Since the start of the year, bicycle accidents have increased sharply -

Clément Follain / 20 Minutes

  • Since the deconfinement, the passages recorded on the Paris cycle paths have jumped by 66%.

  • Bicycle accidents - cyclists or pedestrians hit by a bicycle - have increased by 30% since the start of the year.

    A less important pace, therefore, than the increase in practice. 

  • In orthopedic surgery departments, new pathologies, linked to the practice of cycling in urban areas, have emerged. 

More numerous in the streets of Paris, but also in hospitals.

Since the start of the year, bicycle accidents have increased in the capital.

Over the first eight months of the year, 580 cyclists were victims, according to the police headquarters, of a collision or a fall requiring medical intervention.

That is to say an increase of 30% compared to 2019. And the trend seems to be confirmed: the number of bicycle injuries increased by 70% in August.

“In recent weeks, we have seen a significant increase in interventions for serious accidents,” confirms the spokesperson for the Paris firefighters, Lieutenant-Colonel Claire Boët.

In his department at Béclère de Clamart hospital, Professor Thierry Begué, also president of the French society for osteoarticular trauma, estimates that, since deconfinement, he receives between 10 and 15 patients every week for injuries related to the practice of bicycle: cyclists but also pedestrians run over by them.

That is 40 or 50% more than last year, he estimates.

“It goes from big scratches to open and multiple fractures,” he says.

If fatal accidents are rare - six in total last year - the capital has experienced a black series for a month.

Since August 12, four cyclists have lost their lives in Paris, all struck by a vehicle, including two on the weekend of September 12 and 13.

Accidents increase more slowly than practice

But this increase in accidents, certainly unprecedented, is to be seen in relation to the democratization of the practice.

Between the transport strike at the end of 2019 and deconfinement, the bicycle has become for many Ile-de-France residents an alternative to public transport.

The number of passages recorded on Parisian cycle paths jumped 66% between the end of containment and the beginning of August compared to last year.

"The increase in the number of bicycle accidents is lower than that of bicycle traffic," notes Jean-Sébastien Catier, president of the Paris en Selle association.

And this cycling enthusiast recalled that, in the capital, the number of bicycles is now equivalent to that of motorized two-wheelers, but “there are six or seven times more deaths among bikers”.

The arrival of autumnal weather, with all that it counts of showers and frost, nevertheless raises fears of an explosion of accidents.

“Last year, at the time of the transport strikes [in December 2019 and January 2020], we were faced with a significant increase in bicycle accidents,” recalls the spokesperson for the BSPP.

An increase that she attributes to bad weather but also to shorter days and trips in the dark.

If Prof. Thierry Begué does not fear a saturation of orthopedic services - in particular because all bicycle accidents do not require urgent intervention - he notes an emergence of specific pathologies.

“We obviously still have clavicle fractures, which are a classic pathology of falls from a bicycle, but we are seeing more and more open fractures of the foot or the leg, caused by an impact with a car or a truck.

Another injury, until now "reserved" for bikers: multiple fractures of the wrist, "puzzle style", linked to a fall at high speed that we try to avoid by putting the arms forward reflexively.

To limit accidents, the president of Paris en Selle insists on the need to improve the arrangements to separate the bicycle lanes from those reserved for cars.

“The majority of serious accidents are caused by collisions with cars or trucks,” he insists.

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  • Mobility

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  • Paris

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