Evaluation of New Zealand’s bicycle helmet law (2012) | Hacker News Reader

Evaluation of New Zealand’s bicycle helmet law (2012)

nzma.org.nz

49 pointsawjr49 comments

For those with too little time, the basic premise is that helmet laws appear to suppress cycling significantly, increase the risk of cycling and cause premature deaths through lack of exercise

TL;DR "The following trends were observed following the introduction of New Zealand’s helmet law:

Cycling usage reduced by 51%. Cyclist’s injury risk per hour increased by 20–32%. Estimated to have contributed to 53 premature deaths per year (due to reluctance to cycle and hence people not exercising). Thousands of fines are issued annually for not wearing a helmet. May contribute to discrimination in accident compensation and the legal processes. Could have contributed to environmental pollution and environmental harm (due to use of vehicles in place of cycles). Possibly diminishes civil liberties and human rights (by imposing a requirement to wear a helmet when several reports raise serious doubts whether they improve safety overall)."

I believe this kind of trend has been known for a while and was a main reason for not introducing helment laws in Germany.

Yes, exactly this issue was discussed last summer and helmet laws declared detrimental for exactly the points laid out in the article.

No, helmets aren't killing cyclists, car drivers are.

In the 1980's the New Zealand government removed tariffs on imported cars leading to a massive growth in car ownership.

More cars leads to more driving and less cycling. Then, with more cars on the road, cycling becomes more dangerous.

This trend just happened to coincide with the change in helmet law.

Not sure your argument stands up to the 0-17 age group having a 75% reduction in cycling.

Yes, their parents drive them about until they're 15 when they get their first car.

Fewer children are cycling and walking to school. More children are being dropped off at school by car.

More cars and less cyclists ultimately results in less safe conditions for cyclists.

>>>>> Fewer children are cycling and walking to school. More children are being dropped off at school by car.

I'm actually astounded by this. I grew up in a fairly typical suburban neighborhood, and everybody walked to school. A few weeks before I started kindergarten, my mom walked me to school, to make sure I knew the way. The kids who got driven to school, were teased for it.

Today, every kid in that neighborhood gets driven. There's a long line of cars in front of the school, and the amount of traffic is cited as a reason why it's no longer safe to walk.

When I went to school, the bike racks were large and jammed with bikes. These days, there's maybe one 6 foot rack for the whole school, with 3 bikes in it.

Also, see this response https://www.nzma.org.nz/journal/read-the-journal/all-issues/...

"there was a 67% decline in serious traumatic brain injury (TBI) comparing data for the years nearest the helmet law (1988–1991 vs. 1996–1999)."

"Tin Tin et al6 list several reasons apart from the helmet law for declines in cycling rates and increases in cycling injuries. These include the lack of cycling focus in the New Zealand road safety agenda, an increase in children being driven to school due to parental concerns of safety and an already existing pre-law decline in cycling rates."

I don't think that totally stacks up though. A decline in injuries at the time of the introduction of the laws is natural - there was a lot of campaigning and awareness at the time.

And ultimately a net decrease in head injuries doesn't mean that much when there are many other injuries with cycling generally being more dangerous.

I'm just a single data point but I stopped cycling in nz after they introduced the fines for being caught without a helmet. I've cycled daily in London for years now an it's a much safer place to cycle. My feeling is that's generally due to the awareness from having a lot of cyclists on the road. Whatever nz are trying to do with their foisting of rules upon people, it's not working.

"Whatever nz are trying to do with their foisting of rules upon people, it's not working."

Based on funding and who advocates these laws, a substantial amount of advocates are supporting them in order to clear the roads to promote motoring.

I'd say that's working just fine.

You're overlooking one thing: The less cyclists are on the road the less car drivers will be used to their presence and on the lookout for them. This is the danger caused indirectly by helmet laws.

I was arguing that there wasn't a shift away from cycling due to helmet laws - but a shift toward driving due to other (largely economic) factors.

Of course, I agree that if "less cyclists are on the road the less car drivers will be used to their presence and on the lookout for them."

I would love to see the two datasets side by side

You are correct that the basic premise is that cycling laws cause problems. Unfortunately, there is no data or analysis that would tend more than incrementally toward that conclusion.

