Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

To Encourage Biking, Cities Lose the Helmets

nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

81–90 of 212 posts

Re: To Encourage Biking, Cities Lose the Helmets

#81

Post by alook »

_delirium wrote: post #70
rickmb wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do people insist on pretending all of Europe is full of bike lanes? In most inner cities there often isn't room for bike lanes, or the lane is just a line on the asphalt. I bike to work every day in Amsterdam, not a single bike lane on my route, I have to share the road with cars, trams, buses, trucks and scooters. The only traffic that actually poses a regular challenge because of their erratic movements and ten…

I wouldn't say they're widespread in Europe, but I moved from the SF Bay Area to Copenhagen, and they're certainly a big factor here. The "bicycle highways", completely separated and wide lanes that form major arteries through the city, make it much easier to bike to work from most places, without danger of car interference, or of being "doored" by parked cars opening their doors. Some other efforts: 1) the traffic l…

Doesn't Copenhagen also structure its traffic protocols around bicycle commuters? For instance, letting cyclists go on a green light several seconds before cars, in order to ensure that nearby drivers can see them?

Copenhagen has done studies [1] indicating that every mile driven accounts for some net economic loss (due to the harmful health effects of sedentary lifestyles, pollution, the cost to the commuter of gas/cars, the cost to society of maintaining automotive infrastructure), where very mile ridden constitutes a net economic gain (decreased healthcare costs due to being more active, lower personal cost of owning a bicycle, etc).

If the US spent more time looking at commuting from an economic and health perspective, we'd probably find that more government action is needed, beyond "Bike to work day"

[1] http://sustainablecitiescollective.com/node/38206

Re: To Encourage Biking, Cities Lose the Helmets

#82

Post by ScottBurson »

notatoad wrote: post #44
papalalu wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the fact is that a helmet is not enough to guarantee your safety - if cycling without one is "nuts", cycling with one is too.

A helmet might not guarantee safety, but it is an effective protection against a brain injury. If you fall off your bike and break your collarbone or leg or something, it's not really a big deal. Bones heal with virtually no permanent damage, brain injuries don't. It isn't about removing all risk - some danger is inherent in pretty much everything you do. The point is to manage the risk, and take acceptable precautio…

Anecdatum: I recently learned that an old friend of mine had died in a bike accident. No other vehicle was involved; he hit a road hazard (I'm not sure exactly what, but perhaps an uncovered storm drain) and landed on his head. He was wearing a helmet, but it didn't save him.

I've always worn a helmet when cycling -- and I'll continue to do so -- but I've never had an accident in which it mattered, and I don't think it changes the odds as much as you suggest.

Re: To Encourage Biking, Cities Lose the Helmets

#83

Post by diego »

Volpe wrote: post #80
diego wrote: post #75

This article is rampant with dishonest usage of statistics and anecdotes: “Statistically, if we wear helmets for cycling, maybe we should wear helmets when we climb ladders or get into a bath, because there are lots more injuries during those activities.” Ok, but how about the severity of the injuries? This is like saying that most car collisions in the US happen in parking lots. Also, there are lots more injuries pe…

So you've rallied against the articles points from a logical point of view. But do you have any evidence that helmet use decreases (severity of) injury? From the evidence I've seen, requiring helmets lowers cycle usage, which in turn lowers the number (total, not per capita) of injuries, which politicians see as a 'win'.

Did you downvote me? You can google the studies yourself, there are lots of those supporting whatever conclusion you prefer.

I don't have an opinion on helmets, only on the logical fallacies used in the article.

Re: To Encourage Biking, Cities Lose the Helmets

#84

Post by enraged_camel »

As someone who commutes to work via bike 2-3 times a week, the thing I would appreciate the most would be if highways had walled-off bike lanes. The reason I say this is because surface streets having bike lanes is not enough. The thing with highways is that they are able to run diagonally to the surface streets, which often times reduces distances drastically. With bike lanes though, often times I feel like I'm zig-zagging to get from point A to point B, which feels terribly inefficient.

Re: To Encourage Biking, Cities Lose the Helmets

#85

Post by mc32 »

mmagin wrote: post #79
maurits wrote: post #67

To Encourage Biking, Cities should do two things, and two things only: - Bike lanes. Physically separated bike lanes. This is not rocket science. Trains have rails, airplanes have a nice bit of tarmac and bikes should have a space tailored to their specific needs as well. Typically in the Netherlands, bikes are banned from roads that are 50km/h and up. And they don't need to battle it out with fast traffic, for there…

I assume this doesn't allow cars to make a right turn during a red light. That, and the long path for cyclists to make a left turn are probably what would make a lot of people in the US resist this design. (I think it looks like a good idea, however.)

