Injury Severity of Motorcycle Riders Involved in Traffic Crashes in Hunan, China: A Mixed Ordered Logit Approach

Issues related to motorcycle safety in China have not received enough research attention. As such, the causal relationship between injury outcomes of motorcycle crashes and potential risk factors remains unknown. This study intended to investigate the injury risk of motorcyclists involved in road traffic crashes in China. To account for the ordinal nature of response outcomes and unobserved heterogeneity, a mixed ordered logit model was employed. Given that the crash occurrence process is different between intersections and non-intersections, separate models were developed for these locations to independently estimate the impacts of various contributing factors on motorcycle riders' injury severity. The analysis was based on the police-reported crash dataset obtained from the Traffic Administration Bureau of Hunan Provincial Public Security Ministry. Factors associated with a substantially higher probability of fatalities and severe injuries included motorcycle riders older than 60 years, the absence of helmets, motorcycle riders identified to be equal duty, and when a motorcycle collided with a heavy vehicle during the night time without lighting. Crashes occurred along county roads with curve and slope alignment or at regions with higher GDP were associated with an elevated risk of fatality of motorcycle riders, while unsignalized intersections were related to less severe injuries. Findings of this study are beneficial in forming several targeted countermeasures for motorcycle safety in China, including designing roads with appropriate road delineation and street lighting, strict enforcement for speeding and red light violations, promoting helmet usage, and improving the conspicuity of motorcyclists.