Serious bicycle crashes have reduced on Beach Road, Melbourne's most eminent street for sporty cyclists, bucking the city-wide trend of worsening injury rates as cycling has gained popularity.

Cyclist injury rates almost trebled between 2001 and 2011 in central Melbourne, where the boom in rider numbers has been strongest, but new data reveals they have dropped off on Beach Road, which teems with several thousand riders each weekend.

Rider behaviour on Beach Road has markedly improved. Credit:Eddie Jim

The decline in crash rates has been put down to the recent banning of on-street parking on Saturday and Sunday mornings and better rider behaviour following the death of a pedestrian who was run over by cyclists on the so-called Hell Ride in 2006.

The good news is revealed in a new study by the Monash University Accident Research Centre, which used geospatial analysis of 10 years of VicRoads crash data to compare injury rates with the number of riders in certain locations around Melbourne.