We could try the box-style left turns that are deployed in Asia (s well as a few places in the US).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=juNLGZrb5Ak

Re: To Encourage Biking, Cities Lose the Helmets

#86

Post by ChrisClark »

Volpe wrote: post #80
diego wrote: post #75

This article is rampant with dishonest usage of statistics and anecdotes: “Statistically, if we wear helmets for cycling, maybe we should wear helmets when we climb ladders or get into a bath, because there are lots more injuries during those activities.” Ok, but how about the severity of the injuries? This is like saying that most car collisions in the US happen in parking lots. Also, there are lots more injuries pe…

So you've rallied against the articles points from a logical point of view. But do you have any evidence that helmet use decreases (severity of) injury? From the evidence I've seen, requiring helmets lowers cycle usage, which in turn lowers the number (total, not per capita) of injuries, which politicians see as a 'win'.

Well, for one thing. My dad would be dead if it wasn't for his bike helmet. That's good enough for me to wear one. It's anecdotal, but it's very personal, so I'm probably not going to change my mind.

What's cool is the helmet company wanted his helmet back so they could study it.

Re: To Encourage Biking, Cities Lose the Helmets

#87

Post by cbr »

baddox wrote: post #16
jmspring wrote: post #7

Until there is a distinct change in driver attitudes, riding without a helmet in most of the US is just nuts. Sure, there are places like Portland with dedicated bike lanes and an overall emphasis on pro-bike culture, but it is a rare spot. In the bay area, there is a very large biking community -- road, mountain, around town, etc. The problem is, the infrastructure isn't there for bikes compared to Amsterdam. We hav…

Most of the "anti-helmet" studies and arguments I've seen aren't particularly anti-helmet in principle, but rather just make the case that the benefits of wearing a helmet apply equally to pedestrians and automobile drivers/passengers. The argument isn't that helmets can prevent head injuries while riding a bike. The argument is that if there are laws or social stigma around bicycle helmets, then they should apply eq…

> the benefits of wearing a helmet apply equally to pedestrians and automobile drivers/passengers

Cycling is about six times more likely to kill you, per hour, than driving. So while helmets in cars would help some, the case for them on bikes is stronger.

Re: To Encourage Biking, Cities Lose the Helmets

#88

Post by oofabz »

Helmets are important for inexperienced cyclists and mountain biking, because you have a high risk of falling. But riding around town is a low risk activity and a helmet is unnecessary. We need to learn to distinguish between these scenarios instead of lumping all cyclists into one group.

Re: To Encourage Biking, Cities Lose the Helmets

#89

Post by tripzilch »

rickmb wrote: post #64
mikeryan wrote: post #8

This article is great but it does itself a pretty big disservice by pretty much ignoring a lot of why many of the European cities which have successful programs are successful. Namely they have made significant investment into infrastructure to make bicycling safer, many times prioritizing bike traffic over auto traffic. I ride quite a bit, live in Berkeley which has numerous "Bicycle Boulevards [1]" and I'm pretty c…

Why do people insist on pretending all of Europe is full of bike lanes? In most inner cities there often isn't room for bike lanes, or the lane is just a line on the asphalt. I bike to work every day in Amsterdam, not a single bike lane on my route, I have to share the road with cars, trams, buses, trucks and scooters. The only traffic that actually poses a regular challenge because of their erratic movements and ten…

> I bike to work every day in Amsterdam, not a single bike lane on my route

Really? I don't visit Amsterdam that often, but the rest of NL really is full of bike lanes.

I agree with the GP post: in order to safely bike around without helmet, you need infrastructure that takes bikes into account. Also, traffic that expects bikes.

And maybe your particular work-route does not have bike lanes, but the road designs do take them into account, and any motorized vehicle expects to see bikes because they are ubiquitous.

For those who read Dutch, this wikipedia article talks about the bike infrastructure in the Netherlands as well as several other European countries: http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fietsverkeer#Infrastructuur . Curiously, it doesn't mention Amsterdam being any exception to this, either (I'd swear seeing plenty of bike lanes there as well, but that could be projection as I expect to see them everywhere in Dutch cities).

Re: To Encourage Biking, Cities Lose the Helmets

#90

Post by alanfalcon »

ams6110 wrote: post #18

As a kid in the 1970s, I rode my bike everywhere, never wore a helmet (nobody did), and here I am today. Of course helmets can help avoid head injury, not riding bikes probably helps even more. I mean where do you draw the line on the fear vs. the actual chance of something happening. On the subject of community shared bicycles, our town tried that about 10 years ago, all the bicycles were stolen within the first mon…

As a kid in the 1990s, I rode my bike everywhere, always wore a helmet (kids I knew did), and here I am today. Of course, my helmet may have saved me from serious injury or death when I fell from my bike while on a hill and landed on my head, cracking my helmet in two. I walked my bike back home, hurting but basically okay, happy that I wasn't allowed on my bike without a helmet.

Anecdotes are just a sample size of one and essentially useless... unless the population you care about includes that one person.

Post reply on HN