Kinglake road crashes (2014) | Hacker News Reader

Kinglake road crashes (2014)

the-way-to-the-centre.com

25 pointsscottmcdot11 comments

This analysis doesn't lead to any relavent conclusion at all. It just shows more vehicle accidents of any type than cycle accidents. It needs to at least be scaled by the ratio of bikes to other vehicles on that road. Without even any statistics, it could be meaningful if it also showed crashes elsewhere nearby too. Maybe severe bike accidents are actually more common just off that road than on it? We have no idea from this presentation.

Good on him for having a go though. This is what journalists should be doing to help inform people better than a policeman's bluster.

There would probably be more motorcycle deaths on that road than regular cars as well, as it's a popular spot for enthusiast riders. They have an accident counter sign on that exact road, that if I recall, said there were 200+ motorcycle accidents in the past 10 years (that's off the top of my head). That doesn't correlate with the data in the article either so it makes me wonder if it's correct.

278 last I checked, but I don't think It's for that particular stretch of road.

You're right that he should have (and Strava could probably provide some baseline information on that) to make it conclusive, but I'm confident that the conclusions reached are valid - it's a very popular route and that's an obvious conclusion to a Melbournian cyclist.

You can see it on this Strava heatmap, running from St Andrews to Kinglake - http://labs.strava.com/heatmap/#11/145.29434/-37.55368/blue/....

As someone who's driven that road dozens of times, I can tell you that it's one of the most dangerous I know.

It has very steep cliffs and it's very narrow. It's the only main road between the two small towns.

I can understand the locals annoyance when they're stuck behind a cyclist for the whole stretch and cannot safely get around them without risking their life or the life of others.

There are plenty of roads in the area that are safer, not to mention the abundance of off road riding trails for mountain bikers in the area.

Cyclists deaths is misinformation, but the sentiment from the locals is real and warranted: please choose another road, this is our only road and we got places to be.

Based on the maps and Street View imagery, I only see one potentially safer road nearby (C727/C725; C726 is just as narrow). Other roads in the area are either dead ends (a problem for obvious reasons) or unpaved (a problem for a large share of recreational riders on traditional road bikes).

The climb up from Whittlesea is impressively direct in places on a pushie. I've seen plenty of people do it, but it is a different kind of ride and I'm not going to try it any time soon ...

I like his GIS work, but there is no conceivable way that there were only 3 pushie accidents on that road in 7.5 years so sorry VicRoads but I doubt the dataset is accurate.

Funny to see my neighbourhood on HN :-).

Being scary doesn't necessarily mean dangerous. Perhaps the steep cliffs actually keep people paying better attention than a narrow road with parked cars or trees along the side which may feel more comfortable but might be equally dangerous. There's the phenomenon that people drive faster on wider lanes regardless of the speed limit.

This was a big issue in the media in Melbourne a while back - media pundits calling for the road to be closed to bikes with lots of invective about how cyclists clearly didn't have the sense to take care of their own lives.

I love it when simply looking at the data shows the bigots for who they really are.

In a car this road scares the crap out of me. Personally I'm not convinced that it should even allow two way traffic as the road is frequented by large 4x4s that almost always enter into the oncoming traffic lane.

Its narrow, has no run off and the hill climbing driver is faced with a close call with incoming traffic or a slip down a steep cliff with no barrier.

Sheer lunacy.

It's an interesting road.

Theres a rumour amongst the motorcycle community that police turn a blind eye to that road so that tourists arn't turned off from visiting the area and spending the money.

Considering the relatively low speed limits there one would presume it would make a great speed trap but I've never seen a radar gun up there in the last 10 years or so.

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