Motorcycle Safety

Right, so that doesn't answer my question. Would a human driver have also killed the motorcyclist?

 

Since we have been keeping statistics auto death rates have been steadily going down. Modern systems like ABS have proven to make the roads safer. Since we mostly agree driving skills have on average gone down it leaves mostly technology improvements in cars as the reason. Every new technology has entered the market place too soon but it does speed up improvement. We do know self driving system have caused fatal accidents. We do not know how many were avoided by the same technology and will not until a good examination of stats shows a reduction trend. It will take time to be able to do that since it is so new but just based on how rare a failure is I see no reason to doubt what the data will say.

 

Tesla has that data, because they have the ability to compare accident rates with self driving on and off. I believe they have said that the accident rate is about half when self driving is enabled.

There may be a selection effect there, because people might be inclined to not use self driving during the trickier situations, thus more likely to have an accident, but given the massive number of miles driven every day by the Tesla fleet, I would guess that effect is pretty minimal.

I believe Tesla (or Elon) has said that a 50% reduction in accidents probably isn't good enough for public acceptance, because even a very small number of accidents trigger the sort of media coverage Dale linked to above. But they are getting there.

 

I do not like substituting technology for driver competency in cars anymore than I like the same trade with pilots in the cockpit.
At least with pilots in this country we seem to be willing to exercise some control but government has made it abundantly clear that will never happen in the automobile.

 

Best motorcycle safetry ever = GO TO THE TRACK!!! Once you ride the track, the street becomes boaring. All though a lot faster, the track is so much safer.

 

The skill set is very different, though. Flying from point A to B generally doesn't require great physical skill, and in fact can be quite easily automated-- just look at all the drones out there. The "flying the airplane" part is easy.

The difficult part is the judgement aspect-- how close should we go that thunderstorm? Should we land at that airport given that it's at night, raining, and the crosswind is at our limit? Should we divert, and if so to where? Those sort of strategic judgement questions are the difficult part of flying. As a passenger, I would like the person making those strategic judgements to be in the airplane with me, so that we pay the same price if they get it wrong.

A car, on the other hand, has relatively little strategic judgement required. The decision making in a car has to do with an immediate question of where did that pedestrian come from, and what do I do? Is that person actually making a left turn, or going to drive straight through the intersection. What do I do about construction, or snow, or fog?

Very different skills involved.

 

That's exactly what my bike racing buddies say. You're bored on the road and take it easy for that very reason.

 

Not every motorcycle is a "track bike" - and most normal people don't have the time/money/equipment to "go to the track"- and there may not be a nearby "track"

Most of Harley sales are street/touring bikes and people should be able to enjoy them without fear of some lazy ass **** on his/her/it phone <or asleep> in "self drive mode" hitting them

I rode my Street Glide to work pretty much every day in spring/summer for several years with no issues because I basically assumed I was invisible <as my dad taught me>

This "self drive" stuff is for lazy pathetic losers- either DRIVE your vehicle or take the ****ing bus

 

Scary???? Really. They crash and in most cases they are the only ones paying a price. Scary is the trucks, busses and SUVs driven by morons who can very easily take out a bunch of people. Or the 18 year old kid in Texas a couple years ago non stop texting. Other drivers had already called in to report him because he was all over the road. He hit a church bus and killed 12 of the 13 people aboard. At the time using a phone while driving was not illegal in Texas.


Thats scary.


Scary is the ***** in the Escalade doing 30 through a busy parking lot while texting and nearly taking me out.

All these incredibly unsafe drivers who threaten the lives and safety of others and we do nothing about it. Thats scary.

I could give a F about someone hurting themselves.

 

I have seen Harleys on the track so I am going to debunk the track bike theory. My point was, its way safer at the track PERIOD. You can say what you about this or that but at the end of the day, the track is the safest.

 

I don't disagree- but normal people with street bikes like to ride them to lunch or dinner or a nice ride in the mountains or a nice ride by the ocean etc and should not have to worry about getting hit by some imbecile with their pathetic EV set to auto-drive- there are enough other things to be concerned about riding on the street and in traffic- but still enjoyable

 

100% I have a dedicated track bike, 2 street bikes and a litle grom that I count as 1/2 a bike. I sitll love the street and like you said, going to lunch or dinner or a nice ride. I try and get out of the city. Here in Wa we have one of the best roads up to Mt St Helens that is just pure heaven so by no means I am saying never to ride on the street but in terms of safety, track is always safer. 2 of my buddies got hit last year in the street. At a local track day, someone just got killed by getting T boned by another track rider so it can happen at the track too. In reality, motorcycles are dangerous no matter what. Be safe and have fun.

 

No question a track is safer but that is not why I ride. A little difficult to enjoy the Grand Tetons at a track.
Image Unavailable, Please Login

 

Nice poster wall paper ;-)

 

My biggest OH **** moment on one of my sport bikes was when I didn’t see the very sharp turn in the country side road while riding at night while going maybe 40ish mph. I had a 1/2 split second choice lean it over or wreck. I remembered the saying “you’ll run out of nerves before you run out of traction when the bike is leaned over”. I made it through the curve without anything happening. If I had gone down and was hurt it could have been a long time until I was found. This was back in the late 90s. The bikes now are even more capable, faster, and better everything. I don’t remember where I heard that saying but that saying save my ass or life that night

 

I was sitting at the next table over in a restaurant bar waiting for a table for dinner from some people who I could tell were celebrating something. After a while I had heard so many bits and pieces I had to ask. Guy was very nice and explained earlier that day he had his last cast removed. It had been right about a year. He went on to explain on a moonless night he was riding his motorcycle down the freeway in a semi rural area between 2 suburbs in the San Francisco Bay Area. He went up over an overpass and for just a second he thought he saw something ahead of him but too late, he hit the black horse standing in the middle of the freeway.
Killed the horse. Said he nearly cut it in two. The EMTs were shocked with all the blood and gore and guts to find him still alive.

No mulligans in life. Do it right the first time.