Bicyclists are among the most vulnerable users of our nation’s roads. When they are struck by motor vehicles, riders often suffer devastating, catastrophic injuries.

Because of this reality, more and more communities and local governments are putting a higher emphasis on improving roadways to make them safer for non-motorists, including bicyclists.

In Silicon Valley, efforts are underway throughout the region to both improve road safety for cyclists and promote the use of bicycles for commuting.  The Silicon Valley Bicycle Coalition has a stated goal to encourage cyclists to complete 10 percent of all trips in the region by bicycle by 2025.

To assist in hazard identification and encourage safe routing. Walkup Melodia, Kelly, & Schoenberger worked with 1Point21 Interactive to analyze bicycle crash data from 2011-2021 to identify the most dangerous areas for cyclists in Silicon Valley.

For our analysis, we included all crashes involving at least one cyclist in communities throughout San Mateo and Santa Clara counties during the study period.

All in all, we analyzed 14,718 bicycle crashes, where 141 bicyclists were killed and another 1,461 were injured.  We identified 25 areas throughout Silicon Valley where a high volume of bicyclists were struck within close proximity of one another.

We believe that by understanding where collisions occur, we can help cyclists make better decisions on routes of travel and identify areas that may require infrastructure improvements.

[Interactive Map] The 25 Most Dangerous Places for Cyclists

The map below is interactive.  Each dot represents a collision involving a bicyclist from 2011-2021.  The grey zones represent the dangerous areas we identified through our study.

*If you are viewing this map on a mobile device, rotate to landscape for best viewing experience.

The 25 Most Dangerous Areas for Cyclists in Silicon Valley

We ranked each zone based on collision volume and injury severity.  The zone name is an approximate area to help viewers understand quickly where each is located.

Six of the areas that we identified were located in Palo Alto, including three of the top ten.

#1 Downtown North

• City: Palo Alto
• 100 bicycle crashes
• 99 injured cyclists
• 46 percent of bike crashes occurred at intersections

This area of Palo Alto was the site of the most bike crashes and the most injuries.  In fact, the Downtown North zone and the Downtown – SJSU Area in San Jose (number two on the list), had more than twice as many crashes that any other zone in the top 25.

#2 Downtown – San Jose State University Area

• City: San Jose
• 97 bicycle crashes
• 92 injured cyclists
• 57 percent of bike crashes occurred at intersections

Perhaps due to it’s close proximity to San Jose State University, this area had the second highest total number of crashes and injuries.

#3 Downtown Menlo Park

• City: Menlo Park
• 47 bicycle crashes
• 48 injured cyclists
• 55 percent of bike crashes occurred at intersections

This area of Menlo Park consists of upscale shopping and restaurants and is considered to be very pedestrian friendly.  However, after two students were struck by vehicles in September of 2021, Menlo Park Police were prompted to release a safety bulletin, “While we know school zones can be tricky to navigate due to congestion, we are providing these safety tips and traffic reminders to help prevent potential hazards and to possibly avoid collisions, and avoid traffic violations.”

#4 Broadway

• City: Redwood City
• 47 bicycle crashes
• 45 injured cyclists
• 57 percent of bike crashes occurred at intersections

This zone is centered along Broadway in Redwood city and was tied for the third most bicycle-related crashes and had the fourth most injuries.

#5 Downtown – Horace Mann/Hensley

• City: San Jose
• 42 bicycle crashes
• 42 injured cyclists
• 54 percent of bike crashes occurred at intersections

A second zone in San Jose rounds out the top 5.

Silicon Valley Bicycle Crashes By City

Given the size of the area included in this study, we also wanted to see which cities had the most collisions involving bicycles.  Not surprisingly San Jose was number one on this list as it is by far the largest city in the region.  Palo Alto is number 2.

Data Sources and Methodology

Our study examined collision data from the California Highway Patrol for the years 2011-2021.  We isolated all collisions that involved at least one cyclist and occurred within San Mateo or Santa Clara Counties.  Collisions that occurred within 250 feet of one another were aggregated to create our danger zone analysis.

If you would like to report on or republish the results of our study, please link to this page to cite our work.