Helmets are promoted in North America so that when a car kills a cyclist they can blame it on the cyclist if they aren't wearing a helmet instead of blaming it on the shitty cycling infrastructure.
Doesnāt even have to be low speed. David Hookes took a fall in an altercation with a bouncer and hit his head, leading to his death. It was used as a warning to guys like me of how easily a āminorā head injury can be deadly. Not to mention the horror stories I get from my mother, a nurse, of kids receiving life long head trauma because they were too cool to wear protection.
Times are changing though. These days there are loads of annoying kids on fatbikes. Often they go faster than allowed while these kids are even a danger to themselves and others while walking. There's a step rise in accidents but due to the laws they can't do much about it as they fall into the category of bike instead of scooter or moped. Now there's a minimum age (14 I think?) for fatbikes but that barily works preventing accidents. Now with the rise of e-bikes the average cycling speed is also increased which is something everyone needs to adjust to. Drivers too, as cyclists are sooner at an intersection as they used to be. This also causes accidents. This is how I broke my collarbone because a driver thought he had enough time to cross the cycling path but this caused me to crash into him with 25km/h. Without helmets the chance of serious head injuries is greatly increased with speeds of 25km/h. And there are many fatbikes going 45km/h.
Not really that necessary in NL. Most people are cruising the city at 18-20kph. The fietsers on the ebikes obviously go faster, but in heavy traffic, you're not gonna go full speed anyhow.
Even the Fietsersbond cyclist association is changing its tone, while stressing that there is no excuse for reckless drivers or poor infrastructure. āWe have the position that helmets donāt prevent accidents but it can be a wise decision to wear one on a voluntary basis,ā said its director, Esther van Garderen. āEmphasising too much that you should wear a helmet would discourage people from cycling sometimes, though, and has the air of victim-blaming. I think itās coming slowly, although thereās no such thing as a society with zero danger and we value our culture where you can cycle safe and free.ā
Seems like a soft position from Fiestersbond and for good reason. I read your article and then followed the sources and looked up the actual numbers. And you need to STFU with your helmet opinion and actually think about the articles you read/link and their sources. According to the same links sourced in the article(!), the CBS says in 2023, people here in NL over the age of six (roughly 15-16m people) traveled over 1000km each by bike in the year. So just shy of 3km a day by bike. Millions upon millions of trips per fucking year. How many of those millions of trips resulted in a crash? 120k. Wow, that seems like a lot doesn't it? How many people cycle on any given day? According to wikipedia, which cites a EU travel report, 36%. So 5.4m-ish people, making at least one trip per day makes it almost 2 billion trips over an entire fuckin year (5.4m * 365 == 1.97b). So, of those 2 billion trips, we have 120k crashes. Which is... hold on, let me paste it from the calculator because it has so many fucking zeros: 0.000060882800609.
Now, let's do some math. How likely is it that you will be in a crash in a given year?
No-crash probability per trip:
1ā0.00006=0.99994.
Annual no-crash probability (365 trips):
(0.99994)^365ā0.9783.
Annual crash probability:
1ā0.9783=0.0217 or 2.17%.
So a 1 in 46 chance of being in a crash in a given year from cycling one trip every day and of those crashes, less than half are serious. Over my 1000km I cycle. Get the fuck outta here with "very common" from your shit article.
Firstly your numbers are wrong, you need double the number of trips (itās at least 2 just for commuting). So letās say 5% chance over your lifetime. And that number is increasing because of the reasons mentioned in the article.
Secondly just cause itās more likely than not youāll never get a crash doesnāt mean you have to be a dumbass and not wear a helmet. Is it really that difficult to take a little bit of precaution for something with a 5% chance of happening sometime in your lifetime? Seems like a no brainer to me.
So you get out of here with your self-destructive attitude. Wearing helmets saves lives.
I don't live there, but I've often heard that the common rationale for not wearing a helmet is that bike-bike or bike-human accidents usually don't result in head injuries. Usually, it is a bike-car accident that can result in head injuries, and if you get hit by a car at speed then you have other issues.
You are correct either way, but the problem wouldn't be as bad if bike lanes are completely separated from cars. I do not have a source, but I'd assume that places like 's-Hertogenbosch, Houten and Utrecht have less head injuries due to the better (completely separated from cars) bike infrastructure compared to Amsterdam or Rotterdam.
Like the commenter you're up against, most Dutch people are very feral when wearing a helmet on a bike is concerned. Everyone considers themselves a master of biking and therefore impervious to damage.
Opinions claiming otherwise are very toxicly brushed aside. Even though numbers increase, specially with electric bikes becoming more common.
They actually found that both cyclists and drivers tend to take more risks when helmets are abundant, which in turn leads to more serious accidents instead of fewer.
