helmets, because science

[mstone]

The pedestrian-as-cow-horn thing was also humorous. (And, unfortunately, more likely than that other stuff.)

[Rootchopper]

I didn’t die. https://rootchopper.wordpress.com/2015/04/29/and-i-didnt-even-die/

I rode again today without a helmet. I’m still here.

My daughter was learning to ride and fell off her bike. She careened toward a storm drain. The helmet kept her head from going into the drain. At the speed she was going she might have gotten a boo boo. I crashed dozens of times when I was a kid. I am perfectly okay today. Really. I’m just a few spokes shy of a wheel.

[Raymo853]

I know there was a study about car drivers wearing helmet. Showed more lives would be saved each year if car drivers wore helmet than all motorcycle and bicycle riders killed each year.

[dasgeh]

I’ve seen at least one study that said that riding in traffic without a helmet was more safe, because drivers gave more room to cyclists without helmets. I think there’s just not enough data for know for sure one way or the other, so I’ve stopped judging others for whether they wear a helmet or not.

[hozn]

@dasgeh 114778 wrote:

I’ve seen at least one study that said that riding in traffic without a helmet was more safe, because drivers gave more room to cyclists without helmets.

I just find it hard to believe that most accidents (where cyclists could benefit from head protection) are caused by cars following *and* seeing cyclists — yet still passing too close. Was this demonstrated or otherwise asserted by this study?

[mstone]

@hozn 114783 wrote:

I just find it hard to believe that most accidents (where cyclists could benefit from head protection) are caused by cars following *and* seeing cyclists. Was this demonstrated or otherwise asserted by this study?

It could be that the data are of such poor quality, and the sample sizes so tiny, that any conclusions about helmets are specious. In which case, focusing public policy on things which do have strong evidence is probably the best strategy.

[dplasters]

@hozn 114783 wrote:

I just find it hard to believe that most accidents (where cyclists could benefit from head protection) are caused by cars following *and* seeing cyclists — yet still passing too close. Was this demonstrated or otherwise asserted by this study?

The study was done in the UK by a university of Bath professor I believe? He took data on his commute daily swapping back and forth on wearing a helmet and not wearing one.

On average, cars passed closer when he was wearing a helmet vs when he wasn’t. Theres a lot of other factors in play there though. Perhaps he rides in a different location on the road with and without a helmet, sample size, repeatability, outliers (pretty sure he was hit twice.. both times with a helmet??? going all off memory here) etc.

The concept is ‘oh snap, look at that squishy melon head – i better give him room’ vs ‘plastic bucket, pass away at whatever speed’.

[hozn]

@dplasters 114790 wrote:

The study was done in the UK by a university of Bath professor I believe? He took data on his commute daily swapping back and forth on wearing a helmet and not wearing one.

On average, cars passed closer when he was wearing a helmet vs when he wasn’t. Theres a lot of other factors in play there though. Perhaps he rides in a different location on the road with and without a helmet, sample size, repeatability, outliers (pretty sure he was hit twice.. both times with a helmet??? going all off memory here) etc.

Thanks. Yeah, I’ve heard of this study a few times, but never read the original. And I could even appreciate how this passing-distance thing could be true, but I don’t see any way to get from this assertion to the idea that wearing a helmet is less safe, unless we also know that this is how car-on-cyclists accidents/injuries/fatalities happen. Based on first and second-hand accounts, I don’t buy that. (Every story I have heard of car-on-cyclist accidents involved the car not seeing the cyclist, pulling out quickly in front of a cyclist, under-estimating the cyclists speed and cutting them off, or simply hitting cyclist crossing an intersection. None of these scenarios seem improved by not wearing a helmet.) But I could imagine that in some environments it could be true that most accidents happen when cars just crash into cyclists from behind.

[dasgeh]

@hozn 114783 wrote:

I just find it hard to believe that most accidents (where cyclists could benefit from head protection) are caused by cars following *and* seeing cyclists — yet still passing too close. Was this demonstrated or otherwise asserted by this study?