I don't doubt the conclusions of the report, really, but it's missing the part where it explains how helmet laws suppressed cycling. You didn't ride your bike to school because you had to wear a helmet? Maybe. Or maybe you didn't ride your bike to school because nobody rides their bike to school anymore because their parents are scared to let them. (That also changed in the last 25 years or so).

Obviously both are a factor and maybe mine is the lesser, I'm just saying that it's not in the report.

Too scared to let them because they fear physical attack? Or too scared to let them because they fear a bicycle injury?

I'd be far more inclined to jump on my bike and ride to my local shops instead of driving if I didn't have to wear a helmet. If I'm riding on the shoulder of a busy road then I wear a helmet by choice, but riding around my quiet neighbourhood is a far more pleasant experience without a helmet.

Riding around city streets in Europe without a helmet further demonstrated to me just how nanny-state Australia really is.

Correlation does not imply causation - the observed 75% reduction of cycling among children aged 5-17 (from 40 minutes to 10 minutes per person per week) from 1989/90 to 2005/08 coincides with the increase in popularity of internet/video games etc (and I believe, a drop in all forms of outdoor activity)

Also this article is 3 years old and should probably be appended with [2012]

This has been observed across time and across the world.

Alberta, Canada. Ten years later, same result:

http://cyclehelmets.org/1250.html

In the latter half of the period you mention, distance cycled in Copenhagen has gone up about 25%.[0]

I realise that Denmark and the Netherlands are the 'exceptions' to the rule, because there cycling is used to actually get places rather than for fun. But I know Denmark has no strict helmet laws. Not sure about the Netherlands.

[0] http://cyclehelmets.org/1257.html

No helmet laws in the Netherlands.

I am so tired of this phrase. Please stop citing it as if it is some kind of knockdown argument.

Evidence for causation consists of a correlation and a proposed causal mechanism. Presenting us with random correlations does not disprove anything.

I think the problem with laws like this is drawing a line when to stop. How much should a state protect you from yourself? I would argue, that the state should indeed protect mentally ill people from doing harm to themselves but should not hinder me to harm myself if I do not endanger others with my actions. I value my freedom much higher than winning the world life-expectancy competition.

Unfortunately our society works around fears. You need fear to get attention or political approval. Everything is getting more complex and thus more and more people want the to step in and regulate things for them.

Additionally this liberal [0] thinking is a bit elitist. To make it actually work in a society drifting apart, you would have to invest huge amounts in education and welfare to prevent typical health problems of the underclass. This would ironically increase the size of the state.

[0]: In the European meaning of the word.

My bicycle helment saved my life. You'll never convince me they're a bad idea.

I don't think the argument is if bicycle helmets are good or bad, but rather bicycle helmet laws. You can be for wearing a helmet at all times and still against bicycle helmet laws. Much the same way you can be for the legalization of drugs but not be a drug user yourself.

No one is saying you shouldn't wear them, the debate is whether or not countries should make it mandatory. If you require bicycle helmets then fewer people ride their bikes, leading to fewer people pushing for safe bicycling laws, more cars on the road, and a less active (and thus less healthy) population.

But this isn't shown by the article. Cycling dropped, but there is no indication that this was caused by helmet laws. A much more detailed study would be required to determine the cause of reduced cycling.

Well, except that the same thing has been found in other studies as well. The results of this study are completely unsurprising to anyone who has read any other study of helmet laws in his/her life.

At some point you just have to accept the evidence.

It's not about accepting the evidence. It's about making sure we interpret it correctly.

The main question to ask is this: why exactly do mandatory helmet laws reduce bicycle usage, and what needs to be done to address it?

Is it that helmets are too expensive? (They aren't.)

Is it that they are too difficult to put on and take off? (They aren't.)

Is it that they are too uncomfortable? (Maybe, but not any more so than seat belts, and yet most people aren't arguing against seat belt laws.)

Essentially, I'm not against accepting the validity of the evidence from these studies. I'm simply against the mentality of "mandatory helmet laws reduce bicycle usage, therefore we must not have mandatory helmet laws." That conclusion is too simplistic. The topic requires further study.

Helmets are quite inconvenient. One's head gets sweaty, one's hair gets mussed, one can't hear anything for the wind noise, and seeing a helmet gives autocage drivers the psychological permission to leave about eight inches when passing. Those who chose to cycle without a helmet have their reasons, just like most other human beings who do as they choose.

