{"id":8598,"date":"2026-05-27T14:26:04","date_gmt":"2026-05-27T13:26:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.velosuisse.ch\/?p=8598"},"modified":"2026-06-04T09:40:10","modified_gmt":"2026-06-04T08:40:10","slug":"das-risiko-mit-dem-e-bike-zu-verunfallen-ist-in-zuerich-gesunken","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.velosuisse.ch\/en\/das-risiko-mit-dem-e-bike-zu-verunfallen-ist-in-zuerich-gesunken\/","title":{"rendered":"Dr Wernher Brucks: \u00abThe risk of having an accident on an e-bike has fallen in Zurich\u00bb"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Thursday 28 May sees the start of Cycle Week in Zurich, the largest national cycling festival. In the run-up to the event, the Swiss Cycling and E-Bike Office spoke to traffic psychologist Dr Wernher Brucks, Head of Road Safety at the City of Zurich, about cycling safety in Switzerland's largest city, helmet wearing, fines for cyclists, distracted driving and the construction of cycle paths - with some surprising answers.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><em>Swiss Cycling and E-bike Expertise Centre, SFVE: How is it that the Federal Roads Office, FEDRO, is reporting rising e-bike accident figures, while the city of Zurich is reporting a falling accident risk?<br \/>\n<\/em>Wernher Brucks: The media releases that I am familiar with from the Federal Office generally show absolute accident figures and their development. For example, you compare one year with the previous year or the last five years with each other. You can see that the number of e-bike accidents is increasing. However, these absolute figures must be considered in the context of exposure. This is a statistical term and means how often and for how long a vehicle is used. In other words, kilometres driven, number of journeys or time spent on the road. Here is an example: If there used to be 1,000 accidents per 100,000 journeys and later 1,200 accidents per 150,000 journeys, then the number of accidents has increased. At the same time, however, utilisation has increased even more. Before, there was one accident per 100 journeys, after one accident per 125 journeys. In other words, the risk of accidents has fallen, even though there are more accidents. In the city, we have the advantage that we also have usage data. We have around 30 counting stations and can therefore show how cycle traffic is developing. In our analyses, we therefore always present both: the absolute accident figures and their relationship to usage. In the past, accidents increased more than usage. This meant that the risk increased. For the past three years, it has been the other way round. The number of bike journeys is growing faster than the number of accidents. We define the accident risk as accidents per journey. And it is precisely this risk that has fallen in recent years. That is why pure accident figures are not meaningful. The decisive factor for us is how many accidents occur in relation to usage.<\/p>\n<p><em>SFVE: Does this confirm the critical mass theory: more bicycle traffic makes bicycles more visible overall and therefore safer?<br \/>\n<\/em>Wernher Brucks: You can't read that directly from the figures, but it is a possible interpretation. People talk about \u00absafety in numbers\u00bb. I cycle through the city on my e-bike every day. Especially now in spring, I notice that bikes are often travelling in large groups. Before the traffic lights, the entire lane in front of the cars fills up with cyclists. This clearly changes the behaviour of car drivers. I have the impression that when we are travelling in a group, we are much less likely to be overlooked than when I am cycling alone. I therefore believe in the theory that when there are many cyclists on the road, each individual is better noticed - and therefore cycling is safer overall.<\/p>\n<p><em>SFVE: We live in a time of constant distraction - for example, with smartphones. I have the impression that lack of attention is greatly underestimated in the statistics. For legal reasons, hardly anyone voluntarily admits to having been inattentive. How do you see it?<br \/>\n<\/em>Wernher Brucks: FEDRO is currently running a research project entitled \u00abOverlooked cyclists\u00bb. Among other things, VR glasses are being used to investigate how it can be that car drivers are looking but still don't notice cyclists. There are many reasons for this: firstly, the silhouette of a bicycle is very narrow - something we are also familiar with from motorbike riders. Secondly, there are visual obstacles, such as the A-pillar in a car, which has become wider over the years. Thirdly, there really is a blind spot in the human eye. So you can look at something and still not see it. Then there is selective attention. A well-known experiment illustrates this well: two groups pass balls to each other and the