A new bill tabled by the Green Party is to be put to Victoria State Parliament in Australia this week which would require drivers and motorbike riders to leave at least a one-metre buffer when overtaking cyclists, and 1½ metres when travelling on a road with a speed limit of more than 60 km/h.
The bill would see Victoria follow Queensland, which is already trialling minimum safe passing distance laws for cyclists, and South Australia and the ACT, which are set to do so.
Under current road rules, drivers must leave a “sufficient distance” when overtaking somebody on a bike or risk 10 penalty units and a fine of almost $1500. But the rules provide no specific guidance on what a safe passing distance is.
Samantha Dunn of the Green Party told The Age, “We’re starting to see out of other states that it makes a real difference to cyclist safety. There is a huge community of cyclists in Victoria and they should have similar protections behind them as cyclists in other states have.”
The Amy Gillett Foundation, is behind a nationwide push to introduce the one-metre rule which says the law will help reduce the high proportion of cyclists who are fatally struck from behind.
Research by the foundation found that in Victoria, 26 per cent of cyclists killed on the road between 2002 and 2012 were hit from behind, a greater proportion than any other crash type.
In Queensland, where the law came into effect in trial form in April last year, bike rider fatalities have fallen. Thirteen cyclists were killed in 2013, nine last year and there have been no deaths so far this year.
