Ontario Coroner’s Report Outlines Strategies to Increase Bike Safety

The Ontario chief coroner’s report calls for a comprehensive cycling safety public awareness and education strategy that starts in public schools and continues through the purchase of every new and used bicycle and through driver’s licence testing. (Alex Wong/Getty Images)

A review of cycling deaths in Ontario has given rise to 14 recommendations in a report from the chief coroner’s office ranging from mandatory helmet use for all ages to improvements to infrastructure and community designs.

“It is our hope that this report and its recommendations will give voice to those cyclists who have lost their lives, and that from an examination of the tragedy of their deaths may come hope for a safer Ontario in which all road users can share our roads more safely,” Deputy Chief Coroner Dan Cass wrote in the report.

The review of 129 cycling deaths between 2006 and 2010 found that 86 percent of those who died were male and over half were persons 45 years old or older.