spectators are asked to count how often the white team plays the ball. Meanwhile, a person dressed as a gorilla runs through the picture - many people don't notice. The conclusion is clear: if you are focussed on something, you tend to ignore other things. In traffic, this can lead to a large vehicle being noticed, but not a bicycle next to it. What you mention - distraction by smartphones or thoughts - is an additional factor. The influence of smartphones is certainly significant. I am not aware of any current Swiss study on this, but as far as I know, the BFU is carrying out observations. My personal experience as a cyclist in the city of Zurich is that many drivers are on their mobile phones. One indication is their behaviour at traffic lights - when the light turns green, cars often don't drive off straight away, which indicates distraction.<\/p>\n<p><em>SFVE: In cities like Amsterdam or Copenhagen, very few people wear a helmet, yet there are no more serious accidents than in countries with a high helmet-wearing rate, such as Switzerland. How urgent do you think it is to make wearing a helmet compulsory?<br \/>\n<\/em>Wernher Brucks: You are referring to current political demands, such as making helmets compulsory for e-bikes or children. Personally, I don't think a compulsory requirement is necessary, but an explicit recommendation in favour of wearing a helmet is. It's true that fatal injuries often affect the head. But this is also true for pedestrians - this does not mean that helmets are compulsory. The crucial question is: do we focus on passive safety - i.e. protection in the event of an accident - or on active measures that prevent accidents? Countries such as the Netherlands and France reduce the energy in the system, for example through lower speeds and clear separation of traffic types.<\/p>\n<p><em>SFVE: Are you in favour of a 30 km\/h speed limit throughout the city?<br \/>\n<\/em>Wernher Brucks: I am not making a political argument here, but a physical one. Speed is part of the kinetic energy that is released in a collision and is particularly crucial for less protected road users. Kinetic energy is calculated from mass times speed. If you compare the formula for different modes of transport, the difference becomes clear:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>A tram weighing around 75 tonnes at around 48 km\/h generates approximately 7 million joules of kinetic energy.<\/li>\n<li>A car weighing 1.5 to 2 tonnes at 50 km\/h is around 150,000 to 200,000 joules.<\/li>\n<li>A bicycle with rider, which together weighs around 80-100 kg, at 20 km\/h reaches around 1,200 to 1,500 joules.<\/li>\n<li>A pedestrian travelling at 5-6 km\/h is around 100 to 150 joules.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>These differences are enormous. That's why road safety is about reducing the energy or ensuring that road users with very different kinetic energy don't get in each other's way in the first place. For me, this is the core of road safety. It's not about political attitudes, but about physical relationships.<\/p>\n<p><em>SFVE: These figures are very impressive. Graphically depicted, humans are barely visible....<br \/>\n<\/em>Wernher Brucks: In no other technical system - nor in any socio-technical system - would we allow what we accept in road transport. In air or rail transport, it goes without saying that such large energy differences are strictly separated. There, it is consistently ensured that they do not even come into direct contact with each other.<\/p>\n<p><em>SFVE: The approach of leaving the through axes at 50 km\/h and introducing 30 km\/h in the neighbourhoods was plausible. The latest proposal would have introduced a 30 km\/h speed limit across the board. This raises the question of whether this would not have led to more slow-moving traffic in the neighbourhoods?<br \/>\n<\/em>Wernher Brucks: I'm not sure whether that would actually be the case. I can mainly put on my safety glasses here. As a cyclist, I am inevitably also travelling on main roads - and the conditions there are often difficult: lots of traffic, heavy traffic and high speeds. That can't be completely avoided. We work with high safety standards. Our benchmark is \u00ab8 to 80\u00bb. This means that, ideally, an eight-year-old child should be able to cycle independently and just as safely as an 80-year-old person. This may seem unfamiliar today, but it is a clear objective. A 30 km\/h speed limit has several effects. It's not just about everyone driving more slowly. It also changes the design of the road space. If a road is designed for 30 km\/h in the long term, it can be planned differently. Slower-moving vehicles require less space because they move less sideways. This creates space that can be utilised differently - for example for bicycle traffic. These are relevant orders of magnitude: A carriageway can be about half a metre narrower at 30 km\/h.