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fact sheets : bicycling by the numbers
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fact
sheets : bicycling by the numbers
How
many bicycles are sold each year? Why do people ride? What are the numbers
on bicycling crashes? Find answers to these and other questions by clicking
on the links below.  How
many people ride bikes? Other
national transportation-related surveys that include bicycling Why
do people ride? How
many bicycles are sold each year? How
many cyclists are killed and injured each year? Who
is involved in bicycle crashes? What
is the economic cost of crashes involving bicyclists? How
many bicycles are stolen each year? How
safe do people feel bicycling? How
much has been spent by the Federal Government on improving conditions
for bicycling? How many people ride bikes? The 2002 National Survey of Pedestrian and Bicyclist Attitudes and Behaviors was sponsored by the US Department of Transportation’s National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) and Bureau of Transportation Statistics in order to gauge pedestrian and bicyclists trips, behaviors, and attitudes. http://www.bicyclinginfo.org/survey2002.htm  According to the survey, approximately 57 million people, 27.3% of the population age 16 or older, rode a bicycle at least once during the summer of 2002. The survey breaks this down by gender, age, and race/ethnicity. top
of pageOther national transportation-related surveys that include bicycling: United States Census, 1990 & 2000: Percentage of journeys to work by bicycle in 1990: 0.41% (466,856 people) http://www.census.gov/population/socdemo/journey/usmode90.txt Percentage of journeys to work by bicycle in 2000: 0.38% (488,497 people)* http://factfinder.census.gov * Data are based on a sample and are subject to sampling variability. Nationwide Personal Transportation Survey, 1995: Percentage of trips: 0.7% (approximately 3 billion miles, and 9 million daily bicycle trips) http://www-cta.ornl.gov/npts/1995/Doc/trends_report.pdf Note - Data for the 2001 National Household Survey is available at http://www.bts.gov/nhts/index.html National Sporting Goods Association, 2002: Number of people aged seven and older who participated more than once: 41.1 million. http://www.nsga.org/public/pages/index.cfm?pageid=149 Sporting Goods Manufacturers Association, 2000: People aged six and older who participated at least once in recreational bicycling: 53.0 million http://www.sgma.com/reports/data/2001/p27_samplepages2001.pdf top
of pageWhy do people ride? The BTS survey found that in February 2003, of the 20.9 million people riding bicycles the majority reported doing so for exercise/health (41 percent) and recreation (37 percent). Only 5 percent reported commuting to work by bicycle as the primary use of the bicycle during the previous 30 days. http://www.bts.gov/omnibus/household/2003/february/index.html The 2002 National Survey of Pedestrian and Bicyclist Attitudes and Behaviors also reported on the purpose of respondent’s bicycle trips. The survey found that exercise and health for recreation followed the largest percentage of trips.
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of pageHow many bicycles are sold each year? According to the Bicycle Retailer and Industry News http://www.bicycleretailer.com/ the total US Bicycle Market rose from 15.2 million on 1997 to 16.6 million in 2001. The worsening economy hit the bike market hard in 2001, decreasing from its height in the last five years of 20.6 million in 2000 to 16.6 million in 2001. 
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of pageHow many cyclists are killed and injured each year? In 2001, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration http://www-nrd.nhtsa.dot.gov/pdf/nrd-30/ncsa/tsf2001/2001pedal.pdf reported that 728 bicyclists were killed in crashes with motor vehicles and 45,000 were injured. These numbers represent 2 percent of the total number of people killed and injured in traffic crashes. In 2000, the number of fatalities dipped below the 800 mark for the first time in the past decade:
A 1991 study, The
Costs of Highway Crashes by the Urban Institute and Federal Highway
Administration,
calculated the average nonfatal injury cost per person involved in a motor
vehicle crash. In 2000 dollars, the average nonfatal injury cost per person
involved in a motor vehicle crash is $61,375. Multiplying this number
by the 51,000 reported injury crashes in 2000 totals $3.1 billion.
31.32 percent were Somewhat Satisfied 17.55 percent were Neither Satisfied, nor Dissatisfied 16.84 percent felt Somewhat Dissatisfied 11.73 percent felt Very Dissatisfied top
of pageHow much has been spent by the Federal Government on improving conditions for bicycling? In the years before passage of the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act of 1991(ISTEA), Federal spending on bicycling and walking facilities was approximately $4-6 million per annum. ISTEA was reauthorized when the Transportation Equity Act for the 21st Century (TEA-21) was enacted on June 9, 1998, which authorized Federal surface transportation programs for highways, highway safety, and transit for the 6-year period from 1998-2003. By FY 2002 spending of Federal funds by States has grown to more $416 million. http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/tea21/index.htm
In September 2003 The Safe, Accountable, Flexible, and Efficient Transportation Equity Act of 2003 (SAFETEA) will go into effect. SAFETEA’s goal is to make “substantial improvements in the safety of the Nation's surface transportation” by more than doubling “funding for highway safety improvements over TEA-21 levels through a new core highway safety infrastructure program in lieu of the existing Surface Transportation Program safety set-aside”. (http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/reauthorization/safetea.htm) top
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