I honestly don’t remember, but I believe it was a better-run study than what dplasters described. My point is more that helmet wearing isn’t necessarily a clear-cut issue. Except in the case of mandatory helmet laws – those are clearly bad.

[jrenaut]

That kind of study is pretty much impossible to do scientifically. Pretty tough to measure passing distance, and even tougher to do it without some sort of measuring device that would probably change passing distance.

[dplasters]

I didn’t mean to make the study sound like rubbish. It is an interesting idea.

For the forums eyes:

http://www.bhsi.org/walkerstudy.htm
http://www.bhsi.org/walkerfigs.pdf

For those who want to spend $42…
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0001457506001540

Just saying though..
The author was hit by a bus and a truck during the experiment, and was wearing a helmet both times.

[dasgeh]

@jrenaut 114793 wrote:

That kind of study is pretty much impossible to do scientifically. Pretty tough to measure passing distance, and even tougher to do it without some sort of measuring device that would probably change passing distance.

Why not just set up a camera?

[scoot]

@jrenaut 114793 wrote:

That kind of study is pretty much impossible to do scientifically. Pretty tough to measure passing distance, and even tougher to do it without some sort of measuring device that would probably change passing distance.

Walker used ultrasound. I didn’t see a description of the sensor itself, so it’s hard to tell if it was visible to drivers or not.

Here’s another paper which disputes the significance of Walker’s results. TLDR, but it appears that Olivier and Walter conclude the following: The entire effect observed by Walker occurred for passing distances that are already sufficiently wide (i.e. > 1m). When only passes closer than 1m are considered, there is no significant dependence of passing distance upon helmet-wearing status.

[ewilliams0305]

wearing a helmet should be your decision. I wouldn’t ever take that away from sensibly adults. However, I’m assuming most of you have never smashed a car windshield with one. Try that without a helmet on…. My decision as a sensible adult has always been to wear a helmet. It’s too bad for the car windshield I smashed with it, maybe it would have been fine had I left it at home. Not judging people that choose not to. Just pointing out that shit happens when least expect it, including a block away from home in a residential neighborhood.

As for driving related and helmet related studies, Hogwash. Purely circumstantial, way too many variables. I’ll stick to my guns a assume that the added protection just may save my life again.

[rcannon100]

@ewilliams0305 114832 wrote:

However, I’m assuming most of you have never smashed a car windshield with one. Try that without a helmet on….

Why do you assume that. I have. No, the helmet, in my case, did not make a lick of difference. In your case, most likely, it did not make a lick of difference either. A helmet is a relatively thin, solid. The force of an impact, like from a windshield, will be transferred straight through it. The force of your impact either would or would not have hurt your head – your helmet gave you almost no protection.

That said – yeah I am one of those people – if you tell me that a helmet will give me a small amount of protection – mainly from lacerations but not from blunt force – I’ll wear it. Just like I wear lights and high viz and reflectors. If you tell me something will significantly but to a small degree (significant hear means measurable, it is not the same as a lot) make me safer – I will probably do it. I am one of those people who ALWAYS drives with his lights on, believing it might make me 4% safer. Thats a significant percentage.

I have absolutely no illusion that a helmet is giving me significant protection – and I understand now the anxiety of the anti-helmet crowd – because so many people are of the illusion that “a helmet saved my life.” That statement is entirely doubtful. What saved your life, in your case, was probably the safety glass that a windshield is make out of – not the helmet.

7 things you should give up to be a happy cyclist
http://www.londoncyclist.co.uk/7-things-you-should-give-up-to-be-a-happy-cyclist/
“3. Give up on the helmet debate: One thing I avoid doing at all costs is getting in to an angry debate about whether you should wear a helmet or not. I find that most people have fairly embedded views on this and arguing with them mostly seems to just further embed them in to their own opinions. As humans we are not wired to prove ourselves wrong. Instead, I give up on the need to always be right.”

[Author]

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