Does Helmet normalisation deter cyclists?

[DaveReading]

Today on the way to work, a passing helmet busy after he has passed turns and snarls “Where’s your helmets?”

I'd have been tempted to ask him how many he thought I should be wearing.

 

[KnittyNorah]

I wear a helmet on a bicycle mainly because I've always worn a standardised-marked, up to date, 'crash hat' on a horse, even in the face of mockery from others - and have been through a great many iterations, developments and advances of those, AND have worked in head injury units ...
Riding anything with my head uncovered simply feels wrong, and has done since I was in my mid-20s.

That said, a bicycle riding helmet is a very different thing to a horse riding helmet and IMO a horse riding helmet is more comfortable, fits better and is more protective in all aspects of the sport for which it was designed, than are most bike-riding helmets, even given the sort of low-speed pootling about I do on non-trafficced, tarmac or other hard surface paths and tracks.

Promoting bicycle helmet usage in the current road climate of lawlessness is rather like giving someone a box of elastoplast when they start work in the packaging department of a razorblade factory which doesn't use any machinery ...

 

[Ming the Merciless]

Today on the way to work, a passing helmet busy after he has passed turns and snarls “Where’s your helmets?” Perhaps the irony of him cycling towards a T-junction on a blind bend, wearing dull black clothes and looking backwards, not towards where he was going was lost on him.

What is wrong with people?

 

[Ming the Merciless]

Butting heads over cycle helmets

”
The data presented by LeBlanc and colleagues1 show that the risk of head injury per cyclist did not change as a result of the law, but rather the risk of other injuries approximately doubled. Their bicycle count data show a 40%–60% fall in the number of cyclists after the law was passed, from 88 per day down to 33 or 52 per day. Their injury data show a sharp fall in total injuries in 1997, but for 1998/99 the number of injuries was higher than before the law (443 v. 416). The absolute number of head injuries has fallen by half, but so has the number of cyclists, although the total number of injuries has increased. Likewise, the claim of a doubling in the rate of helmet use omits the more telling point that the absolute number of cyclists using helmets did not materially change.

The Nova Scotia helmet law experience strengthens the arguments against helmet laws. No reduction has occurred in the risk of head injury per cyclist, relative to this study's loose definition of head injury. However, a big increase has occurred in the risk of non-head injury per cyclist. Furthermore, there has been no material increase in the number of helmeted cyclists. Rather, cycling on a substantial scale has been deterred. The deterrence of the safest mode of urban transport will not contribute to overall road safety or public health.

Utility cycling is a low-risk activity. Although cyclists in Great Britain do not have a notably good safety record, the expectation for a fatal crash for the average cyclist is only once in 18 000 years (3 million regular cyclists, 165 deaths per year). Experience shows that strong helmet promotion or laws bring about a low-utility, high-injury cycling culture. In countries such as France, the Netherlands and Denmark, little interest is shown in helmets, despite high levels of utility cycling and much better safety records. Cycling is very safe where it is popular.2 In France and Denmark, an hour of cycling is much safer than an hour of driving.3 In all countries for which I have seen data, pedestrians are more at risk than cyclists.4,5

Research here in Great Britain by the Transport Research Laboratory shows that the public relates helmets and their promotion to danger, and this deters cycling.6 As the relevant report comments, “Fear of traffic peril is a huge deterrent, though fear usually exceeds true danger. Discussion of safety frequently sharpens fear and so deters cycling.” The report observes that local authorities who ran prominent helmet campaigns saw a sharp drop in cycling activity.

The British Medical Association reviewed the question of a national helmet law in 1999 and concluded that helmets should not be made compulsory anywhere in Great Britain.7 This decision recognizes real-world experience in countries where helmets have come into general use, but little, if any, benefit has been observed in time trends of serious injuries.8 Injuries may even have increased.9 It is clear that a helmet will not prevent death in a serious crash with a motor vehicle.”

