I've never been a motorcycle rider.
But I can say
if I had I grown up owning one I probably would have rode it at least when I was younger. Now I'm older and thoughy yes it seems it would be nice someday to ride in the country or mountains, etc. it really doesn't make sense to consider it any safe at all.
A lot of people die on country roads on a sunday drive, etc.
Motocycles simple are not safe in that they offer no real protection. You are hurling along at say 50 mph and 'BOOM' you could die. Even 25 or even 0. Its simple physics. There is nothing to absord any impact forces except your body and whatever armor you have on.
At least cars have materials to absorb the forces, now airbags, etc.
And here in the US the statistics at least more people die every year in auto crashes then US casulties in the entire Vietnam war, etc.
Driving is dangerous, in anything.
That said there is certainly statistictly more risk the more objects you may encounter - especially when the orbits of those objects are unpredictable like here in SoCal where every fool is on their cellphone and half can drive at all to begin with.
Then there is the just plain aggressive manic drivers that have massively increased since the 80's.
I actually live in the San Diego area and this place is rated to have one of THE worst drivers rating in the US. There hardly a day goes by here that a motorcylist is not hit (and usually killed) and on the news. Whereas there are many auto accidents everyday it is far less frequently fatal.
And San Diego is fairly small and uncrowded capared to much of SoCal - Southern California.
What to speak of what it must be like in Los Angeles which has easily many times the density amount of people and cars and even years ago it was hell to drive there in the daytime and half the night. Now its probably impossible so I never even take a trip up there for 10 years.
This in spite of the fact I love driving and was a commercial driver on and off for many years and drove all over LA and SoCal.
There is one useful piece of advice i can give motorcycle riders and that is that most do not know how to ride one properly;
The thing is most riders ride on either side of the lane. This is a big mistake IMHO eg..
Recipe for Disaster:
------------------------------------------
you
- - - - - - - - - - - [CAR]--------
or you
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This puts the biker in the blind spot or spot of least awareness if visible of the auto driver. Thus there most of the time don't even see you or notice you at all.
I can tell you this for a fact because I am an expert driver and drove probably a million or more miles delivering goods for a total of about 20 years and I've been driving for 40 years personally.
While I understand reasons why the biker rides not in the middle of the lane - they (erroneously) want to be able to manuever or actually they think
outmanuever an auto that is a big mistake.
That fact is IMHO trying to outmanuever another vehicle is exactly wrong.
You want advice from all my driving? Be predictable - that actually avoids accidents. Trying to outmanuever will probably get you killed. Most accidents are accidents - that implys the other person did not see or anticipate the move of the vehicle or whatnot they hit.
Of course one has to be defensive. So its quite a quandry.
And I have heard the motorcycle does not have the braking power of a 4 or more wheel vehicle but still I think is is a bad mistake to ride on the side of the lane.
I can't tell you the number of times I've almost not seen a motorcycle and almost crashed due to this. And a few times I never saw them. They blame the driver but they hang out in the blind spoots for most drivers about half the time!
as for aggressive motorcycle riders;
That will probaly get you killed even quicker, unless maybe you are a member of a fearsome Biker gang and wearing colors..