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Last updated: May 8, 2023

Cyclists, Beware of SUVs

SUVs strike bikers higher on their bodies, leading to more severe injuries.

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Aliza Vigderman, Director of Content

Bicycling, also known as pedalcycling, became more popular during the pandemic, reaching a decade-long high in 2022. That year, there were 52.7 million bikers in the U.S., an 8 percent increase from 2019.1 However, with more pedalcyclists comes more property damages, injuries, and fatalities due to collisions.

The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) analyzed 71 single-vehicle crashes in Michigan involving bicyclists and cars, as well as bicyclists and SUVs from 2015 to 2021. The takeaway? SUVs cause more severe injuries to bikers than typical cars. Here’s why.

SUVs Cause More Severe Injuries to Bikers

IIHS’s study analyzed crashes from the Vulnerable Road User Injury Prevention Alliance (VIPA) database, which included police reports, crash reconstructions, injury attributions, and bicyclists’ medical records. Its data is based on the Abbreviated Injury Scale (AIS), which ranks the severity of injuries from one (minor injuries) to six (maximal injuries). By aggregating the three highest AIS scores per bicyclist, statistician Samuel S. Montfort and senior research engineer Becky C. Mueller determined the cyclist’s Injury Severity Score (ISS). The higher the severity of the total injuries, the higher the ISS score a biker would have, up to 75.

Examining these scores, Montfort and Mueller found that SUVs cause more severe injuries to bikers because the tall front ends of SUVs strike cyclists higher on their bodies compared to passenger vehicles. The front ends knock bicyclists down, making them more likely to be run over rather than vaulted onto the hood of the car.

Kinematics by vehicle type Car SUV
Forward projection 65% 62%
Wrap trajectory 13% 14%
Roof vault 17% 0%
Fender vault 0% 10%
Run over 0% 10%
Side impact 4% 5%

DID YOU KNOW?

Kinematics describes how a bicyclist moved after being struck by a car.

While for both car and SUV collisions with bicyclists, forward projection is the most common kinematic, SUVs have a much higher chance of running someone over, leading to more severe injuries than a roof vault, for example.

Injury severity by striking vehicle component/type Car SUV
Header/roof 29% 0%
Hood/cowl 21% 0%
Pillar/mirror 17% 19%
Ground 15% 25%
Windshield 12% 1%
Front end 5% 4%
Fender 0% 14%
Wheel/undercarriage 0% 37%

People struck the ground in 25 percent of collisions with SUVs, compared to only 15 percent of collisions with cars.2

How Common Are Bicycle Crashes?

According to data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s (NHTSA) Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS), from 2011 to 2021 (the last year the NHTSA released data), the number of crashes involving pedalcyclists increased by 13 percent.3 But while injury-only and property damage-only crashes both decreased by 14 and 11 percent, respectively, fatal crashes increased by 42 percent.

Number of crashes involving pedalcyclists and all vehicle types Fatal Injury only Property damage only Total
2011 712 48,234 3,390 52,336
2012 770 49,577 6,056 56,403
2013 787 48,095 5,999 54,881
2014 759 50,491 5,927 57,177
2015 866 45,556 4,588 51,010
2016 884 64,201 4,945 70,030
2017 831 50,009 4,000 54,840
2018 909 46,906 3,143 50,958
2019 889 49,208 3,841 53,938
2020 985 38,854 3,451 43,290
2021 1,008 41,501 3,011 45,520
Total 9,400 532,632 48,351 590,383

In 2021, only 2 percent of crashes involving pedalcyclists were fatal, but 90 percent involved injuries and only 8 percent were property damage-only.

While there are more passenger vehicles than SUVs on the road, SUV crashes involving pedalcyclists are on the rise. From 2011 to 2021, the number of fatal crashes involving bicyclists and SUVs increased by 78 percent, compared to a 26 percent increase with passenger cars.

Number of fatal crashes involving pedalcyclists and passenger cars or SUVs Passenger car SUV Total
2011 269 131 400
2012 314 140 454
2013 319 148 467
2014 311 132 443
2015 374 142 516
2016 358 142 500
2017 337 155 492
2018 363 170 533
2019 360 180 540
2020 371 238 609
2021 365 233 598
Total 3,741 1,811 5,552

NOTE:

Despite only making up 9 percent of the vehicles in the U.S. as of 2021, SUVs were involved in 27 percent of all crashes involving pedalcyclists that year.4

Conclusion

Pedalcyclists, especially those new to biking, should be wary of riding near SUVs, given the higher propensity of severe injuries in the event of a collision. Interested in other forms of transportation? Check out our overview of microtransit, which combines elements of rideshares and public transportation.

Citations

  1. 2022 Outdoor Participation Trends Report. Outdoor Foundation. (2022).
    https://outdoorindustry.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/2022-Outdoor-Participation-Trends-Report-1.pdf

  2. Bicyclist crashes with cars and SUVs: injury severity and risk factors. Monfort and Mueller. (2023, Apr).
    https://www.iihs.org/api/datastoredocument/bibliography/2277

  3. Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS). National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. (2023).
    https://www.nhtsa.gov/research-data/fatality-analysis-reporting-system-fars

  4. Market Beat. NADA. (2022, Jun).
    https://www.nada.org/media/5517/download?inline

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