Moreover the Netherlands don't have comparatively more head injuries each year than more car-centric countries, suggesting that cycling doesn't contribute that much overall.
And most injuries tend to happen to old people. Drop the 60+ bracket and suddenly head injuries from cycling drops to an inconsequential number.
My experience when wearing a bike helmet in NL is that car drivers seem to take more risks with my safety, they drive closer to me than I normally experience, and I feel less safe than when I'm not wearing a helmet.
But yes, dain bramage would be worse. And yes, an accident hides in small corners, but I'm not sure if wearing a helmet makes me safer, even on our streets.
Nah im not gonna carry a liter of foam around to cut a 10^-5 chance in third, you do you of course, but this risk is small enough and the inconvenience of carrying around a helmet is large enogh for me to not care for cycling as transportation.
I find the fear mongering around this topic to be supremely annoying. Just let adults ride their bikes however they want. If you try to get your child, employee, or participants in a sporting event to wear a helmet, that's completely reasonable. But assuming the vast majority of dutch cyclists to be idiots for cycling without a helmet is just asinine.
Everyone seeing cycling as a normal mode of transport is never gonna work if everyone is scared of cycling to the point of never considering it without a helmet. Mandatory helmet laws seem to be one of the most effective measures to discourage cycling, so don't try to make a bike culture that effectively acts like one.
Cyclists are the worst where I live, they have zero respect for pedestrians. The city spent millions on bike lanes and these fucks will zip past you and your toddlers on the sidewalk, they never wear helmets, they donāt know any road laws, anyways this would be a nightmare in my city
this is exactly anti-bicylce-propaganda. There are by far more deadly accidents involving cars and trucks than involving bikes and pedestrians. You are afraid of the wrong thing.
Also you are describing the results of car focused infrastructure, that hasn't been effectively planned for cyclists nor pedestrians. The dutch people are not much different than you or me, they just made the infrastructure right and assimilated it over the years. The close calls you are describing look harmless in the video, when you realize that even if there were an accident, not much would happen. But we still get many car-related deaths. Do you see what i mean?
Which city are you in and what does the car infrastructure look like in the street you are describing?
Some people put those fears into your head to create a divide between us. They want you to see close calls with cyclists and be mad about it. So that you don't see this:
If you hate my cause because i called out that your feelings are fueled by propaganda, the die was loaded from the start. Propaganda uses hate. I bet you are not telling me the city you are describing because it is a car infested hell with one ineffective bike lane.
Vehicular Cyclists, or Middle-Aged Men In Lycra, or MAMILs, will set that standard.
These aren't MAMILs. These are people who just want to use the most convenient way of getting around in a place where cycling is considered a valid answer to that question.
there will always be bad and good examples in all the groups. You can't blame an entire group.
I know a couple of MAMILs and they are all very careful, friendly riders.
Anecdotal evidence is merely evidence of an anecdote.
Just because those people are decent (or maybe seem decent when they're around you) does not mean that assholes do not exist.
The point still stands that MAMILs cycle in spite of infrastructure, not thanks to. This is not the case in the vid, but probably is the case for the above commenter.
Would you be comfortable sharing the lane with things that outweigh and outrun you by two orders of magnitude, where a forgettable bump for them would probably be your death, and where at best there's a chance they might not notice or see you in a decent frame of time, at worst they'll actively try to hurt you. I'd hate to cycle in such an environment.
Vehicular Cycling is the Dark Souls of cycling. Dutch cycling, or Practical Cycling as I'd prefer to call it, is more the Animal Crossing of cycling.
yes, people counted and compared. This plus trams has waaay more throughput than a usual car intersection. Check out not just bikes video on that topic with various combinations and graphs, and get mad at car infrastructure with us!
Oh yeah no Iāve been in that camp for a long while. Iām actively furious that my state had an approved plan for high speed rail like 15 years ago connecting all the major cities in the area, and connecting to the national line. And then some asshole republican came in and scrapped it even though it was already fully funded and ready to go.
It would be active right now if that hadnāt happened. Instead I have to drive 2.5 hrs to see my friend, 2 hours to go to my specialist doctor, and the same 2 hours in the opposite direction to get to the national line. All of those trips were supposed to be under 45 min on the train.
So so fucking salty about it. I fucking hate driving. I hate having to pay to maintain a vehicle. I hate that car infrastructure means walking is almost impossible. Iād love to ride a bike or bus locally, but the infrastructure doesnāt sufficiently exist for either to be practical in my area (Iām not riding my bike on the road. People here would actively try to kill me.)
I am sorry about that. My place isn't perfect either and we get a couple of deaths every year. Cycling isn't accepted by all car drivers, but it is a normal concept anyway.
But i am happy not to live in the USA for example.
