The number of miles walked vs biked is misleading because what is important is how much time is spent doing the activity. If 5 times as many miles are walked rather than biked, than easily 20 times more hours are spent walking than biking. Time is key, more so then miles. Walking is only "more dangerous" because you are exposed to the risk for longer. Other factors like lower visibility and higher rates of intoxication contribute to this.
But everyone keeps missing the point of this article. It's not whether you should wear a helmet, it's whether it should be legally mandated. Two hugely different things. You shouldn't run with scissors, but I don't think it should be illegal.
I have been a competitive cyclist for most of my life, and I would never race or train seriously without my helmet. But if I rode to the corner shops it's a completely different story. As an Australian who now lives in NYC I think it's fantastic how many people I see commuting to work everyday, doing their shopping etc using bicycles. And none of them wear helmets, contrasted with Australia where the number of commuting cyclists is actually pretty low. The majority of cyclists are higher-speed fitness cyclists.
Every person who rides a bike to work is one less car that will potentially run a cyclist down. And it's cars that cause the vast majority of injuries to cyclists.
I was in an accident while cycling, and I took a direct impact to the head. If I wasn't wearing my helmet, I'd be dead. You will never convince me that wearing helmets is pointless.
When riding on bike paths, helmets actually make it substantially more likely you'll hit your head. Your instinct to duck your head into your shoulders will typically prevent a head impact, while the additional inches of helmet often mean the helmet will hit. The helmet also puts you more off-balance as you fall. I know several people who've hit their helmets after a fall while riding. They all testify to this by way of saying they'll never ride without one again. I've never heard of anyone hitting their head without a helmet, despite the fact that most people I've known in my life didn't use one, including each of these very people for most of their cycling lives. (After all, virtually no one used a helmet 20 years ago, so most people 40 and up spent most of their riding time without one.)
Anecdotal, but there are reasons to believe this would be born out.
One way to test some of the implications is to try wearing your bike helmet for 15-20 minutes before going cycling. You'll hit your head on cabinets, your car door, sometimes in ways that are actually painful.
How do they come up with these numbers? Surely nobody counted my walk to the corner store this morning.. nor my ride to the bar last night. Flight miles, flight hours and flight trips are easily counted. Same with bus and train. Cars are harder, but at least there are odometer statistics through the motor vehicle departments or at a minimum some estimation via the insurance companies (not sure if they dip into that data or not). But how do they calculate the hours, km and trips spent on foot or cycling?
I'm not trying to discount the data, just questioning how they find it. I feel like they are missing a lot of kms and trips for highly common and non-regulated modes of transportation.
Phil, that's causal decision theory! All else is not equal. As a very clear example, wearing a helmet causes drivers to give you less berth. (not that berth is terribly relevant to safety)
At some point you have to allow common sense as evidence. If you fall off your bike, all else being equal, you're less likely to get a head injury if you are wearing a helmet. I don't need studies to prove that. And if studies conclude the opposite, I will say the studies are wrong.
Basically with all the pro-helmetters on this one; people with helmets cycle more dangerously, that's a concern, but it's not really the helmet's fault.
But I didn't post just because I want people to listen to my opinion so...
The largest [study], covering eight million cyclist injuries over 15 years, showed no effect on serious injuries and a small but significant increase in risk of fatality. … The head injury rate in the US rose in this study by 40 % as helmet use rose from 18% to 50%. … This can be explained away extremely easily. Don't know when this study occurred, but compared cycling technology over a 15 year gap at any point in the last 70 years and injury rates going up should be taken for granted: bikes have been getting lighter, faster, and nimbler at a steady and amazing rate, and the average cyclist speed is better than ever. That means more collisions and falls.
hey, i do donwhill MTB every weekend. i will never ride my bike without a helmet. it's just plain stupid. i'm pretty sure helmets do not prevent accidents, but they're the difference between laughing and being carried straight to the hospital after a fall.
i think the problem is that there are two different kinds of people and neither one is able to recognize the opposite. the first group is the "boring" ones: riding fixies for commuting or leisure. they never overspeed or jump.
the second group is the recreational and professional cyclists. going at 60 mph on a road bike during a race and not wearing a helmet is not good, jumping a 30 foot ramp in a mtb is also wrong.
the problem with the first group is that they asumme that everybody is as "boring" and careful as them. that is why they endorse "NOT USING A HELMET".
Robin, this is an honest question: why don't you wear a helmet while you're walking? Presumably there's some measurable possibility it would protect you from serious brain injury or death. And it seems that you value your own life more highly than most people do, given your interest in cryonics. I know why Idon't wear a helmet -- because I don't take as strong an interest in preserving my life, and because I care whether people think I look silly. But I would think the calculus might be different for you.
The number of miles walked vs biked is misleading because what is important is how much time is spent doing the activity. If 5 times as many miles are walked rather than biked, than easily 20 times more hours are spent walking than biking. Time is key, more so then miles. Walking is only "more dangerous" because you are exposed to the risk for longer. Other factors like lower visibility and higher rates of intoxication contribute to this.
