Manchester has been ranked the 7th worst city in the United Kingdom for cyclists, based on a study by Idealo.
The study analysed 30 cities across the UK looked at their cycle accidents in the past five years, and compared it to factors such as weather and the number of bike trails.
Manchester has had 9,782 in the past five years, meaning 24.73 accidents per 1,000 people in Manchester.
The list is topped by Bradford, where there have been 35.84 accidents per 1,000 people.
Other notable cities include London in 3rd – with 29.74 accidents per 1,000 people – and Birmingham just below it, with 28.35 accidents per 1,000 people.
Idealo, the company that made the study, compare shopping platforms and trends across the UK.
They believe that one of the factors in cycle accidents is the number of bike trails across cities.
For most cities, it can be seen that more trails lead to a reduction in cycle accidents. For example, Bradford and Leeds which have one and zero bike trails, respectively, top the list in number of road accidents.
This is highly fluctuant, with London being an anomaly – as it ranks 3rd in the number of road accidents but has over 200 bike trails across the city.
Bike trails are not an absolute reason for cycle accidents. The number does change by city, as seen below.
Instead, Idealo argues that there a multiple factors. They believe that other factors include the weather – namely temperature and rain statistics.
It is noted that more rain across a year is resulting in more accidents. Here too as Bradford and Leeds top the accident rankings, they also have 16.2cm of rain a year.
Meanwhile, the city right behind them in 3rd, London, sees just about 11.1cm of rain.
However, Manchester and Birmingham are the exceptions to the rules. Both see high amounts of rain- 12.4cm and 18.4cm, respectively – rank in 5th and 7th.
With temprature, Idealo believes that lower temperatures often cause more accidents and discomfort to cyclists.
As a result, Bradford with an average temprature of 14.8°C has many more accidents than Wolverhampton, with an average temprature of 17.3°C.
All factors working in unison have been suggested as the reason for cycle accidents across the UK.
Featured Image: Merve Selcuk Simsek @ Unsplash
