Children vulnerable cycling with traffic

By SCOTT MacLEOD

Sally Richardson was 6 years old when a van bowled her off her bicycle while she was riding along a quiet Taranaki road.

When she left hospital six months later the first thing she wanted to do was get back on her bike. But now, 49 years later, the Auckland schoolteacher worries about her 23-year-old son cycling.

She has good reason. Statistics show that cycling is a dangerous activity - especially for children.

In the 12 months to August, police reported 21 cyclists killed and 564 injured in collisions with vehicles. Hospitals treated another 1346 injured in other bike smashes.

The Land Transport Safety Authority says one-third of all people injured in cycle accidents are aged under 15. Twenty-eight children aged 10 to 14 have been killed in the past 10 years and 25 aged 5 to 9.

While there has been a large decrease in the number of children riding to school in the past decade because of concerns about safety, children still make up the biggest part of the cycling population.

Children are small objects, poorly visible to motorists, and they often lack control of their bicycles. But worse, many children know almost nothing about our road laws.

Cyclists do not need a licence. People of any age can ride without studying the road code.



The Waitakere City Council road safety coordinator, Kitch Cuthbert, believes that the problem is getting worse because the police who teach cycle safety to schoolchildren have had their resources cut. She sees children as young as 5 cycling on busy roads without helmets.

"In Australia, they have teachers who are properly trained in road safety," Ms Cuthbert says.

So how can parents protect their cycling children?

The first way is to buy a decent helmet. The US Bicycle Helmet Safety Institute says a helmet will stop 85 per cent of head injuries when a crash happens.

Cyclists should choose a helmet that covers the temples and moves no more than 25mm in any direction. The chin strap should always be tightened, so the helmet will stay on if there are two impacts from being hit by a car and then the road.

Secondly, parents should consider whether their child is old enough to ride on the road. Some road safety groups say nobody aged under 12 should ever cycle with moving traffic.

Ms Cuthbert believes parents should not let children ride to school until they are at least 10.

Parents should teach their children to ride in the backyard or a safe car park until they are able to cycle in a straight line while making hand signals or looking over their shoulder.

Brakes and reflectors should be checked before riding.


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