Need to save some money?  Thinking about buying a motorcycle to save money and gas?  According to my research, buying a motorcycle may be good for your weekly gas bill, but it could also sets you up for an extended trip to the hospital – or worse.

There are some enticing reasons to buy a motorcycle. Consider this:

• Mid-size motorcycles get 40-50 mpg
• Used mid-size bike costs $3,000-$6,000

What’s not in this short list are the safety concerns associated with driving a motorcycles.  The National Highway Traffic Safety Commission did a study and put together a laundry list of conclusions.  If I assume all the conclusions are causal, then it translates into this list of “lessons learned”:

• Wear a helmet
• Stay of rural roads
• Don’t drink and drive
• Be really careful going around turns
• Stay off undivided roads
• Don’t speed
• Don’t drive a night
• Stay away from fixed objects
• Learn to brake and steer in emergencies
• Don’t age (my favorite)
• Get a license

With a list like this, it feels like you should keep your motorcycle in the driveway.  The report also says that when looking at accidents from 1990 through 1999, if you are in an accident on a motorcycle, there was a 3.6% chance that you would die in that accident!  Put differently, that’s almost a 1 in 25 chance.

Another study showed how knowing how to drive a motorcycle and being formally trained is really important.  In this study, 92% of motorcycle drivers were self-trained or trained by friend and family.  Furthermore, more than half of all the accidents were from drivers that had less than 5 months of driving experience on the accident motorcycle and less than 3 years of total riding experience.  For anyone who’s thinking about buying their first motorcycle, you are in this demographic.

I don’t want to be too much of a cynic, because motorcycles are a lot of fun and there are many great motorcycle drivers who will never get in an accident.  I used to drive a motorcycle and so did my dad.  Lots of my friends have driven motorcycles too.  I stopped driving my motorcycle after a bid accident and at least one of my friends stopped driving after his dad was killed on his motorcycle.  It’s grim, but that’s my personal story and it’s consistent with the studies I quoted above.

If I’ve convinced you that driving a motorcycle may not be right for you, then consider putting that $5,000 towards a different car that you will be happier driving.  It could be nicer to drive, get better gas mileage, or both.  Happy driving – whatever you might choose to drive!