Bikesharing and safety

With bike share on the horizon, it’s time to rethink King County’s adult helmet law

This is interesting, in part because the article and even some of the comments are starting to catch on to what often gets lost in the debate over helmets and bike safety generally - that's it's all about HOW you ride!

Stats are starting to show that bike-sharing is safer than riding your personal bike. Maybe because many people's riding styles on their personal bikes are faster, hunched over (meaning primed for forward ejection in almost any incident), and likely competing with traffic. Plus bikeshare tends to be used in urban environments for short, casual trips, as opposed to long commutes or sport/recreation warrior-ing.

Heavy, slow, upright bikeshare bikes inherently enforce more of a citizen-cycling mode, making it quite rare to be injured while biking. Yes, even on the mean streets of North America, London, etc. Let's hope the lesson can be applied to personal bikes.

And before certain people start shrieking, no, I don't mean 'hey everyone, stop wearing a helmet'. Do what makes sense for you. Helmet or not, it just seems to be proving out that citizen cycling (for lack of a better term to encompass many aspects) is safer. Let's stop pretending that all biking is the same.

The Case for Bicycle Infrastructure

This is great, saw it over on Copenhagenize today. Basically a mighty (yet accessible) barrage of international research bits backing up the virtues of bike lanes and cycletracks. Hope it trickles down to all the dark, musty places where the idea somehow still lurks that somehow bike lanes - especially protected lanes - are somehow a bad idea or not worth the investment.

Someone in DC might want to pass this along to new DDOT Director Terry Bellamy.

The Case for Bicycle Infrastructure

Much of the rest of the world including quite a bunch of (presumably) smart people seem to have come to the conclusion cycle lanes and cycle tracks are very much worth every penny.

full article

A resolution

The Washington Area Bicyclist Association has an online Resolution to Ride Responsibly that area cyclists can sign:

Please think about how you ride, your responsibility to yourself and other road users, and what you can do to help as a member of the bicycling community.

The pledge itself includes:

• I resolve to be a more responsible bicyclist

• I resolve to better respect the rights of other road users

• I resolve to make a good faith effort to better follow the law

• I resolve to yield to pedestrians

• I resolve to help make bicycling safer and easier for all of us

Sounds reasonable and welcome. I know some are irritated by it for various reasons, but not me. While I think I'm already a responsible rider, I'm signing because I'm all for encouraging a more civic-minded collective biking mentality in DC. We need to always strive to be a positive and collaborative part of the overall transit-scape.

Think of it as good cycling citizen-ship. All of us, to varying degrees, can do even better on these points. This could make the task of cycling advocacy easier during this pivotal time, and help defuse the kind of driver hostility that we know is out there, right or wrong.

No one's saying absolute, strict compliance, just as (for example) none of us stop fully at every stop sign when driving. Just make being a good biking citizen a goal and a habit as best you can. If you're already doing that, great.

Let's seduce with reasonableness, even in the face of irrationality.

Wooing is key

from Streetsblog:

Wooing the Hesitant Cyclist

For those who bike everywhere now, biking in the street is probably no big deal. But most of those cyclists probably fall within the two categories of “Strong and Fearless” or “Enthused and Confident.” Together they make up 8% of the population. In the U.S., 8% is pretty good, but if we really want to break through, we need to find a way to get the 60% who are “Interested but Concerned” to ride a bike.

full article

Mo' better

More bicycling means safer streets

When many bicyclists are on the road, cycling safety improves substantially. […] Now comes data from Portland, Oregon, that suggests encouraging bicycle use leads to greater traffic safety in general.

And, it's worth noting:

[Portland's] 300-mile network cost approximately the same as the construction of a mile of urban freeway.

full article

A hopefully rare post about helmets

You may have noticed I didn't point out in the previous post that the woman isn't wearing a helmet. First of all, it's obvious and speaks for itself.

Second, I don't want to be the guy saying 'see, don't wear a helmet'. I do want to be the guy saying 'make choices based on adult powers of risk assessment'.

Third, I don't want to talk much about helmets on this blog, because then the same arguments go around and around. It's boring and no one convinces anyone of anything.

With that said, ok, this is more good and sensible ammo for the next time someone says, 'hey, where's your helmet'?

If you don’t like wearing a bike helmet, you might like to read this

Why does the perception of bicycle safety seem to differ so much with the reality? One reason is this notion that you have to be wearing ’safety gear’ (aka ‘danger gear’ – helmets, fluoro) which any normal person looks at and thinks… “Gee, that MUST be dangerous. I wouldn’t want my husband/wife/child/mother/father doing that. You must be so brave… etc etc”.

I cycle over 5000km per year for commuting and every other trip I would normally take a car for. I haven’t ‘fallen off’ since I was 10 years old. I don’t wear a helmet for 99% of these trips. I’d like to not have to break the law.

full article

The real danger of biking

This short scene is pretty charming, but does serve as a stark reminder of one of the real perils of bicycling:  you may not be able to catch up to your girlfriend on the bus.

I remember Twist and Shout (Tro, håb og kærlighed in Danish) from around the time it came out in 1984. Really good but under-known coming-of-age film set in 1960s Copenhagen. I've always liked Danish director Bille August. His work usually has a certain atmosphere or quality that you can't quite put your finger on. Something about the muted color palette maybe.

Gangs of DC

Riding home yesterday I came across one of these little herds of kids on bikes, on their way from school. Just south of the Petworth metro, off Georgia Avenue. I see them in the morning sometimes too, passing through Columbia Heights. Looks like how I imagine the Portland bike scene.

I think it's great and cool, but also a little sad in a way. I remember being that age and riding my bike everywhere, by myself or with a friend or two, just launching out on adventures. Kids in the city or suburbs don't get the same freedom now.

Then again, in those days we didn't wear seatbelts, adults smoked a lot more, and a sunburn was a badge of honor. Not to mention the range of unfortunate 1970s fashion choices. But it was a fun time to grow up.

On helmets (or off)

Many people (riders or not) in the US have a zero-sum kind of attitude towards bike helmets - helmet good, no helmet stupid. I think the reality for slow, urban riding is far more complex and frankly there's a fine case for going without.

In case you missed it (as I did), here's an articulate post on the topic by James Schwartz over on The Urban Country.

To which I would only add:  yeah, what he said. I personally don't wear a helmet, and James does a great job explaining the rationale. If you wear a helmet, that's great if that suits you, power on.

Watch the furniture, though

Good item today over on Copenhagenize, about a campaign by that city's health department. Good way to address the reflexive fear some people have about getting on a bike.

You're Safer on the Bicycle Than on the Sofa

As noted in the post - "Appropriate message in a city saturated with cycling. In Emerging Bicycle Cultures, it is always better to highlight the basic facts that appeal to homo sapiens, like A2Bism and quicker transport through our cities. With all that said, this is an important poster in that finally SOMEONE is countering all the negative branding that cycling is suffering..."

I'd say Washington DC is an Emerging Bicycle Culture. Or rather, there is an existing old-guard bike culture dominated by pant straps, helmets, toe-clips, spandex, courier-types, off-roaders, etc. All the stuff that has its own logic but can be off-putting to those considering biking as a practical, elegant, everyday means of getting around.

Within that are tender shoots of citizen cycling, cycle chic (or whatever you want to call it) visible here and there, that just need a little care and watering.