Instrumental Health

How do you view motorcycle and car safety technology?

John Newman

• JohnNewman
• technology

One of the consistent gripes or complaints that motorcyclists revisit is the number of distractions piling up inside cars by way of gadgetry and increasingly sophisticated instrumentation sold on the basis of assisting or making a motoring trip safer, more entertaining, easier to find directions etc. All of which, paradoxically, could be the cause of crashes or incidents...involving us.

From the elevated position of a motorcycle saddle how often have you observed a car driver using a mobile phone, trying to punch in sat nav co-ordinates while on the move, changing a CD or scanning for the track they want to listen to. Oh, and eating, drinking, or pushing their hair around while looking in the mirror?

The main culprit is of course the mobile phone. Now, not just an instrument for making and receiving calls and texts, but an app loaded gadget allowing people to run many aspects of their lives if they're that way inclined.
Research carried out in the US on mobile (cell) phones and the role their use plays in crashes is alarming. A survey carried out last year by their National Safety Council puts the figure as high as 26%.

It's not easy to find similar research studies and statistics for the UK, but the Department of Transport carries out an annual observation study relating to seat belt use and mobile phone use. Which in 2014 came up with a figure of 1.6% of motorists observed holding a phone to their ear or in their hand – seat belt use was 98.2%.
This observation method takes place at sixty sites in four designated geographical areas (South East, Newcastle/Durham, Manchester and Norfolk) in England, and twenty sites in Scotland, at specific time periods. Then, one presumes, the figures are extrapolated to cover the two countries and provide the total figure; however it seems to me, that if you spend any amount of time on the road, you might question this as being an underestimate.

Technological advances cannot be un-invented as the cliché goes. With almost everything that human kind has invented, designed and developed, there have been pros as well as cons. But as instrumentation for bikes becomes more sophisticated and ubiquitous – gps devices, iphone mountings, communication and music systems, action cams (as Garmin call them), on bike computer info modes - perhaps it's time to take stock and ask ourselves how much of this is necessary, or a distraction from the skill and concentration required to get pleasure and safety from our motorcycling?
One of the constant safety messages communicated by police riders, and the various advanced riding courses is that most crashes, accidents, call them what you will, are caused by a loss of concentration. We often like to hold the moral high ground over car drivers in terms of our levels of skill and competence. If motorcycling becomes as instrumentalised  (I've made that word up too) as cars, what do we lose or possibly gain?  
Any thoughts or reactions to this article? How do you see increased technology in cars and motorcycles?
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