6th Annual Motorcycle Safety Forum -- Conspicuity

Conspicuity

Conspicuity (con-spik-CUE-i-tee): A term used to define the condition of being "visible", "easy to notice" or "obvious"; the ability of an object to draw attention to itself, even if no one's actively searching for it. Rider conspicuity, therefore, is the ability of a motorcyclist to draw attention to themselves, even though other drivers may not be actively looking for them.

Evidence is mounting in our multi-tasking age that operator distraction | inattention is a leading cause of motor vehicle accidents. Being proactive when behind the wheel or in the saddle and driving | riding defensively are always good survival strategies. Seeing and being seen are major elements of a viable survival strategy. And there's credible research to suggest this to be true. A major study(1) conducted in 1993-1996 investigating a correlation between rider conspicuity and crash-related injury concluded:

'... Wearing reflective or fluorescent clothing and white or light colored
helmets and using headlights in daytime could reduce serious injuries
or death from motorcycle crashes by up to one third ...'.

In a vast number of crashes involving a motorcycle and another motor vehicle, one causal factor seems to surface with alarming regularity time after time after time -- the motorcycle rider was either not seen at all by the operator of the other vehicle or seen too late for the crash to be avoided. Sadly, the all-too-frequent outcome of an unplanned 'meeting' like this is a life-altering injury -- or worse.

This year's conference topic, Gear-Up 4 Safety, focuses not only on the responsibility of motor vehicle operators, but on motorcycle riders as well.

So, how does one become more visible when riding? There are plenty of ways to become more noticeable in traffic -- like the Top 10 High-Viz tips(2) below:

Fluorescent/Reflective Safety Vest

White Helmet

Brightly Colored Jacket

Strategic Lane Positioning

Headlight Modulation

Flash Your Taillight

Reflective Materials

Movement

Auxiliary Driving Lights

Hand Signals

To obtain more information on each of these tips and several others, please visit Minnesota Department of Transportation's website at: www.highviz.org. And if you'd like to know how well you're doing being a 'visible' rider, take the online quiz on the site as well.

Be safe and enjoy the ride!

(1) Ref: Motorcycle Rider Conspicuity & Crash-Related Injury: Case-Control Study http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/328/7444/857
(2) Ref: MN Department of Transportation | http://www.highviz.org