<\/p>\n<p><em>SFVE: In Switzerland, however, the legislator even opposes a minimum overtaking distance of 1.5 metres, as in neighbouring countries.<br \/>\n<\/em>Wernher Brucks: I don't know the reasons why there is no minimum overtaking distance in Switzerland. However, I am convinced that we should regulate this by law so that it becomes a social norm. We can't achieve this quickly and reliably enough with pure communication. Just one metre overtaking distance would help. I often drive abroad, for example in Italy, Spain or France. The minimum safe distance is regulated by law there. I clearly notice the difference: drivers stay behind me until they can overtake with enough distance - often around 1.5 metres. Precisely because it is laid down by law, it has developed into a behavioural norm.<\/p>\n<p><em>SFVE: Another perennial issue is roundabouts, where accidents occur time and again because cyclists are overlooked. Parliament and the Federal Council are nevertheless opposed to a ban on overtaking bicycles on roundabouts. <\/em><br \/>\nWernher Brucks: In Germany, I have seen overtaking bans that are clearly signposted - a bicycle on the right, a crossed-out car on the left. As far as I know, there is no such thing in Switzerland. The roundabout in combination with bicycles is a long, rather unfortunate story anyway. The first decisive factor is how roundabouts should be built according to the current state of engineering science. They must be designed in such a way that cars and larger vehicles cannot drive through at high speeds in the first place. This is achieved, among other things, by the so-called deflection angle: the entrance to the roundabout is designed in such a way that it is necessary to slow down. At the same time, visibility should not lead right through the roundabout so that drivers do not see that it is \u00abfree\u00bb as soon as they enter and speed up accordingly. The aim is always to keep the speed down. Roundabouts have gained a bad reputation because many older systems did not fulfil precisely these principles. Cars could drive through them relatively quickly, which was particularly problematic for cyclists. This characterised the perception, although it was only due to the specific design. In my opinion, a ban on overtaking bicycles at the roundabout or just before it would make sense. This could be supplemented with markings and signs. For example, I thought about putting bicycle pictograms in the middle of the carriageway - or in front of the roundabout - to show that it is normal for cyclists to ride in the middle of the carriageway and not stay on the edge, which invites them to overtake. We must not forget: There are people who took their driving test 30 or 40 years ago and have never learnt how to ride a bicycle in the centre of a roundabout.<\/p>\n<p><em>SFVE: There have indeed been some adjustments in favour of cyclists in recent decades. In the past, we learnt to drive on the far right when turning right in a car so that no bicycles could overtake. Today, cyclists who want to go straight ahead on the cycle lane have priority over cars turning right.<br \/>\n<\/em>Wernher Brucks: That may be. At the same time, mutual consideration always applies in road traffic. If a car is already flashing on the right, as a cyclist I would hold back from overtaking. Because these situations are among the most common types of accident. Our current analyses show: When it comes to collisions between cars and bikes, there are two main constellations: Either a car turns right and overlooks a bicycle on the same carriageway, or a car turns left and overlooks an oncoming bicycle.<\/p>\n<p><em>SFVE: Time and again we hear the recommendation that it is sometimes wiser for cyclists to give up their right of way. What do you think of this recommendation?<br \/>\n<\/em>Wernher Brucks: This recommendation may seem a bit staid, but I support it from the point of view of a two-wheeler rider. I ride like that myself. People travelling on two wheels are less protected and therefore keep a closer eye on their surroundings for their own benefit. I often think for others and in certain situations I prefer to give up my right of way if it serves my own safety. We also pick up on this in the \u00abLevel up your ride\u00bb learning programme from Pro Velo Schweiz, which we helped to develop. It shows exactly these kinds of situations. I recently saw an example in the city: A lorry was at a red light. A cyclist stood behind the lorry and waited. She was very careful. She should have had right of way and could have passed him on the right on the cycle lane and got in front of him. We design the infrastructure precisely for situations like this. Today, we make sure that there are so-called bicycle bags about four metres long in front of traffic lights. In the past, these were often only two metres long - that was a mistake because the bikes were difficult or impossible to see from the lorry in this area. The aim is to design the infrastructure in such a way that it is forgiving of mistakes. It should not be the sole responsibility of cyclists to ensure their own safety.