.... They can go way of topic really quickly...
;)
CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Debate!
The problem with forums is......
(53 posts)- Started 13 years ago by recombodna
- Latest reply from gembo
- This topic is
closed
-
Posted 13 years ago #
-
Wow, the IMMENSE POWER of Devo and a cute child on a tricycle can't even derail this argument. What can be done?
LOLCats?
Posted 13 years ago # -
Loving this topic..!
The problem with forums is simply that they are like real life. Everybody is different and there's no reason for them always to agree.
The only other option is to have a consensus (or rule) that only non-contentious topics can be discussed. But for most, this would defeat the purpose of a forum - you'll learn nothing from a conversation without any differences.
Posted 13 years ago # -
@wfb - OK I admit my sentence structure leaves something to be desired there. Typing too fast in when I should be working.
Naturally I hope nobody gets hurt wearing whatever they coose to wear, I was not meaning you would get a worse injury... So apologies for misleading the readerYou say:
"I understand why people wearing them affects me but how does it work the other way?"How exactly does me wearing a lid affect you?
Posted 13 years ago # -
@Stepdoh - good lolcat, I like the ginger cat using the tail as a mudguard (is that chic?)
Posted 13 years ago # -
hey why don't we sort this out with a naked fist fight on hot coals...........no?........anyone?..........................hello ........
Posted 13 years ago # -
If the cats don't work someone will have to resort to kittens, and where does the escalation go from there!?! :-o
Posted 13 years ago # -
NNNooooOOOoooOOOoooOOOOoooOO!!!!!
Posted 13 years ago # -
videos of babies giggling uncontrolably
Posted 13 years ago # -
oh hold on, I can do that, no wait. Sorry will stop using my child :)
Posted 13 years ago # -
spytfyre,
Well, off the top of my head,
The more people who wear them the easier it would be to bring in compulsion as has happened in other parts of the world.
The more people wear them the more likely it is that we get judges coming out with things like the one earlier in the week where he said cyclists should wear helmets even though he admitted it would have had no effect.
If a judge comes out with something like that then some smart lawyer will argue to decrease compensation in a case where someone is injured while not wearing a helmet. After all it is common sense that cyclists should wear them, it must be so, a judge said it.
The more people wear them the more cycling is seen as dangerous. This deters people from cycling and the fewer cyclists are on the road the less consideration we get. Less cycling will increase cardiovascular disease and, as you may be aware, Australia has recently overtaken the US as the land of lard.
Cycling being seen as dangerous worries my mum sometimes because she then thinks I do a dangerous activity. It's not more so than her walking over to get her paper but she doesn't need to wear a helmet to do that so cycling must be more dangerous. To save me from this dangerous thing my dad often offers to give me a lift home.
We are excluded from activities where helmet rules are enforced. Pupils in my school don't get help from the guy who cycles to school every day all year because the council mandates helmets in any activity. I don't know who came up with that rule but I suspect I do considerably more milage.
People assume helmets are mandatory. I have even found web pages which said helmets were required on the road the Isle of Wight Tourist board for example used to say that. They changed it two years ago after I referred them to the highway code.
On an unusual personal note about 7 years ago a member of the guidance staff in the school I worked at told a whole class of first years that I was a bad example because I didn't wear a helmet. Her assumption was that I should and she was so sure of this she did an unprofessional thing and bad mouthed another member of staff. Her being a bit on the beefy side and driving 4 miles each way to work everyday was something I never commented on at all.
Posted 13 years ago # -
@weefoldingbike - "If a judge comes out with something like that then some smart lawyer will argue to decrease compensation in a case where someone is injured while not wearing a helmet. After all it is common sense that cyclists should wear them, it must be so, a judge said it."
Well put, I grant you that.
"The more people wear them the more cycling is seen as dangerous. This deters people from cycling"
I'd debate that, as I just said over on the "War Gear" thread I think people will get on a bike if it suits them (thinking here of people saving money getting around), if they feel helmets are the norm they will get one, I would be very interested to see raw data figures on how many people want to but avoided buying a bike because they thought it was unsafe...
"Her being a bit on the beefy side and driving 4 miles each way to work everyday was something I never commented on at all."
