Did you read the article? These bikes are 2-3 meters long. There is no chance of this type of injury occurring with them.
It's seems like marketing and cost-cutting issue for them.
Customer: "Driver is wearing a helmet, and nobody provided helmets for us.. Are we in danger?"
Pedal Me: "Say no more.. "
Plus it seems they only bought caps & jackets for their drivers previously, no safety gear. Drivers are replaceable, aren't they? (\s)
And other thing, why is a 3 meters long bike road-legal?
Why shouldn’t it be?
Huh? Why shouldn't it be?
A normal road bike gets close to 2 meters at the tips of the wheels. Add a trailer and that's easily 3.
Because there’s nothing unsafe about it.
Better questions are: why are cars that exceed 90 mph street legal? Why are trucks with lift kits street legal? Shouldn’t we be preventing things from being on the street that are actually killing people?
However, the type of bike they are using is much safer than a normal bicycle because of its size.
I have had my bike's wheel get physically jammed into a train track and went over the front. I was wearing a helmet, though I didn't hit my head. I was practicing Aikido back then and did a nice roll resulting in no injury. There is no way I could do that today.
With a wheelbase of 2-3m, there's just no way the bike tips forward like this, especially with the rider positioned towards the back. Couple that with the fact that cargo bikes travel at lower average speeds and it's not clear to me how this injury occurs.