<\/p>\n<p><em>SFVE: Another issue is skidding accidents and failure to control the vehicle. The figures show that more than half of all accidents fall into this category. Cycle paths and cycle routes on side roads are often repaired with chippings. This is very dangerous for cyclists because they slip on the chippings and can hardly brake. It would never occur to anyone to repair motorways with chippings. That would be far too risky. Cyclists, on the other hand, get into exactly these situations. If you are not trained to ride and brake on loose surfaces, you will fall.<br \/>\n<\/em>Wernher Brucks: There are indeed deficits here. Switzerland does not maintain its cycling infrastructure with the same seriousness as it would for cars. Countries such as the Netherlands and Sweden show that things can be done differently - for example with consistent winter road maintenance. In general, bicycles are often not treated as an equal means of transport. This can also be seen in the fact that cars stop on cycle lanes or block them, which is prohibited.<\/p>\n<p><em>SFVE: It is interesting to note that the centre lane is disappearing on the roads through the villages. Instead, motorised road users orientate themselves to the two cycle lanes on the left and right. For cyclists, however, this means that part of the rear-view mirror - around 20 cm - often protrudes into the cycle lane.<br \/>\n<\/em>Wernher Brucks: In principle, we have had good experiences with such core carriageways - but only under certain conditions. You need a 30 km\/h speed limit, little heavy traffic and a comparatively high proportion of cycle traffic. There are clear standards for this in Switzerland. If these conditions are met, it can work well. However, there are also examples where the conditions are not right and the situation is correspondingly more critical.<\/p>\n<p><em>SFVE: Roadworks are also problematic - cars are often parked on the cycle lane.<\/em><br \/>\nWernher Brucks: We receive a lot of feedback on construction site situations. Construction companies often organise a construction site with car traffic in mind. Less consideration is given to cycle traffic.  Diversions for cycle traffic are not possible at will. A bypass of 500 metres with an additional 100 metres in altitude is simply not acceptable to cyclists on an organic bike. In such cases, many cycle straight through the roadworks.<\/p>\n<p><em>SFVE: Other critical points are obstacles such as scooters or tram tracks.<br \/>\n<\/em>Wernher Brucks: We have that too. In a way, Zurich is the Swiss champion when it comes to sharing vehicles. We have around 8,000 vehicles available for hire that can be parked freely in public spaces. The clientele of these providers is very diverse, and the vehicles are treated correspondingly differently. Sometimes they are parked carelessly, sometimes in such a way that they obstruct pedestrian and cycle traffic. As a result, cyclists are constantly on the alert. They have to constantly pay attention to how they get past obstacles, because every single one can lead to a fall. In the city, tram tracks are also the most common cause of falls. In second place are kerbs. For cyclists, these should ideally be lowered to zero centimetres or at most one to two centimetres high. At the same time, there is a conflict of interest here with the Disability Discrimination Act, as kerbs must remain easy to feel for visually impaired people. The aim here is to find a middle ground that works for everyone.<\/p>\n<p><em>SFVE: Why are the crossings onto cycle paths often so rough that you get hit if you're not careful?<\/em><br \/>\nWernher Brucks: In the city, we sometimes use such crossings deliberately. We have noticed that cyclists - for example in front of schools - are often travelling too fast. Analyses by the University of Applied Sciences Northwestern Switzerland show problematic situations: In one observation, around 40 % of cyclists did not stop in front of a pedestrian crossing where a child was waiting. They didn't even slow down. In one video, seven cyclists rode past and only the eighth person stopped. There is a need for action here. That's why we sometimes use structural elements that are noticeable at higher speeds - such as ramps that \u00abhit\u00bb if you cycle too fast. Another example is fast e-bikes. Compared to other European countries, Switzerland has relatively liberal regulations for 45 km\/h e-bikes. This makes sense for commuting. However, in the city, for example in a 30 km\/h zone in front of a school, cyclists cannot simply travel at 45 km\/h just because it is technically possible. Ultimately, it's about a balance of rights and obligations. We have talked about the rights of cyclists - it is just as important that they behave considerately in traffic.