Bike accidents abound on campus

As freshman Caroline Rodriguez was biking to class two weekss ago, a speeding car hit her back wheel and sent her flying onto the pavement. An ambulance arrived on the scene minutes later and whisked her to the emergency room, where she was given extensive MRI tests and treated for the wounds on her back.
According to the police record, the accident occurred as Rodriguez exited the Lagunita Court dormitory complex and was turning onto Santa Theresa street. Deputy A. James of the Stanford Police Department called this location one of the major hotspots for bike accidents on campus.

Bicycle accidents have become ingrained into the Stanford culture simply because they are so common. They pop up in the Stanford Unofficial Guide as one of the “101 Things to Do Before Graduating.” Some consider them a rite of passage for freshmen. And in its fliers, the a cappella group Fleet Street Singers say that it is “a proud Stanford Tradition . . . not unlike bike accidents.”

Getting into a real bike accident, however, is no fun at all, and if you spend a day walking around campus, you are bound to see one — or several.

It is difficult to know exactly how many accidents occur on campus because the overwhelming majority of them are never reported. Unless one of the victims is seriously injured and needs to be taken to the hospital immediately, the police are rarely contacted.

Even so, the police record reports 59 accidents last year and already 45 this year.

Dr. Rochelle Dicker, a surgeon in the trauma department at Stanford Hospital, feels strongly that bike accidents are a very serious problem. Dicker says there is a lack of awareness among the students of the real dangers of crashes.

“Even small concussions, short losses of consciousness, without any residual effect, add up over time,” she said. “So if you get one on top of the other, it can have a particularly terrible toll.”

The hospital treated 196 severe bicycle injuries last year, a number that has almost doubled since 1998. Unfortunately, the hospital records do not distinguish between accidents that occur on campus or elsewhere in the surrounding county, making it impossible to determine how many take place at Stanford.

Dicker said she believes bicycle accidents are a major problem at Stanford but doesn’t think that the University is doing enough to prevent them.

“My colleagues are continually asking me what’s being done about it on campus because it doesn’t seem to be changing, it doesn’t seem to be getting better,” she said.

Carolyn Helmke, the bicycle program coordinator at the Parking and Transportation Department, admits that there is a problem, but also notes the high number of bicycles on campus — 12,000.

“Bikers assume they have the right of way, and that leads to problems,” she said. Helmke said she wants to increase the students’ understanding of traffic laws; she is starting a new program in collaboration with the Police Department and Vaden to promote awareness among undergraduates.

Ideally, she said she would educate students when they first arrive at Stanford during New Student Orientation, but said that it is impossible because the NSO schedule is already very packed.

Under the new program, information about accidents will be gathered to determine the most dangerous intersections on campus. Then the University will take the information to lower the number of incidents. In 1993, the University created a similar program, the “Comprehensive Bicycle Plan,” which was designed to reduce bicycle accidents and thefts. A decade later, the number of accidents is approximately the same, and there is still a lack of information on the problem.

Administrators and experts agree that a major problem with bike safety is that Stanford students do not wear bicycle helmets. When used properly, bike helmets decrease the rate of head injury at least by a factor of 10. Under California law, it is not mandatory to wear a bicycle helmet if you are over the age of 18.

Donnovan Somera Yisrael, a health specialist at Vaden, has worked extensively on this problem and said he is appalled that only 2 percent of undergraduates wear helmets.

“Stanford students think they are free thinkers, that they don’t give in to peer pressure,” he said. “But when it comes to bicycle helmets, they don’t wear them just because they look goofy. And I try to confront them with that.”

Bicycle accidents have been a problem at Stanford for decades, and though most of the time the injuries are minor, they have the potential to be fatal. Sergeant Bandy of the Police Department said, “This is a real problem, and it isn’t going to go away easily.”


http://daily.stanford.edu/tempo?page=content&id=15207&repository=0001_article