As the risks are the same why does no one promote a law making it compulsory for pedestrians to wear helmets?
You might want to read this:
http://www.cyclehelmets.org...
Amazed by the Danish campaign or by gwern0's memory?
I stand corrected. And amazed.
> Ordinary cycling is not demonstrably more dangerous than walking or driving, yet no country promotes helmets for either of these modes.
This 2009 Denmark campaign doesn't count? http://www.copenhagenize.co...
But everyone keeps missing the point of this article. It's not whether you should wear a helmet, it's whether it should be legally mandated. Two hugely different things. You shouldn't run with scissors, but I don't think it should be illegal.
I have been a competitive cyclist for most of my life, and I would never race or train seriously without my helmet. But if I rode to the corner shops it's a completely different story. As an Australian who now lives in NYC I think it's fantastic how many people I see commuting to work everyday, doing their shopping etc using bicycles. And none of them wear helmets, contrasted with Australia where the number of commuting cyclists is actually pretty low. The majority of cyclists are higher-speed fitness cyclists.
Every person who rides a bike to work is one less car that will potentially run a cyclist down. And it's cars that cause the vast majority of injuries to cyclists.
I was in an accident while cycling, and I took a direct impact to the head. If I wasn't wearing my helmet, I'd be dead. You will never convince me that wearing helmets is pointless.
When riding on bike paths, helmets actually make it substantially more likely you'll hit your head. Your instinct to duck your head into your shoulders will typically prevent a head impact, while the additional inches of helmet often mean the helmet will hit. The helmet also puts you more off-balance as you fall. I know several people who've hit their helmets after a fall while riding. They all testify to this by way of saying they'll never ride without one again. I've never heard of anyone hitting their head without a helmet, despite the fact that most people I've known in my life didn't use one, including each of these very people for most of their cycling lives. (After all, virtually no one used a helmet 20 years ago, so most people 40 and up spent most of their riding time without one.)
Anecdotal, but there are reasons to believe this would be born out.
One way to test some of the implications is to try wearing your bike helmet for 15-20 minutes before going cycling. You'll hit your head on cabinets, your car door, sometimes in ways that are actually painful.
How do they come up with these numbers? Surely nobody counted my walk to the corner store this morning.. nor my ride to the bar last night. Flight miles, flight hours and flight trips are easily counted. Same with bus and train. Cars are harder, but at least there are odometer statistics through the motor vehicle departments or at a minimum some estimation via the insurance companies (not sure if they dip into that data or not). But how do they calculate the hours, km and trips spent on foot or cycling?
I'm not trying to discount the data, just questioning how they find it. I feel like they are missing a lot of kms and trips for highly common and non-regulated modes of transportation.
Phil, that's causal decision theory! All else is not equal. As a very clear example, wearing a helmet causes drivers to give you less berth. (not that berth is terribly relevant to safety)
At some point you have to allow common sense as evidence. If you fall off your bike, all else being equal, you're less likely to get a head injury if you are wearing a helmet. I don't need studies to prove that. And if studies conclude the opposite, I will say the studies are wrong.
Basically with all the pro-helmetters on this one; people with helmets cycle more dangerously, that's a concern, but it's not really the helmet's fault.
But I didn't post just because I want people to listen to my opinion so...
The largest [study], covering eight million cyclist injuries over 15 years, showed no effect on serious injuries and a small but significant increase in risk of fatality. … The head injury rate in the US rose in this study by 40 % as helmet use rose from 18% to 50%. … This can be explained away extremely easily. Don't know when this study occurred, but compared cycling technology over a 15 year gap at any point in the last 70 years and injury rates going up should be taken for granted: bikes have been getting lighter, faster, and nimbler at a steady and amazing rate, and the average cyclist speed is better than ever. That means more collisions and falls.
hey, i do donwhill MTB every weekend. i will never ride my bike without a helmet. it's just plain stupid. i'm pretty sure helmets do not prevent accidents, but they're the difference between laughing and being carried straight to the hospital after a fall.
i think the problem is that there are two different kinds of people and neither one is able to recognize the opposite. the first group is the "boring" ones: riding fixies for commuting or leisure. they never overspeed or jump.
the second group is the recreational and professional cyclists. going at 60 mph on a road bike during a race and not wearing a helmet is not good, jumping a 30 foot ramp in a mtb is also wrong.
the problem with the first group is that they asumme that everybody is as "boring" and careful as them. that is why they endorse "NOT USING A HELMET".
Re: "Ordinary cycling is not demonstrably more dangerous than walking or driving"
Yes it is. It is at least three times as dangerous as driving by every common mentrc. Some statistics on the topic:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wik...
Robin, this is an honest question: why don't you wear a helmet while you're walking? Presumably there's some measurable possibility it would protect you from serious brain injury or death. And it seems that you value your own life more highly than most people do, given your interest in cryonics. I know why Idon't wear a helmet -- because I don't take as strong an interest in preserving my life, and because I care whether people think I look silly. But I would think the calculus might be different for you.