The obsession with helmets in many countries is born of an idea that violence on the roads is inevitable. It's a bit like responding to knife or gun crime by saying everyone should wear kevlar vests, problem solved! Rather than insisting that knives and guns are not used in public spaces.
Some people have real problems grasping this. Cars are seen as inherently dangerous, pedestrians and everyone else should (ideally) stay off the roads, and nobody should challenge our "right" to drive where and when we like. But driving is still a choice, albeit coerced since there are so few alternatives, and that choice has profound implications for others. Why should I wear protective clothing because you choose to drive a vehicle which puts me in danger? In the Netherlands, to respond to your point, they have largely eliminated motoring-related danger for cyclists.
If anyone is interested in the development of Dutch cycling infrastructure, this is an excellent video:
As somebody who lives in the Netherlands, I've not really found a reason for helmets to be used. Dutch people are generally very competent at cycling (and other non-motorized transport-on-wheels like inline skates).
I've personally also never known anybody who experienced a traffic accident where a helmet would have helped them - it's usually broken legs, scrapes on knees, etc.
We Dutch are basically born on a bycicle and learn to ride it at a young age. Everybody can cycle, it's so...ingrained.
almost 17 milion people. 200 deaths a year. 65000 accidents required doctor treatment (maybe we are not zo great at cycling as we think). 15000 end up in a hospital. Especially old people tend to get killed.
Puts us in the top 15 with the usual suspects. United Kingdom was a surprising one for me though, would not have expected it to be better than say Finland or the Netherlands.
Because car or no car the head still goes crack when it hits the road. To me it seems obvious to reduce a risk of fatal injury with something as simple as a helmet.
Do you wear a helmet when you walk somewhere? If not, why not?
If you've decided that the risk of head injury when you walk somewhere is so little that you'll take the risk and not wear the helmet, you've made the exact same decision as the cyclists. In the Netherlands, because they have a sensible traffic system, the risk has been reduced so far that many, many people make that same decision that you do when you walk without wearing a helmet.
No, I don't wear a helmet when walking, but I do when cycling. That is because my speed is much higher when cycling, and because it is easier to fall.
And I've experienced that a cycling helmet is good to wear. There was this child that appeared from a bush to the bike path. I hit the brakes and went over the bar. A slight bumb in the head but no injury there; broke a radix bone though.
As you can see in the video, all cyclists drive quite slow. In the Netherlands, cyclists who use their bike for sport, do wear helmets and go outside town.
because it is easier to fall ... I hit the brakes and went over the bar
Please do not be offended, and by all means keep on wearing a helmet if you want (after all it is safer, no denying that) but maybe there is room for improvement in your cycling? Those two things I quoted seem to indicate you haven't completely mastered cycling, or your bike isn't properly setup, or a combination of both. I see them for instance as well with foreigners who never owned a bycicle and then come to a country and are given one. For an experienced byciclist riding is usually a second nature, like walking, and falls don't happen more often then they do with walking. Note I'm talking 'normal' cycling here, not for instance downhill or bmx where not ever falling sometimes means you're not pushing yourself hard enough :]
Well, I have been riding bike well over 40 years and I do about 4000 km per year on bike, and I don't think I will master it any better in the future than I have so far. I don't fall often, but it happens more often than when walking and is definitely scarier. I mostly don't do "sports", I just commute.
And since bikes don't have ABS, I either have brakes that are not powerful enough, or I have brakes that throw me over the bar if I a mistake in a surprising situation (such as in the case I mentioned). Most falls I have are due to ice. Every winter morning is a decision: do I take the bike with studded tyres, or the one that is much lighter to ride? Sometimes I make the wrong assessment.
I still have a couple of years to go to reach that number of years, and doing roughly 3000km/year commuting. So I guess we just look at it differently then; I also ride bmx/dirt jumping, less in the last years because it can be quite harsh on the body, might be that it teaches you more control over a bike in general.
Ragarding the brakes: there are types which can bring you to a sudden halt if needed, but with a lever that still has lots of travel to allow for fine modulation. Usually the more expensive disc/rim brakes with oil instead of a steel cable are fine. Though I agree that if it's your instinctive reflex to completely squeeze the lever in a perilous situation it's either all or nothing.
Regarding ice: completely agree, even with proper equipment it's a struggle. And probably does lead to more falls then walking.
You made a decision that you're happy with the risk of not wearing a helmet when walking, but you decided that the risk when cycling was enough that you want to wear a helmet. I don't care why you made that decision. It's not relevant.
Other people made the decision that they're happy with the risk of not wearing a helmet when cycling.
What is so special about you? Are you some kind of super-powered genius, and your assessment of personal risk is some kind of magically "absolutely correct" answer? Why should your personal choice about acceptable risk be made law? (Trick question; it shouldn't)
Helmets would save a lot of head injuries in car accidents - which is why they are mandatory in racing. So would you advocate compulsory helmets in cars?
I disagree. I think that forcing people to wear helmets would result in less people cycling, defeating the purpose. Being able to hop on and hop of your bike while not carrying a helmet around is great. I don't think anyone would want helmets introduced. If you are doing high speed cycling on a racing bike then you need a helmet, but if you are going to the shops to get milk on a city bike with no gears I don't think it adds anything.
Of course safety is important. Not having lights on your bike in winter is very dangerous (drivers can't see you in their mirrors) and the police do frequent random stops and issue fines.
Anecdotally a friend of mine was in a very bad cycling accident (hit by a bus). She had no helmet and it wouldn't have helped. After months of rehab for her broken leg she is cycling again without a helmet. Of course she could have fallen differently and a helmet would have helped, but most of the damage was caused by the collision and not the fall.
Mandatory helmet laws kill people, and possibly more than are saved.
This happens in two ways: car drivers drive more dangerously when they see a helmet; less people ride a bycicle and so there is more pollution and more deaths or more lack-of-exercise related death.
"Dr Walker thinks the reason drivers give less room to cyclists wearing helmets is because they see them as 'Lycra-clad street warriors' and believe they are more predictable than those without."
"To test another theory, Dr Walker donned a long wig to see whether there was any difference in passing distance when drivers thought they were overtaking what appeared to be a female cyclist.
"While wearing the wig, drivers gave him an average of 14cm more space when passing."
However, allowing this to remain true is victim blaming. A driver should be forced to respect a cyclist and give them room.
"The law is invaluable when a bicyclist is injured in a collision. It establishes a clear basis for citing motorists for unsafe passing."
"How do motorists give three feet on narrow roads?
"State law has never guaranteed motorists a right to pass whenever or wherever they want. Motorists may only pass when it’s safe to do so. This doesn’t change with the Three Feet for Safety Act.
"The new law requires motorists to slow down and wait to pass only when it is safe to do so. Motorists have to be prepared to demonstrate that three feet were NOT available and the slower, closer pass was done according to the law. This is a higher burden of proof for drivers than we have under the current law, which places no conditions on how to pass at a “safe distance.”
So hopefully, the police will aggressively ticket motorists acting in a way that is unsafe for cyclists.
I don't support mandatory helmet laws because we have evidence that it actually increases the risk of cycling. Not using a helmet also only affects the cyclists risk of injury. Still, I personally advocate using a helmet when you cycle.
