The Question The View The Argument Your Opinion

Consumer Report

iinta CONSUMER REPORT CYCLING SAFETY

CYCLISTS: SHOULD WE BE ABLE TO SEE WHAT'S COMING?

A close pass. A mirror inches away. A distracted driver drifting toward the bike lane. For cyclists, the danger from behind can feel uniquely powerless. Is it time to reopen the conversation?

By iinta Consumer Report

A reader discussion on visibility, distracted driving, infrastructure and the rules of the road.

Cyclist riding beside a passing vehicle — AI-generated editorial imagery for illustration.

Cyclist and pedestrian beside roadway traffic

Cyclists travelling in a protected bike lane

THE QUESTION

“

If a cyclist can see the vehicle coming, does that extra warning create a meaningful chance to move - or does riding against traffic introduce greater risks at intersections and driveways?

THE VIEW FROM THE SADDLE

The danger you don't see

I am an avid cyclist. On trails, the experience is very different from riding beside moving traffic. On a roadway or painted bike lane, the vehicle approaching from behind is often the one I cannot evaluate. I cannot see whether the driver is looking down, drifting toward the shoulder, reaching for something, or simply has not noticed me.

On more than one occasion, a passing vehicle has come close enough that I felt I was almost clipped by a mirror. That experience is the basis for this discussion: facing traffic gives a cyclist visual information and, in some situations, time to react or move. That is a reason to ask the question - not proof that wrong-way cycling is safer overall.

Cyclist looking toward approaching roadway traffic

~47 Canadian bicyclist deaths
in 2023*

~445 Canadian bicyclists seriously injured
in 2023*

73% of cycling deaths in Canada involve
a motor vehicle**

71,000 cyclist deaths worldwide
in 2021

*Rounded from Transport Canada's 2023 totals: bicyclists were 2.4% of 1,964 road fatalities and 4.8% of 9,261 serious injuries. **Parachute reports 73% of cycling deaths involve a motor vehicle.

Worldwide, the World Health Organization reported about 71,000 cyclist deaths in 2021, about 6% of global road deaths.

What does cycling injury cost Canadians?

There is no reliable current national dollar total isolating the cost of bicycle crashes alone. The earlier version of this feature used Transport Canada's approximately $36-billion estimate for all Canadian motor-vehicle collisions. That figure is real, but it is not a cycling-cost figure and therefore does not belong here as though it were.

For context only, Parachute's national injury-cost work estimates all transport incidents cost Canada about $3.6 billion in 2018. That includes many forms of transport injury and cannot be attributed to cyclists. A defensible Canada-wide bicycle-only property-damage total is not published in the national sources reviewed.

What we can say: serious cycling crashes generate emergency response, hospital and rehabilitation costs, lost work and productivity, insurance costs and property damage. But assigning a national dollar figure to cyclists without cycling-specific data would overstate what the evidence supports.

Pedestrian walking facing approaching traffic

THE OTHER SIDE OF THE ARGUMENT

Walking faces traffic. Cycling usually doesn't.

There is a familiar safety principle behind the instinct to face traffic: if you can see danger approaching, you may have time to respond. Several countries explicitly use that principle for pedestrians where there is no sidewalk or footpath.

Country	Pedestrian guidance when no footpath
United Kingdom	Keep to the right-hand side so you can see oncoming traffic.
New Zealand	Walk facing oncoming traffic and stay as far off the road as possible.
Australia (NSW)	Government guidance tells pedestrians to walk facing traffic where there is no footpath.
United States	NHTSA advises pedestrians without a sidewalk to walk at the road edge facing traffic.

ROAD POSITIONING

But bicycles are treated differently

Ontario treats a bicycle as a vehicle. Provincial guidance tells cyclists to ride on the right side of the road and requires motorists, where practical, to leave at least one metre when passing. Ontario can use specially designated contraflow bicycle lanes, but that is controlled infrastructure - not general permission to ride against traffic.

The safety counterargument is predictability: drivers entering from side streets and driveways generally look for vehicles travelling in the expected direction. A cyclist approaching from the opposite direction can arrive where a motorist is not expecting them.

←

REAR VISIBILITY

Facing traffic lets the rider see an approaching vehicle and potentially react to a close pass.

↗

INTERSECTION VISIBILITY

Riding with traffic makes the cyclist's movement more predictable to drivers at intersections, driveways and turns.

WHERE SHOULD THE CONVERSATION GO?

Maybe the real problem is the space between us

A painted line offers guidance. It does not stop a mirror, a drifting SUV or a distracted driver. Protected cycling infrastructure, lower speeds, safer passing distances, better sight lines, enforcement and driver awareness can address the underlying conflict without requiring cyclists to travel against the normal flow of traffic.

WE WANT YOUR OPINION

06 QUESTIONS

Join the conversation.

iinta is opening this discussion to cyclists, drivers, first responders, police, road engineers, health professionals and families. We want experience and evidence - not shouting from opposite sides of the road.

01
Would you feel safer if you could see vehicles approaching you?
02
Should cyclists ever be permitted to ride facing traffic on selected roads or specially designed lanes?
03
Would that create more danger at intersections and driveways?
04
Are painted bike lanes enough - or should busy roads require physical separation?
05
Should Canada strengthen passing-distance rules, distracted-driving enforcement or cyclist visibility requirements?
06
Have you ever been clipped, sideswiped or forced off the road by a passing vehicle?

SOURCES & NOTES +

Transport Canada, Canadian Motor Vehicle Traffic Collision Statistics 2023; Parachute, Cycling and Cost of Injury in Canada; World Health Organization road-safety data; Ontario Ministry of Transportation bicycle-safety guidance; UK Highway Code; NZ Transport Agency; NSW Government; U.S. NHTSA.

Statistics from different years and methodologies should not be directly compared.