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Pedal Me bans staff riders from wearing helmets for safety reasons

bikebiz.com

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Re: Pedal Me bans staff riders from wearing helmets for safety reasons

#41

Post by alanbernstein »

edmcnulty101 wrote: post #9

Helmets are trying to reduce an already tiny risk. We live in a world of safety fanaticism.

Sorry, but this is a bad, dumb comment. Your point is valid generally, but not here.

What is the COST of wearing a helmet? $60 purchase and 5 seconds every time you ride. Essentially nothing.

Compare to, e.g. TSA, which has a cost of billions of dollars and millions of person-hours. Unlike helmets, which are known to actually prevent some injuries, TSA is also effectively useless at its intended goal.

Re: Pedal Me bans staff riders from wearing helmets for safety reasons

#42

Post by logifail »

tomphoolery wrote: post #6
whimsicalism wrote: post #3

IIRC it is studied that cars behave more dangerously around bikers with helmets while they give a wide berth to unhelmeted bikers.

"it is studied" Source please? This sounds like absolute bullshit. I've known so many people who have been killed or permanently disfigured because they didn't wear a helmet while biking in a large city. Cars don't give a fuck about us.

> This sounds like absolute bullshit. I've known so many people who have been killed or permanently disfigured because they didn't wear a helmet while biking in a large city.

When I was at uni and was cycling to a 10am lecture, a small van pulled out of a side road across my path. I was in a cycle lane and had right of way. He simply didn't look in my direction until he had already started to pull out. I was unable to stop or avoid him, so hit the front of his van head on, was briefly airborne, and landed on the road on the other side. Miraculously only scuffs and bruises, although my bike was a write-off. At that point I started wearing a helmet(!!!)

The next year, one of my friends went over the handlebars of her bike during a collision, except she landed head-first on the road, thankfully she was wearing a helmet. The helmet was split, she walked away with nothing other than mild concussion. Another friend and I walked out to rescue her bike later from the accident location, it also was a write-off.

Once you've seen a bike accident up-close there is simply no justification for not wearing a helmet. Even if you haven't seen an accident, wear a helmet!

Re: Pedal Me bans staff riders from wearing helmets for safety reasons

#43

Post by whimsicalism »

perlgeek wrote: post #35
whimsicalism wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fair enough, although it relied on video data, not self report, and included over 2300 cars. Perhaps it would have been different for different cyclists. Here is a study investigating this methodology of studying car behavior and ultimately concluding it is useful: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S00014...

... or in different cities, or even different countries, or at different times of day, or in different seasons.

You're right, although I think you would find that it is very common for people to incorrectly generalize all sorts of studies beyond their geographic purview given that most psychological studies are conducted in regions close to major research unis. See also the "WEIRD" phenomenon.

Not sure about the time or season though.

Re: Pedal Me bans staff riders from wearing helmets for safety reasons

#44

Post by throwawayhelmet »

Okay, true story. Years ago I struggled with this exact logic regarding skiing with helmet. After serious consideration I decided to start skiing so carefully that I do not need a helmet. As you may guess at this point, The very first day I left my helmet home, I got into an accident and got a skull fracture.

I started using my helmet again after that.

(But another safety related thing I have started to really doubt. Skiing alone is supposed to be risky. I do ski alone, quite a lot actually. I have gotten into my share of accidents of various seriousness. And not a single of them has been when I have been alone.)

Re: Pedal Me bans staff riders from wearing helmets for safety reasons

#45

Post by glenngillen »

wl wrote: post #21
tejohnso wrote: post #2

From [the tweet], "People that are taking risks that are sufficient that they feel they need to wear helmets are not welcome to work for us" [the tweet]: https://twitter.com/pedalmeapp/status/1489594692857647113?s=...

Riding on roads isn't like mountain biking where you mostly control the amount of risk you take on. Riding on roads puts you at the mercy of other people's choices. I feel the need to wear a helmet anytime I'm riding on a road for that reason.

I don’t know any mountain biker that doesn’t wear a helmet. Most I ride with wear full face.

I don’t think there’s any riding situation where you can think you’re in complete control of the risk.

Re: Pedal Me bans staff riders from wearing helmets for safety reasons

#46

Post by nkingsy »

edmcnulty101 wrote: post #9

Helmets are trying to reduce an already tiny risk. We live in a world of safety fanaticism.

A minor fall on a bike that results in a blow to the head can kill you or give you major brain damage. I am not a social person and I know as in we would hug if we saw each other 2 people who had life altering brain damage not wearing a helmet.

Re: Pedal Me bans staff riders from wearing helmets for safety reasons

#48

Post by jstanley »

_Wintermute wrote: post #24
Sebb767 wrote: post #15

How dare those guys drive on roads with cars! This seems insane. Even if the data supported this, anyone from the PR department should have seen how much bad press this generates from a mile away.

From their point of view, it's like if a delivery company banned drivers from installing roll-cages and racing harnesses - the initial question should be, why on earth do you think you need that?

It's more like banning drivers from wearing seatbelts.

Re: Pedal Me bans staff riders from wearing helmets for safety reasons

#49

Post by whimsicalism »

BurningFrog wrote: post #38
perlgeek wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There was one study about that, which was... not very robust science. It relied on self-report of the biker (and if I remember correctly, it was just a single one, so not enough data).

Yeah, there is always a study made somewhere by somebody supporting whatever you want to believe in. Individual studies are on average fairly useless.

Could you reply with the study showing the opposite using new data? It should be pretty easy given that there is always a study showing you what you want.

I'll be waiting :)

Re: Pedal Me bans staff riders from wearing helmets for safety reasons

#50

Post by Kim_Bruning »

heikkilevanto wrote: post #36

Must be a cultural thing. If someone tried this here in Denmark, they would get such a shitstorm. Helmets are generally understood to increase cyclist safety.

Interesting!

AFAIK, in the Netherlands helmets are considered to slightly reduce safety in the general case (but this is not a strong effect).

The general objective is to make infrastructure sufficiently safe so that helmets become redundant.

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