#84 Area-wide vulnerable road user (VRU) treatments (part 4)

Vulnerable road users (VRU) face significantly elevated risk of injury in the event of a crash when compared with other road users (i.e., occupants of cars, trucks, buses). The current series of briefs looks at VRU treatments as part of an area-wide approach, drawing substantially on the Austroads (2020) report titled Integrating Safe System with Movement and Place for Vulnerable Road Users[1]. The series is structured in four parts, with the current brief (part 4) focusing on motorcyclist safety measures:

• Part 1: Introduction to the series

• Part 2: Cyclist safety measures

• Part 3: Pedestrian safety measures

• Part 4: Motorcyclist safety measures

  
  

The Austroads (2020) report cited above focuses on pedestrian and cyclist safety and does not include motorcycle-specific treatments, although motorcyclists are considered vulnerable road users in most of the relevant Australian and international literature. Data for Australia show motorcyclists accounting for 21% of road deaths in 2024 while motorcycles represent less than 5% of registered vehicles. This brief therefore draws on two additional Austroads reports addressing infrastructure and related treatments for motorcycle safety. These can be considered key references for further reading:

• Infrastructure Improvements to Reduce Motorcycle Casualties (Austroads, 2016)[2]

• Motorcycle Rider Perceptual Countermeasures (Austroads, 2023)[3]

  
  

Risk factors

Many readers will be familiar with at least some risk factors associated with motorcycle crashes. These differ significantly for single versus multi-vehicle crash types, but for riders, they frequently involve excessive speed, limited experience and/or impairment, and for other road users, failing to see and/or failing to give way. Road infrastructure as a ‘main factor’ is not prominent in crash data analyses and represents only 2% of direct contributors in single vehicle motorcycle crashes according to Austroads (2016). However, Austroads also states that (p.153):

…motorcyclists are a unique road user group that are influenced more adversely by road infrastructure compared to a passenger vehicle. Motorcyclists rely on road infrastructure elements to be designed or maintained to a higher level than what would traditionally be provided for passenger vehicles.

Various infrastructure elements that may contribute to motorcycle crash risk and injury severity are identified in Table 1.

Table 1: Road infrastructure elements that may be a factor in motorcycle crashes (Source: AP-R515-16)

Mitigation measures

Appropriate infrastructure can help to reduce rider crash and injury risk both directly and indirectly. Pothole repair and improved surface texture, for example, represent direct measures to reduce ‘loss of control’ crash risk. Less direct measures may include, for example, improving sight lines and installing fencing to help prevent ‘hit animal’ crashes. As speed is a prominent crash factor, general speed reduction measures such as traffic calming and enforcement are likely to benefit all road users, while specific treatments such as perceptual countermeasures (PCM) on curves may target motorcyclists particularly (see Austroads, 2023).

A tabulated hierarchical approach to treatment identification in the context of the Safe Roads pillar of the Safe System is reproduced below in Table 2. This considers indicative issues and treatments in response to identification of four particular hazards (roadside object, surface texture, crash risk on curves, right turn intersection crashes), but this process can be readily applied to other hazards.

Table 2: Remedial treatments by hierarchy of control (Source: AP-R515-16)

[1] Austroads (2020). Integrating Safe System with Movement and Place for Vulnerable Road Users (AP-R611-20). Sydney, Austroads.

[2] Austroads (2016). Infrastructure Improvements to Reduce Motorcycle Casualties (AP-R515-16). Sydney, Austroads.

[3] Austroads (2023). Motorcycle Rider Perceptual Countermeasures (AP-R688-23). Sydney, Austroads.