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC117837/

 

[Moon bunny]

I'd have been tempted to ask him how many he thought I should be wearing.

There were two of us.

 

[icowden]

Replies here are slowed by moderation - both directly and indirectly in that you need to try not to typo stuff because editing is not allowed.

Malta's legislature was convinced enough people were deterred that they repealed their helmet law: https://road.cc/content/news/236188...helmet-law-it-hinders-efforts-get-more-people - I don't know how online Malta's political processes are, but you might be able to find the evidence that led them to that conclusion by searching.

There are some dissenting analyses but it looks to me like Australia is the longest demonstration of discouraging cycling by law: http://www.cycle-helmets.com/cycling-1985-2019.html

The Isle of Man seems about to try to prove the same effect again by making helmets compulsory for cycling: https://cyclingindustry.news/isle-of-man-compulsory-cycling-helmet/

And some in Denmark claim that even just showing helmets (not compelling them by law and not even promoting them) discourages cycling: http://www.copenhagenize.com/2013/10/promoting-cycling-positively-now-with.html

There's also this excellent work from Dave Horton hosted there: http://www.copenhagenize.com/2009/09/fear-of-cycling-03-helmet-promotion.html

These are interesting but I wonder how much work has been done to bring up kids with the expectation of wearing a helmet, vs the potential reduction from the curmudgeon community? Plus, different countries are um... different?

For example, I doubt there are many kids in the UK who don't regard a helmet as being part and parcel of riding a bike for example, and the majority of cyclists seem t choose to wear a lid. Cycle clubs require lids, as to sportives and other events.

Climate is also (I think) a really important factor in these studies. Australia and Malta for example are HOT whereas the UK is rarely particularly warm. I resent wearing a helmet much more if the weather is hot, as I start to overheat. I'm also a sun dodger. My favourite cycling days are pleasant semi-overcast weather with temps between 16 and 20c. I can imagine that if the daily temperature is 25c plus, a helmet becomes much more of an annoyance.

Denmark, a bit like Holland has some great cycling infrastructure, so again, given that interactions between cars and bikes is greatly reduced I can imagine that the perceived need for a helmet is very different there.

I don't think it is something you can assess very easily. Sadly in the UK, Cycling is often treated as an unpleasant annoying niche transport / sport that gets in the way of motorists. Hence we have some terrible cycling infrastructure, a casual disregard for road surfaces, and the need for recording motorists who don't understand that close passing is illegal.

 

[icowden]

In countries such as France, the Netherlands and Denmark, little interest is shown in helmets, despite high levels of utility cycling and much better safety records. Cycling is very safe where it is popular.

I think that's the important bit. We stopped being a nation of cyclists, and now cyclists get treated badly. We need to get back to when cycling was normal.

 

[matticus]

These are interesting but I wonder how much work has been done to bring up kids with the expectation of wearing a helmet, vs the potential reduction from the curmudgeon community? Plus, different countries are um... different?

For example, I doubt there are many kids in the UK who don't regard a helmet as being part and parcel of riding a bike for example, and the majority of cyclists seem t choose to wear a lid. Cycle clubs require lids, as to sportives and other events.

curmudgeon community Is this phrase helpful, or even meaningful?

I need to correct some of your 2nd para:
There's a pretty even split of helmet rules in clubs (as it happens, only one of the 5 major clubs around me has compulsion).
Many events do NOT require them e.g. Audax - around since 1984 and supporting millions of miles ridden annualy in the UK.

A large proportion of adults who you describe as "choosing" to wear them are actually following rules (e.g. employers) or family pressure.

Kids? Well this is just opinion, but I reckon most would choose not to wear them if/when they can get a way with it.

 

[Drago]

I only used to wear them at work because those was the rools, and the insurance insisted upon it.

In a wonderful irony they actually cause more injuries than they prevented as several officers were assaulted when the little toerags grabbed the lid. As a consequence MIAS and IPMBA advise releasing the clasp when in close proximity to anyone who might with harm to the rider.

