Cyclists have reported being “doored” 62 times since November, according to Toronto police, the first public tally of a statistic the force began tracking last year.

“Dooring,” which occurs when a stopped car suddenly opens its door and hits a cyclist, is among the worst fears of urban bike riders. From 2012 until November 2013, Toronto police didn’t track the incidents because of a change in the provincial definition of a “collision.”

After the Star highlighted the statistical blind spot last year, the chair of the police services board asked the force to start tracking so-called “door prizes” again.

Between Nov. 5, 2013, and Aug. 12, 2014, police received 62 reports of dooring. That’s on pace to be considerably fewer than the 144 a year Toronto averaged between 2007 and 2011.

That could mean the city is getting safer for cyclists. But the drop-off could also indicate that fewer people are calling the police when they get struck by car doors.

While police provided the Star with the total number of reported dooring incidents since November, they said all other information about the accidents — their location, their severity, what type of vehicle was involved — would have to be accessed through a Freedom of Information request, which can take months or even years to process. .

Justin Bull, a Toronto software developer who runs a pair of popular bike safety websites, said he thought the information should be more readily available.

“The crazy, tech-savvy public like myself could see that data because we decided to check it out one day and contact their councillors with ideas,” he said.

It is, of course, impossible to know how many unreported dooring incidents occur on Toronto’s streets, but some cycling advocates believe official figures don’t capture the scope of the problem.

“Your instinct when you get doored is to make as little a deal of it as possible and get on your way,” said Bull. “That’s the Canadian way.”

One of Bull’s sites, doored.ca, allows users to post information about their accidents. There are more than 100 entries, 66 of which document dooring accidents in the last 12 months.

Still, Bull’s database is hardly definitive.

“No one really knows about my site,” he said. “It’s not a one-stop shop for an accurate representation of the cycling populace.”

Councillor Mike Layton, who was doored last year and reported it, said cyclists should be educated on the importance of involving the police.

“You have to report it to the police,” he said. Cyclists have an “obligation to make sure it shows up as a statistic.”

He noted that dooring is an ever-present concern for bike commuters like him. “We’ve got a lot of streets where they’re cycling next to parked cars,” he said. “I know that every week I have one or two close calls.”

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In other cities, detailed figures on dooring accidents suggest that they are, on average, more violent than other kinds of bike crashes. An ambulance was called in 50 per cent of Chicago doorings, compared to 30 per cent for other cycling accidents, according to Charlie Short of the city’s transportation department.

Improperly opening the door of a vehicle is a violation of Ontario’s Highway Traffic Act. In 2012, drivers and passengers wracked up 104 convictions across Ontario for doing so, but the Ministry of Transportation doesn’t know how many of those involved cyclists.