FactCheck: are bendy buses more dangerous?

The background

Transport - part of the daily drudge for millions of London commuters, and by dint a literal and metaphorical driver of the UK economy - is a hot issue in the London mayoral campaign, which kicked off in earnest this week.

Tory MP and mayoral candidate Boris Johnson has been one of the most vocal haters of the capital's 380-odd bendy buses.

Or rather, "jack-knifing, traffic-blocking, self-combusting, cyclist-crushing bendy buses", as he denounced the red transporters in a speech to the Tory party conference in September.

Less poetically, but no less seriously, he promised in his manifesto to replace the bendies with an as-yet-unspecified "new Routemaster".

The bendy buses - which have two large single decker sections joined with a flexible middle - were put in place to cope with high demand on busy routes. They hold up to 149 passengers, 59 more than the standard modern double decker.

Many replaced the iconic but smaller Routemaster, originally designed in the 1950s, which had conductors and an open back platform which passengers could use to hop on and off.

But Boris takes issue with the safety of bendy buses, which he has previously claimed "wipe out cyclists", as well as criticising them for being more prone to fare-dodging and crime.

He reckons bendy buses are twice as dangerous for pedestrians and cyclists compared with other types of bus. Is he right?

The analysis

Boris's claim is based on figures given to the London Assembly for accidents on bendy (articulated) and other (non-articulated) buses last year.

According to these, there were 5.6 pedestrian injuries per million miles operated on bendy buses in 2006/07, but just 2.6 pedestrian injuries per million miles operated on other bus types.

In the same year, there were 2.62 collisions with cyclists per million bendy bus miles, and only 0.97 cyclist collisions per million miles operated on other bus routes.

The actual number of incidents is small in all cases, but there's still a pretty big difference between the two types of bus: pedestrians and cyclists are both more than twice as likely to get into trouble on a bendy bus route.

But this doesn't necessarily prove that the bendy bus is to blame. What about other factors, such as the roads the buses are using? Is it possible there are just more accidents on certain routes, regardless of the type of bus in operation?

Figures released in January to the London Assembly paint a more moderate picture than the overall totals to which Boris refers. This breakdown compared collisions on all 12 bendy bus routes to collisions on 15 selected non-bendy routes.

These selected routes tended to cover busy inner-city areas rather than the quieter suburbs. The number 41, for example, which goes from London Bridge, through Holborn, to Wood Green, or the number 8, which goes from Bow in the East End, along Oxford Street to Victoria.

It's not necessarily a scientific study, but it would seem to be a more accurate representation of the kind of routes bendy buses serve.

According to this breakdown, bendy bus routes threw up 5.6 collisions with pedestrians in 2006/07; non-bendy bus routes 5.17.

Collisions with cyclists were 2.62 on bendy buses; but 2.78 on non-bendy routes.

Damning evidence that bendy buses are, well, not much different from other buses?

"The incidents that take place are both random, to do with the road networks themselves, and to do with weather conditions," David Brown, TFL's head of surface transport, said when presenting the figures to the Assembly. "They are not related to the type of vehicle that is operated on those roads."

Overall, there were more bendy bus collisions - which could be to do with anything from a pedestrian, cyclist or vehicle to a lamppost, building, street sign or tree.

There were153 per million miles, compared with 117 for non-bendy buses. But cyclists and people made up a small proportion of these. Luckily, it's far more likely to be an inanimate object that gets over friendly with the bus.

How do bendy buses score in contrast to accidents involving the old Routemaster?

Changes in routes mean that data isn't directly comparable, but according to other figures TFL gave FactCheck, between January 1994 and September 2007 there were 0.05 fatalities per million km operated by bendy buses and 0.08 fatalities per million km operated by Routemasters.

FactCheck rating: 2.5

How ratings work

Every time a FactCheck article is published we'll give it a rating from zero to five.

The lower end of the scale indicates that the claim in question largerly checks out, while the upper end of the scale suggests misrepresentation, exaggeration, a massaging of statistics and/or language.

In the unlikely event that we award a 5 out of 5, our factcheckers have concluded that the claim under examination has absolutely no basis in fact.

The sources

Accidents involving bendy buses
Transcript: January 17 2008 Transport committee meeting
Boris Johnson, Conservative mayoral manifesto
Boris Johnson: Our nation's capital deserves more - speech to Conservative party conference, 30 September 2007
London bus maps

Your view

You've read the article, now have your say. We want to know your experiences and your views. We also want to know if there are any claims you want given the FactCheck treatment.

Email news@channel4.com

FactCheck will correct significant errors in a timely manner. Readers should direct their enquiries to the editor at the email address above.

Share this article

Send this article to a friend »

• Del.icio.us
• Digg
• Reddit
• Facebook
• StumbleUpon

What are these?