You have now ;)
Posted 13 years ago # -
Well that would be difficult to find out because people scared of buying a bike will not go to the shop.
In Aus cycling went down when helmets were made mandatory,
Errr... actually I may have occasionally mentioned how she never seemed to find a shirt her size.
Posted 13 years ago # -
Ahem. I posted the other topic because I thought this one might get shut down for veering off-topic. The post two up by wee folding bike would be especially relevant ;-)
Posted 13 years ago # -
I'm trying to keep out of the helmet thing but the Aus stats get my back up, there was a similar drop in the UK cycling levels where there was no legislation.
Posted 13 years ago # -
steveo,
How about the rest of the world?
You have a better explanation of the Aus numbers (and a link to the UK ones)?
Posted 13 years ago # -
The Danes are experiencing a marked fall in numbers of kids cycling to school, corresponding with a marked rise of helmet promotion (but there is no law). Legislation is after all only one end of the fearmonger spectrum.
I daresay if you do have any alternative explanations for the well-coordinated fall in cycling numbers in Oz, the guys at cyclehelmets.org as well as the Australian government themselves would probably love to hear from you.
Posted 13 years ago # -
Nope no alternative theory don't care enough to make one, merely poking holes in the existing theory since there was no helmet legislation in the UK but there was a huge drop in the numbers cycling at about the same time, see last helmet thread for details.
Posted 13 years ago # -
Well how do you feel about this TRL paper?
In the conclusion they find this:
Eleven Local Authorities reported that they had held short cycle helmet campaigns, when activities were focused solely on the promotion of helmets. The changes in wearing rates between 1994 and 1996 in these regions were compared with those who had not held such a campaign (Table 16). A significantly greater increase in helmet wearing was found among those who had held a short, focused campaign than those who had not (p<0.001). However, the overall numbers of cyclists observed in areas which had held such a campaign fell significantly by 2.8%, versus a 4.9% increase in the other areas (p<0.001).
That's the whole para. If you want the paper it's free from TRL.
So there could have been a different cause in the UK for this huge drop of which you speak. That does not mean that helmet laws were not to blame for the AUs drop.
Orthodox Jews don't eat pork. I don't eat pork. We don't eat it for different reasons. If you are right about a fall here it doesn'tmean that the Aus fall is unrelated to the helmet law.
Posted 13 years ago # -
You never know, there may well be an alternative explanation. If we knew that pushing helmets didn't kill off cycling, I'd be the first to withdraw my objections.
The problem is, not only do casual riders have no alteratives, but *nobody* has any alternatives. It's very odd, given the public health implications, that there's so little interest in understanding it.
Posted 13 years ago # -
spytfyre,
I poked around for a while but eventually found this:
2.4.6 Walking and Cycling
Publication Date:
15 December 2009Transport Scotland recognize that there is generally little baseline data available for walking and cycling schemes. Aggregate data on walking and cycling are published in Scottish Transport Statistics. Data on the frequency of walking and cycling in general and for travel to work in particular are available from the Scottish Household Survey and the Census. Some Local Authorities may also collect survey data on the use of their walking and cycling networks and facilities.
The Walthamforest C*** cycling guy doesn't put much store in the English stats but then that guy doesn't like much of anything:
http://crapwalthamforest.blogspot.com/
Bristol Traffic is less serious:
Posted 13 years ago # -
There are plenty of examples from around the to show that simply the promotion of cycle helmets discourage cycling, here is one from Sweden. Oh and in case you want to know the answer to the quiz, they are 1988 and 2005, I have a messenger bag to prove it ;-)
Posted 13 years ago # -
this just goes round and round and doesn't get anywhere.
It is important to point out that making something harder to do is likely to result in a reduction in the thing. It is also therefore important not to then move beyond data to state that helmet wearing puts people off because it suggests danger, rather than it puts people off because they have to have a helmet. Nice graph tho. If it could be linked with the number of casualties/fatalities on Swedish roads of 6-15 year old cyclists we might be further forward. Thus if half the number of kids cycling (all presumably with helmets???) but same number or more of casualities/fatalities then helmets not helping. Alas we don't have this objective data. Do we?
Posted 13 years ago #
Topic Closed
This topic has been closed to new replies.
posts
