Motorcycles flood the streets of Latin America. Whether in Bogotá, the Colombian capital nestled in the Andes mountain range; Guayaquil, Ecuador’s main port on the Pacific; o Córdoba, the second most populated city in Argentina after Buenos Aires, is a palpable phenomenon that has put the authorities on alert. The rise of two-wheeled vehicles, practical and economical, has also become a kind of epidemic of deaths on the asphalt. Motorcyclists, who are usually young men, are both victims and perpetrators, often for exceeding the speed limits.
The officials, experts and urban planners gathered this week within the framework of the global road safety initiative of Bloomberg Philanthropies, in New York, agreed on their concern about this growing phenomenon, and on the need to improve the quality and attractiveness of public transportation to be able to confront it. Beyond the differences from place to place, this is, along with speed controls, the main challenge in terms of road safety, according to the organization, which works with 27 cities in 15 countries.
“The poor accessibility of public transportation for many people pushes them to move by motorcycle, and this increase produces a load on public roads that increases accident rates,” lamented at the event Daniel Passerini, the mayor of Córdoba, a city of almost two million inhabitants where half of the deaths on the roads occur on motorcycles. The discussion in Argentina and elsewhere in Latin America, he said, focuses on how to improve public transportation to reduce the number of motorcycles in cities. “There is nothing more illustrative than going to an emergency hospital on a Monday morning to see the number of beds occupied by young people, unfortunately from Thursday to Monday is when the highest peak of accidents occurs,” he said. with drama.
Also in Guayaquil, as in so many other places, they have detected a strong migration of public transport towards motorcycles, which caused speed levels to increase on certain roads, supported Blanca López, vice mayor of the Ecuadorian city of nearly three million. population. There they have developed heat maps to detect the points with the highest number of accidents, mainly involving motorcycles, and based on the evidence they have reduced the speed limits from 70 kilometers per hour to 50 and 30 kilometers on some roads. Of the 282 people who died in the port city in 2023, 44% were motorcyclists. Nine out of ten were men, López emphasizes, the majority between 18 and 19 years old, “which means that our young population is the most harmed by the increase in speeds.”
“We are all facing the same situation,” confirms Claudia Díaz, the Secretary of Mobility of Bogotá, the Colombian capital with more than seven million inhabitants that recently reduced the speed limit to 50 kilometers for the entire city. It refers to the increases in the number of motorcycle users, in motorcyclist fatalities and in the interaction of motorcyclists in road accidents. In other words, pedestrians and cyclists are very often killed by motorcyclists. In addition, more than half of motorcycle drivers exceed the speed limits, according to studies by Johns Hopkins University in conjunction with Los Andes University in Bogotá. Of the 244 deaths on the streets that Bogotá has recorded so far this year, ending in May, 109 were motorcyclists.
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Those speed limits are not capricious. In the same scenarios, but at lower speeds, people do not die. Studies show that crashes at 30 kilometers per hour kill 10% of human beings, while at 50 kilometers 50% of people die and at 60 kilometers 90% die. Therefore, with limits of 60 kilometers only one in ten people survives, but at 50 kilometers half do so.
In Latin American and Caribbean countries, the number of motorcyclists killed exceeds the world average. The evidence accumulates. In countries like Colombia, the Dominican Republic and Uruguay, motorcycles already represent more than half of vehicular traffic, according to a study by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB). In cities where the supply of public transport does not satisfy demand, they are increasingly emerging as an alternative. Colombia, where they represent more than 70% of the vehicle fleet, is perhaps the place that best illustrates the phenomenon. With 15.5 deaths per 100,000 inhabitants, it has the worst road accident rate among the 35 countries measured in the latest annual road safety report of the International Transport Forum ―linked to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD)―. While the number of these deaths decreases in almost all places measured, in Colombia the jump is alarming.
In a medium-term view, motorcyclists are the only category of road users that recorded an increase in deaths between 2012 and 2022, a marked contrast with pedestrians, cyclists and drivers (or companions). “The data are very worrying, especially in Colombia, where the number of new motorcycle registrations is constantly increasing,” that report highlights. In Costa Rica and Chile, motorcyclist deaths also increased by more than 50%, but in Colombia the increase was more than 100% in the last decade.
Street incidents cause around 1.2 million people to die and 50 million to be injured annually around the world, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). Despite promising progress in many regions, road safety remains an urgent public health issue. In this context, the proliferation of motorcycles is a concern in Latin American cities, but also in Africa, Asia and even Europe, says Étienne Krug, director of Social Determinants of Health at the WHO. “We have seen during Covid, and also after the financial crisis, that more and more users use motorcycles, and with this comes an increase in motorcyclist mortality,” he notes. “You have to take action, inform, have the right laws in terms of speed, alcohol and driving, helmets, enforce these laws, and also give people other effective and safe means of transportation,” he explains. “We already have a large part of the answer. We will have to study the specificities in cities and countries, but we already know the broad lines,” he concludes.
Bloomberg rewards Bogotá and Argentina for their road safety efforts
The Mobility Secretariat of Bogotá and the National Road Safety Agency of Argentina (ANSV) took home awards in the inaugural edition of the Awards for Excellence in Road Safety, awarded in New York by Bloomberg Philanthropies with the participation of its founder, billionaire Michael Bloomberg, former mayor of the American city. “Every year, millions of deaths and injuries in traffic accidents could be avoided with stricter laws, better infrastructure and more efficient application of the law,” Bloomberg stressed during the ceremony, which EL PAÍS attended at the invitation of the organization. . Colombia’s capital was recognized for its bold actions to design streets that protect the most vulnerable users, cyclists and pedestrians, as part of its efforts to promote sustainable mobility and improve public spaces. The ANSV, for its part, was awarded for the zero alcohol driving law, which has reduced deaths and injuries on Argentine roads.
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