Approaching Bike Hazards via Crowdsourcing of Volunteered Geographic Information

Abstract

Information on individual hazard perception while cycling and the associated feeling of safety are key aspects to foster sustainable urban cycling mobility. Although cyclist’s perceptions must also be critically reviewed, such crowdsourced Volunteered Geographic Information (VGI) provides wide-ranging insights on diverse hazard categories in cycling. In this case study in the city of Freiburg, Germany, hazard perceptions, information about lane types, and the underlying routes were crowdsourced via an open source smartphone application by a small group with the aim of providing cyclists with effective solutions. By dealing with levels of reliability, we show that even a small group of laypersons can generate an extensive and valuable set of VGI consisting of comprehensive hazard categories. We demonstrate that (1) certain hazards are interlinked to specific lane types, and (2) the individual hazard perceptions and objective parameters, i.e., accident data, are often congruent spatially; consequently, (3) dangerous hot spots can be derived. By considering cyclists’ needs, this approach outlines how a people-based perspective can supplement regional planning on the local scale.

Towards a Sustainable and Safe Future: Mapping Bike Accidents in Urbanized Context

“…As shown in Figure 1a, almost all the zones have positive coefficients, which means that the more point of interest a zone contains, the higher the severity of bike crashes. Areas with a higher POI density may attract more cyclists, which can also contribute to the severity of bike crashes, which is similar to the findings of Hologa and Riach [69]. Regarding the traffic signals, it is noticed that the bike crash index is correlated positively in the inner areas of the city and correlated negatively in the suburbs, as shown in Figure 1b.…”

Safety of Cyclists in Poland in the Context of European Road Traffic

“…These factors originate from both elements of the environment and the behaviour of other road users and can be identified from an analysis of the causes of accidents and the typical sources/causes of these risks, as shown in Table 12. The above compilation is a synthesis of findings from scientific and popular articles pertaining to road safety for cyclists, the safety of cyclists as users of vehicles, and the safety of cyclists as athletes [9,[31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40][41][42][43][44][45]. It encompasses a diverse array of incidents that can pose risks to cyclists.…”