Dooring is a traffic collision in which a cyclist is struck by a car door. The width of the door zone in which this can happen varies, depending upon the model of car one is passing. The zone can be almost zero for a vehicle with gull-wing doors or much larger for a truck.
Video Dooring
Legal issues
Most areas have laws that require car users to check for bicyclists before opening the door of their vehicle, but there have been serious injuries and deaths caused by drivers illegally opening their doors in the path of a passing cyclist where this is prohibited by law.
Many areas have laws may be interpreted as requiring cyclists to ride in the door zone, meaning they may expose themselves to danger in order to keep out of the way of motorized traffic. These laws typically have exceptions; avoiding hazards, such as an open door, is sometimes among them.
The problem lies with avoiding this 5 feet (1.5 m) zone, which should be part of the parking zone, when there is a bike lane or the perception by law enforcement or motorists that one should be riding their bike out of the travel lane to not impede faster motorized traffic. In most jurisdictions, a cyclist is considered a driver/operator of a vehicle afforded the same rights as the driver of a motor vehicle; however, in some jurisdictions cyclists are further restricted by laws such as "ride as far right as practicable." From a cyclist's point of view, "practicable" includes safety, and safety is noted in many of these laws through exceptions; however, many law enforcement, judges, motoring public and even cyclists stop reading at "as far right." Most motor travel lanes adjacent to a bike lane are only 10-11 feet (3.0-3.4 m) wide, so if a cyclist has to use that lane to avoid hazards in the bike lane, it is too narrow to safely share with passing traffic and he/she should ride in a "lane-control" method as is allowed by most of these ordinances.
Maps Dooring
Avoidance
Because it is rarely possible to see and react safely to a suddenly opening door, traffic cycling educational programs teach cyclists to ride in the travel lane outside of the door zone despite the fact that in at least one place, New York, 96% of deaths have occurred outside of the door zone. This is easier than locating bike lanes outside the door zone and increasing the width of parking lanes.
Motorists and passengers - both front and rear - can make dooring less likely by practicing the "Dutch reach" - opening the car door by reaching across the body with the more distant hand. Even though it's called the "Dutch reach", it is not taught in the Netherlands to young drivers. The myth is that drivers are required in the exam to use their right hand to open their door, which forces them to turn their torso. That makes it more likely they will look over their shoulder to check for oncoming cyclists who could get doored." Unlike the name would suggest, this method is rarely practiced in the Netherlands, and most certainly not mandatory. Even though it is a safe method for preventing accidents with cyclists, the high prevalence of cyclists in the Netherlands and strict driving classes make sure that drivers have enough awareness of cyclists. It seems the term "Dutch reach" was coined in the USA, possibly because the Netherlands has a lot of cyclists. This move does not have a Dutch name, but in 2016 an American physician in Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA, coined the term to help promote the Dutch method which was little known in the United States. International interest in the term and method followed its coinage, suggesting that the far hand method was or remained little known across the globe.
Press, electronic media and internet news coverage about the Dutch Reach method have since occurred in Canada, United Kingdom, Austria, Australia, Belgium, Brazil, China, Finland, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Hungary, India, Ireland, Italy, Spain, Japan, Poland, New Zealand, Portugal, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, Sweden, The Netherlands, and the United States of America.
In early 2017 the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents (UK) endorsed the Dutch Reach as the recommended road safety practice to avoid dooring collisions. In May 2017 the Commonwealth of Massachusetts (USA) introduced the Dutch Reach far hand method into its 2017 Revised Driver's Manual, Chapter 4, Rules of the Road, as best practice for safe exiting of vehicles. Immediately thereafter the League of American Bicyclists called for its adoption nationally, in addition to safe infrastructure improvements and cyclist vigilance and door zone avoidance.
Prevalence
It is difficult to find statistics on the incidence of door zone fatalities, serious injuries, and collisions as the type of accident is often not recorded consistently from city to city. However, an analysis of Chicago bike crashes found that there were 344 reported dooring crashes reported in 2011, for a rate of 0.94 doorings per day. Doorings made up 19.7% of all reported bike crashes. The number of additional doorings that occurred without being reported is unknown.
Collisions
In Toronto, "motorist opens door in path of cyclist" collisions were 11.9% of all reported car/bike collisions in 2003. Eight percent of serious injuries to cyclists in London in 2007 were caused by cyclists swerving to avoid opening car doors. In the Australian state of Victoria between 2006 and 2010, car door openings caused eight percent of serious injuries to cyclists.
Relative risk
Relative to other collisions such as getting rear ended, getting doored is less risky: "80.04% of those cyclists who were doored were injured, while 94.40% of those in non-dooring crashes were injured." Also, it should be noted that getting doored itself usually is not fatal; rather, most serious door-zone-related injuries are sustained by getting hit by a motor vehicle while swerving to avoid the door. Thus, most deaths and serious injuries occur in the travel lane and not in the door zone.
Fatalities
In New York City, 3% (7 out of 225) of bicyclist fatalities in the ten-year period between 1996 and 2005 were from striking an open door or swerving to avoid one. In London three people were killed in car door opening incidents between 2010 and 2012. In two peer reviewed studies, 124 deaths in London during 1985-1992, and 142 deaths in New Zealand during 1973-1978, none of the fatalities occurred in door opening incidents. While there were 1112 collisions caused by opening doors in the Australian state of Victoria between 2000 and 2010, the first fatality occurred in March 2010.
Bike lanes and door zone incidents
In a comparison of Santa Barbara (without bike lanes) to Davis, California (with bike lanes), 8% of the car-bike collisions in the former involved an opening door, whereas the latter had none.
See also
- Outline of cycling
- Cycling infrastructure
- Shared lane marking
References
External links
- The "Door Zone" includes instructive diagrams.
- The Door Zone Project
- Door Zone Avoidance Preston Tyree, recently retired Education Director at League of American Bicyclists, teaching LCI (instructor) candidates how to teach about the door zone.
- Why You Should Avoid the Door Zone Video showing how bicyclists are thrown into traffic when they collide with an opening car door.
- The Dutch Reach Project A project and website to promote the far-hand 'Dutch Reach' method to avoid crashes, dooring cyclists or personal injury to occupants when exiting motor vehicles.
Source of article : Wikipedia
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