By Warren Woodward
“The single most important development in motorcycle safety in the U.S.”, “undertaken by the Oklahoma Transportation Center, an independent and well-respected research facility” – these are the kinds of words used to describe or, more accurately, hype the motorcycle crash causation study which was authorized by Congress four years ago. Anything government does always costs more than originally promised and this study is no exception. Initial funding was not nearly enough so the project has languished for lack of funds.
The cost overrun – already almost double its initial projected cost – should be a red flag, but instead of reevaluating the situation and abandoning this boondoggle, its private sector promoters, only want it more, even though by law they are picking up half the tab. For example, the American Motorcyclist Association, one of the boondoggle’s chief cheerleaders, is dunning its members with a “Fuel the Fund” campaign. This article will demonstrate why “Fund the Fools” would be a more apt slogan.
First of all, the Oklahoma Transportation Center is not “independent”. Their website reveals that they are an amalgam of state-sponsored interests – three state universities, Oklahoma DOT, the Oklahoma Turnpike Authority, and several businesses that, like the Center itself, rely on state and federal money. Heaven help us if that is what passes for “independent” nowadays. And “well-respected”? Maybe by the interests involved, as in any mutual admiration society, but not by me, or probably not by you either after you read about their bogus methodology.
Some 123,000 motorcycles are involved in accidents yearly, yet only 900 accidents will be studied. How can anything realistic be derived from studying less than 1% of the total? Obviously, the results can be skewed if all involve speeding or all involve DUI or all involve ROW violations. If a variety of accidents are studied, how is it known if the variety is an accurate sample reflecting all types of accidents?
And just what are “all types of accidents”? Some situations are similar but no two accidents are identical. All it takes is one variable to make a situation different. That one variable could be the fatal variable, and it could be something unmeasurable like the rider’ thoughts.
Any accident being studied will be investigated thoroughly. So thoroughly that the current cost estimate per accident is $10,000. Even allowing that as reasonable, nonsense dons the mask of science when, after investigating the accident, researchers then attempt to create what they term “controls”. Controls will be two other riders doing the same thing as the rider who crashed. Those riders will then be interviewed to determine why they did not crash (assuming they did not) and why the initial rider did crash.
This so-called “methodology” is absurd on the face of it and should set off anyone’s BS detector. No two riders are alike, and no two situations are the same. Thus, there is no “control”. A control in an experiment is an absolute to which something else can be compared. There is no absolute here and never will be as long as humans are involved.
For example, let’s say someone crashes because they are speeding in a turn but someone else speeds in the turn and makes it. What does this tell us? Only that one rider is better than another. But wait; even that is not true. Maybe the one who crashed had something go wrong, either with himself – his health, whatever – or with his machine. If the guy died or his machine got totaled beyond recognition, we may not ever know what exactly went wrong. And even if he lived, his assessment of what went wrong could be incorrect. Maybe the guy got distracted for a second by something other riders on the same route would not have to deal with – a personal problem, an attractive woman in a mini-skirt, who knows? So the cause may not have been speed at all – even if the rider was speeding.
The point is, there are too many unknowns and too many variables to quantify scientifically. These are people being studied, not robots. What we will have with this study is costly nonsense masquerading as science. And costly it is. Multiplying $10,000 per accident by 900 accidents equals $9 million. And this is now being called the bare minimum!
The vast amount of money wasted brings up another unfortunate point. The more this thing costs, the more it will be lauded with high-sounding words like “extensive”, “exhaustive” and “landmark”. Gullible fools impressed by those words, by large dollar amounts and names with PhD after them will think, “This is a multi-million dollar study done by experts. It must be right.” But it won’t be.
Editor’s Note: Rider Warren Woodward has been debunking popular mythology since at least 1960 when, after staying up all night Christmas Eve, he stood before his second grade class and announced there was no Santa Claus.