<\/p>\n<p><em>SFVE: There are repeated calls for cyclists to be fined in the same way as car drivers. What do you think about this?<br \/>\n<\/em>Wernher Brucks: It's not that simple. It wouldn't be right to fine cyclists and motorists equally. The amount of the fine depends on the potential damage. A car can cause significantly more damage than a bicycle in the event of an offence. That's why a red light offence in a car costs CHF 250, while on a bike it's CHF 60.<\/p>\n<p><em>SFVE: You are a psychologist. Why are cars getting bigger and bigger? Is it because of status, safety considerations or because the industry is achieving higher margins?<br \/>\n<\/em>Wernher Brucks: (laughs) I can only reproduce what I read. It's probably a mixture of everything. From my point of view, it's a two-way street: The industry brings larger vehicles onto the market, customers find them attractive and so the trend intensifies. Recently, this has taken on dimensions that hardly work in urban areas. Vehicles more than two metres wide are no longer a rarity. The side mirror inevitably protrudes into the cycle lane. This is unavoidable.<\/p>\n<p><em>SFVE: Cars and lorries are currently allowed to be up to 2.5 metres wide. What do you think of regulations that limit the width of cars?<br \/>\n<\/em>Wernher Brucks: There is indeed a certain discrepancy here. There are standards for the infrastructure, for example for car parks. At the same time, the industry is developing vehicles that are not adapted to these standards. From an urban perspective, it is clear that we need smaller and slower vehicles.<\/p>\n<p><em>SFVE: You have seen the ETH Zurich study on the \u00abe-bike city\u00bb. In your experience, is this practicable?<br \/>\n<\/em>Wernher Brucks: It looks very convincing on paper. In practice, however, it would be very challenging to implement. Just introducing individual elements would trigger considerable resistance in the form of objections. At its core, the ETH model envisages organising large parts of the city into one-way streets and making one direction of traffic available to cyclists. Simulations show that this can work. In reality, however, this would be a process that would take many years, if not decades. It is also unclear whether there would be sufficient acceptance. If we look at the fact that it is already difficult to slow down traffic in the city, such a fundamental reorganisation of the system seems even less realistic.<\/p>\n<p>Interview: Martin Platter<\/p>\n<p>27 May 2026<\/p>\n<p>Further information: Swiss Bicycle and E-Bike Centre, SFVE<br \/>\nMartin Platter, 044 764 20 86, 079 231 87 18, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.fachstelle-velo.ch\">specialist centre-velo.ch<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Thursday 28 May sees the start of Cycle Week in Zurich, the largest national cycling festival. In the run-up to the event, the Swiss Cycling and E-Bike Office spoke to traffic psychologist Dr Wernher Brucks, Head of Road Safety at the City of Zurich, about cycling safety in Switzerland's largest city, helmet wearing, fines for cyclists, distracted driving and the construction of cycle paths - with some surprising answers.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":8593,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8598","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.velosuisse.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8598","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.velosuisse.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.velosuisse.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.velosuisse.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.velosuisse.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8598"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.velosuisse.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8598\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8604,"href":"https:\/\/www.velosuisse.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8598\/revisions\/8604"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.velosuisse.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8593"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.velosuisse.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8598"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.velosuisse.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8598"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.velosuisse.ch\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8598"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}