" population of Scotland though, even if it was only 1,000,000 people (discounting those not travelling and those on the train), 2% of 1,000,000 is still a pretty substantial population. If that 2% make only 1 bicycle journey per day over a working year of 40 weeks, 5 days a week, that's still some 4,000,000 journeys a year. I guess it's just something that's nigh-on-impossible to quantify accurately though. Greenroofer on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=3#post-124196 Fri, 06 Sep 2013 22:44:29 +0000 Greenroofer 124196@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ @kaputnik A better statistician than me may be able to chip in with an observation about uncertainty in proportion data (or to tell me that I'm barking up the wrong tree), but I have an inkling that we need to take into account the size of the population from which the KSI's are drawn. There's gazillions of people in cars. There's fewer people on bikes (2% modal share, from SRD above) and the relative size of the source population influences the uncertainty in the reported KSI figures. Of course it could be that in every case the population is sufficiently large that this is irrelevant for the purposes of the graphic. I'm just not enough of a statistician to know. Whatever the details, the message is stark and pretty unavoidable, and the graphic makes it clear. kaputnik on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=2#post-124195 Fri, 06 Sep 2013 22:27:47 +0000 kaputnik 124195@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ @steveo such things result in a "computer says no" error on the office PC. I rely on old-fashioned email, but my home PC has Open Office, whose Excel alternative I abhor, so I didn't foresee any use for it at home. steveo on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=2#post-124194 Fri, 06 Sep 2013 22:25:57 +0000 steveo 124194@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ Google drive is handy for this sort of thing. kaputnik on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=2#post-124193 Fri, 06 Sep 2013 22:25:36 +0000 kaputnik 124193@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ there is no data to suggest that cycling as a modal share has increased beyond 2%, The Transport Scotland Data for 2010 - 2011 suggests a modal share increase from 0.8% of all journeys to 1.3%. I would take this with a massive pinch of salt and statistical error, as I don't seriously think that cycling increased by 62% in Scotland in that time. kaputnik on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=2#post-124189 Fri, 06 Sep 2013 22:19:41 +0000 kaputnik 124189@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ @greenroofer 1) no, which is why I included the serious injury numbers on top of the deaths, as it increases the sample size significantly into the multiple hundreds for both pedestrians and cyclists 2) no with a "but". It's hard to guess which numbers to compare it to. modal %age of journeys, vehicle miles? If you go by the former, cyclist share has increased (perhaps, a little bit and has fluctuated over last 10 years). However pedestrian share has increased too. "Motor Vehicles" has decreased slightly, but we know that the actual vehicle miles driven have increased. There's a lot of underlying complexity, and whichever way I plotted various things out and divived A by B to try and normalise it, what I was finding was that cyclists are the only group where KSI are going up, and they are going up faster than purely modal share would account for. KSI for vehicles are coming down much faster than their modal share is, and are coming down despite increased vehicle miles. And for pedestrians they're coming down significantly too, despite an increased modal share. The only way cyclist KSIs should have gone over the last 10 years if any Scottish Government had a coherent plan backed up by spending and supported by the legal system is down, they've done precisely the opposite, during which time what I imagine has done the most for cycling is not the government or their propaganda department Cycling Scotland, but a general awarenesses of health and environmental issues amongst the general public coupled with an economic downturn. The datasets that Transport Scotland have (or that I could find) don't all tie up nicely in terms of years and measured groups. E.G. I don't think they do pedestrian mileage to allow calculation of KSI per '000 miles walked! I do have the data on a spreadsheet and am happy to share it. Only it's not on this computer so I can't do it right now! P.S. no pedantry / criticism taken. It's also in the nature of my day job too so am more than willing to take on feedback to improve the visual and to stand by the findings and share and explain the data to support it. SRD on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=2#post-124188 Fri, 06 Sep 2013 22:13:46 +0000 SRD 124188@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ "2) Does the graphic account for the increasing numbers of cyclists on the road? My guess is that numbers of drivers and pedestrians are relatively constant over the time period shown, but cyclists have increased, so the increased KSI figures could just reflect an increasing population." We've been through this a few times. To the best of my knowledge there is no data to suggest that cycling as a modal share has increased beyond 2%, and only anecdotal evidence to suggest rising numbers of leisure cyclists. If there is such data, and it is reliable, then yes, we need to take it on board. I have seen attempts to do just this, but I am not convinced that the data they used was robust enough to justify the inferences drawn from it. Greenroofer on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=2#post-124187 Fri, 06 Sep 2013 22:04:05 +0000 Greenroofer 124187@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ @kaputnik. Powerful graphic. As data analysis and reporting professional (well it was either that or become an actuary!) I have an unhealthy tendency to pick holes in graphs when I see them. There's two challenges with the data as presented, and I wonder if there's a way to make it more robust. 1) Does the (I assume) relatively small sample size for cyclist injuries (and perhaps pedestrians too) mean the thing that appears to be an upward trend is actually just random statistical variation? 2) Does the graphic account for the increasing numbers of cyclists on the road? My guess is that numbers of drivers and pedestrians are relatively constant over the time period shown, but cyclists have increased, so the increased KSI figures could just reflect an increasing population. I ask in a spirit of genuine inquiry (rather than trying to be negative and critical) and to see if the experts with access to the data and who frequent this forum can make the graphic even more robust. At the moment it makes a really striking point and tells a horrifying story, but at the same time it's a bit vulnerable to annoying pedants like me saying "ah yes, but..." KarenJS on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=2#post-124171 Fri, 06 Sep 2013 17:10:35 +0000 KarenJS 124171@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ Ha, great, I'm off to retweet then! Thanks. kaputnik on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=2#post-124170 Fri, 06 Sep 2013 17:07:06 +0000 kaputnik 124170@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ I've tweeted, by all means do retweet (you do follow me, even if you've not connected this handle with that! I'm @cocteautriplets) KarenJS on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=2#post-124167 Fri, 06 Sep 2013 16:51:16 +0000 KarenJS 124167@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ @kaputnik that's quite a powerful graphic, wonder if it would be worth circulating on twitter etc if ok with you? chdot on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=2#post-124155 Fri, 06 Sep 2013 14:25:45 +0000 chdot 124155@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <a href="http://pedalonparliament.org/not-just-names" rel="nofollow">http://pedalonparliament.org/not-just-names</a> kaputnik on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=2#post-124150 Fri, 06 Sep 2013 13:56:38 +0000 kaputnik 124150@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/kaputniq/9683949441/" title="Untitled by the Magnificent Octopus, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2842/9683949441_99ffae1746.jpg" alt="Untitled" /></a> I made a graph using Transport Scotland's numbers. It's not pretty. It's cut-off the side bit. Pedestrians down 34% Motor Vehicles down 39% Cyclists up 27% (now with added clickability) Morningsider on "Another cycling death on Scotland's roads" http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=11069&page=2#post-124147 Fri, 06 Sep 2013 13:44:42 +0000 Morningsider 124147@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ Crowriver - If you want to see the Scottish Government flicking the V's at the churches then you need look no further than the Marriage and Civil Partnerhsip (Scotland) Bill - pretty much sums up the churches actual influence in national political matters these days. Pretty sure the tacks guy was also chair of the local community council and a solicitor to boot.