 

[Oldhippy]

I honestly think it does. I have had comments in recent years about wearing no helmet or day glo. I have ridden a bike for over 3p years in all weather and traffic. Never been an issue for me.

 

[Dogtrousers]

Kids? Well this is just opinion, but I reckon most would choose not to wear them if/when they can get a way with it.

I'm replying to this thread because of something that crossed my mind this weekend. I was walking through the park and there were a ton of kids playing on scooters (primarily) and also bikes. The prevalence of helmets was the first thing I noticed. All the kids (I'm guessing these were in the under 10 age group) were wearing helmets. The prevalence of scooters was another thing. Scooters were really uncool, to be abandoned as soon as possible for a bike when I was a child.

So: If helmet normalisation suppresses cycling in a generation brought up rarely having to wear headgear, would the effect be the same on a generation who have grown up habituated to wearing helmets?

I don't know. Maybe the prevalence of helmets from childhood will lessen the effect, because it's less of a "thing" and is just seen as normal. Or maybe the ubiquity of parent-enforced helmets in childhood will make young people avoid activities that require helmets, as they are seen as childish, and they would - as you say - "choose not to wear them as soon as they have the chance".

I have no idea other than that I'd bet that it has some kind of effect.

 

[Ian H]

Here's a pretty comprehensive website concerning helmets & their effectiveness: https://www.cyclehelmets.org/

 

[Ian H]

I need to correct some of your 2nd para:
There's a pretty even split of helmet rules in clubs (as it happens, only one of the 5 major clubs around me has compulsion).
Many events do NOT require them e.g. Audax - around since 1984 and supporting millions of miles ridden annualy in the UK.

CTT time trials do not require helmets. Many older, more established clubs do not have helmet rules, a lot of the newer ones, set up directly through British cycling, do.

 

[presta]

I cannot ride with the local club any more, nor take part in my employer's annual charity ride.

If it's on a public road they can't stop you, can they?

 

[mjr]

For example, I doubt there are many kids in the UK who don't regard a helmet as being part and parcel of riding a bike for example, and the majority of cyclists seem t choose to wear a lid. Cycle clubs require lids, as to sportives and other events.

While you may think that "the majority of cyclists seem t choose to wear a lid" the most recent official statistic that I've seen is that UK helmet use was in the mid-30s % and falling. It does seem to vary a lot from place to place, though.

As others have mentioned, cycle clubs are mixed: Cycling UK don't require it and some of their groups are not allowed to require it, British Cycling is more enthusiastic but not absolute, Cycling Time Trials and Audax UK don't require it, and so on. The capture of almost all sportives by helmet zealots is a bit of a problem and a disappointment.

I mainly see accompanied small children using helmets. Only a few teenagers seem to. The helmet zealot capture of schools may yet be backfiring by making helmet use seen as something for tiny tots and something teenagers want to grow out of.

Denmark, a bit like Holland has some great cycling infrastructure, so again, given that interactions between cars and bikes is greatly reduced I can imagine that the perceived need for a helmet is very different there.

Denmark is somewhere between Holland and the UK and IMO much closer to the UK outside the big cities. It does indeed have some great cycling infrastructure but most of what I've ridden was actually pretty mediocre, mostly a Milton-Keynes-like design but actually maintained (MK currently suffers too many rough and broken surfaces and missing signs) along major roads, accompanied by a surprising amount of painting a dotted line up the middle of the roadside pavement (or similar surfacing) and calling the half nearest the carriageway a cycleway, with it turning into paint-only lanes across junctions. The UK could absolutely be 80% Danish-level cycleways within 5 years with no tax rise if there was political will to divert the motorway-building budget for that time. I don't think they're that far ahead and, as such, observations from there could apply to here very easily.

I don't think it is something you can assess very easily.

I do agree with that, though!