The healthy alternative?

A couple of days ago the Freakonomics blog posted on bicycling safety:

Per kilometer, cyclists are 12 times more likely than car drivers to suffer a fatal accident, according to Rutgers University urban planner John Pucher and Lewis Dijkstra of the European Commission (the same study found traveling by foot to be 23 times more dangerous than driving, per kilometer). To put this finding in perspective, there were 785 bicycling fatalities on American roadways in 2005, compared to 4,881 pedestrian and 43,443 automotive fatalities that same year.

On the other hand, a Danish study found that people who do not bike to work suffer a 39 percent higher mortality rate than those who do. So, assuming you can avoid a fatal accident on the road, biking to work may actually help you live longer.

The risks associated with cycling decrease dramatically when more cyclists are on the road, and especially when those cyclists obey traffic laws...

I cycle often here in Cayman, and I can tell you, it is not for everyone. There are no cycle paths and roads are sometimes very narrow. Many of the local cyclists are also fairly reckless and often don't follow normal traffic rules. My experience, however, is that signaling and taking care to obey traffic laws, earns respect from the motorists, making it much less of a hazardous experience. Had it not been for the heat and humidity, I am sure far more people would cycle to work. The distances here in Cayman are relatively short. But most people prefer their air-conditioned SUVs. Go figure.

To read the Freakonomics post, click here. It contains links to the studies mentioned above.