Is it that they are too difficult to put on and take off? (They aren't.)

I wouldn't assume that. As far as I can remember, this is one of the main reasons cited for the reduction in cycling. Small things can change a persons behaviour significantly.

They're uncomfortable and inconvenient to keep with you once you're at your destination.

There is also potentially (depending on which studies you give credence) the danger of risk compensation causing helmeted cyclists to cycle more dangerously and automobile drivers to pass more closely to helmeted cyclists.

Obviously not scientific, but if you need some totally informal causative bro-science to allow you to swallow these empirical results:

Even if the benefits are "obvious", the large majority of people aren't self-improvement-focused supermen with significant reserves of willpower at their disposal. Even the smallest increase in the necessary "activation energy" (comfort, expense, convenience; whatever) necessary for a task is going to put a large chunk of the distribution on the "fuck it, I'll just drive" side of things.

This is why "engagement" and "user experience" are multibillion dollar industries. Compare abstinence-only education, condom usage, and (kinda, if you squint a bit) drug prohibition.

It may well be that it makes cycling seem more dangerous.

Ideally, you would want some survey data, although I think it might be hard to get people to say that they stopped riding their bike because wearing a helmet is inconvenient, even if it's true.

You're correct about what the evidence actually shows. But unfortunately quite a few people misinterpret it and end up saying that no one should wear a helmet at all, even voluntarily.

See for example this stupid article, which was originally titled "The Case for Ditching Your Helmet." I came across it because a friend posted it to Facebook as "proof" that wearing a helmet never made anyone safer.

http://www.outsideonline.com/fitness/bodywork/the-fit-list/H...

You are guided by faith, not data. You wore a helmet when you crashed, and you lived. You also wore socks and underwear.

EDIT: I realize that there is no debate, as I will "never convince (you) they're a bad idea." I'm talking to the people who are coming at this with an open mind.

The only time I've ever crashed on bicycle was the one time I wore a helmet. I have stopped wearing a helmet because of the same 'logic'. I use my bike to get to work.

One minute from now, someone is going to hit you in the head. You have the choice of whether to put on a helmet first, or not. Which would you choose? Thus the benefit of wearing a helmet is demonstrated.

Gov't action to support bicycle helmets are a good thing - the point is that action to forbid non-helmeted biking turns out to be bad, as the main effect is not to nudge people from biking w/o helmet to biking with helmet, but to nudge people to not biking at all.

I wouldn't try to convince you they're a bad idea, although I might try to convince you that they're just as good of an idea for pedestrians and people in automobiles, where they would almost certainly also save lives.

This is barely above junk. Most strikingly, there is no data that shows trends prior to the introduction of the helmet law. Therefore there is no model for comparing the before and after scenario to the "do nothing scenario", which is what you care about.

There are good, well-known, well-understood methods for handling all the problems with this paper, but since the author hasn't used any of them this work does not do more than incrementally increase the plausibility of the proposition that "Helmet laws make cycling less safe".

Any chance to repeal this law?

The problem is that these laws are pushed by the insurance and auto lobbies specifically to discourage cycling.

Look behind the big bicycle advocacy organizations in the United States and you'll see serious funding from the American Automobile Association and bicycle companies. I assume the situation in NZ is similar.

More like, the auto-lobby pushes motor vehicle infrastructure at the expense of cycling infrastructure.

Would you rather cycle helmet-less on the road or helmeted on a dedicated cycle path?

I ride helmetless on the road, and I avoid cyclepaths, as I'm far less scared of car drivers pulling something sketchy than I am of rollerblader-dogwalker-strollers pulling something sketchy.

I also live in California, where case law has determined that government is never responsible for injuries that occur off the road and on a bike path.

Additionally, it is flat-out unethical to ride faster than 10mph if you're weaving through pedestrian foot-traffic.

The auto lobby loves cycle infrastructure. It gets cyclists off the road.

The study makes some comparisons to UK cycling which should be taken with a pinch of salt. The UK has some of the highest density road traffic in the world - NZ nowhere near.

Not to mention the argument that increased cycling deaths offsets deaths by obesity is completely specious. Obesity kills when you're 40-50+, not wearing a helmet kills kids when they're 10. I know which I'd prefer as a parent.

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