Thanks :) I see other countries and how they accommodate people who canāt or wonāt or donāt want to drive, and I seriously die a bit inside because solarpunk could be everywhere, it could have, and should have, been here! And instead itās only places I can never live (too disabled and/or unskilled to emigrate) with the places I can live being wildly opposed to making life even the slightest bit better.
At the same time, Iām genuinely thrilled that thatās a thing at least somewhere. Jealousy notwithstanding, Iām intensely happy for areas that arenāt actively hostile to non-car transit. It all has to start somewhere to prove it works. Trickle-down solarpunk :p
Fairy sure that you're seeing a bicycle only intersection. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but zero cars is not plausible, not even in Holland.
This is one of the busiest bike intersections in Utrecht. It is right by the central train station. When the camera pans right, you can see the exterior of the amazing bike parking structure that sits under the plaza in front of the station and shopping mall.
Just 100 meters further this same traffic has to cross with public transport and cars, it's mayhem there. But hardly any accidents. Just a lot of impatient cyclist. Source: It's on my daily commute
Obligatory pedantic correction: this is in the Utrecht region in the Netherlands (same name as the city). So neither South nor North Holland in this case.
This looks hilarious but its real. I've seen it with my own eyes. By the way, you see a red colored sidewalk, you get off of that thing unless you want to get run over by bikes.
To an outsider like me. Its hilarious because you've never seen so many people trying to get somewhere on a bike. Specially when its winter and they get icicles on their face. But also when many are dressed like executives at some large corp while riding comfort bikes in the sitting up straight position.
Here in the us people ride bikes to exercise and have absolutely no heading or reason other than that. In Mexico people side their bikes from work if their old or poor or both. They ride slowly for pleasure, just to not have to walk after a long day. Whistling, looking at women walking because women don't ride bikes, machismo. Its traditional. The bikes are old and are quickly becoming replaced by 2cycle mopeds, which women do ride a lot. Tons and tons of mopeds along with tons of moped accidents. So a bunch of people riding bikes, not wearing spandex or helmets, or wearing helmets and a suit, on special roads to get somewhere useful that's on the hilarious end of things. Because its weird and different.
To me, an european but not Dutch it's uncommon to see so many people on bikes, but other than that it's perfectly ordinary. I'm just a bit jealous of the fact that there's no snow on their bike paths
So is this a poor country? Makes me thankful that I live in America where even I can afford my 10 year $1,850/mo 25% APR used 2017 sedan with only 200,000 miles on the meter and no warranty.
I threw up all over my lifted F150 and had to pull over watching this. How do these people get anything done? What if they needed to take a toilet home or a grill?
Really? I did a quick look a while back and it seemed pretty lenient in comparison to America and Canada, don't know if I missed something tho, but the only thing that was really restricting that I recall was getting paid enough, which can be difficult, but it's not like Canada's and the USA's many many restrictions and hoops you gotta jump through
We had looked into it several years ago; my friends had thought it would be nice to raise children there and were looking to "escape" the first Trump presidency.
If you plan to work there, you'll need an in-country sponsor and a job lined up before you arrive. Typically you'll need to be working in a super-educated niche position (holding a doctorate in some specialty). The immigration authorities will investigate and if they determine the position cannot possibly be filled by a Dutch candidate, they'll issue a long-term visa. As long as you remain employed, they'll renew the visa.
Alternatively, you can apply as an "investor." If you have several million dollars to invest into a Dutch business venture, they will let you in. You will still need an in-country sponsor, and you have one year to make the business successful. If the business continues operating they will renew your visa.
You may also "buy in" if you don't plan to work there: If you can prove a few million in liquid cash and that you have the means to sustain yourself for years to come, then they will grant a long-term visa. If the money runs out however then the visa will be revoked.
Finally you can marry in. If you marry a Dutch citizen then you will be issued a provisional visa. Immigration authorities will investigate the marriage and if they are convinced it's legitimate after a year, you'll be issued a long-term visa.
One thing to note about all of these is that they result in a "long-term visa." These can be revoked at any time if you run afoul of regulations or fall outside the criteria and conditions above.
So it's not impossible to move there, but the bar is set pretty high.
They are a thing. But most people are gonna ride a beater that if it gets stolen, no big deal. ebikes in particular are a big target for theft, especially the shitty fat tire ones. In fact, ebikes are becoming a bit of a nuisance because of the speed difference between them and regular bikes. In Amsterdam, we already force the mopeds (ICE or electric) to be on the street with the cars. And the city will vote soon to ban the fat tire ebikes from Vondelpark because of the nuisance they cause among heavy mixed traffic. There have been complaints to the city that older people don't feel safe on the fietspad any more because of the big speed difference and I agree with them. The fietspad should be for everyone, not only the fastest.
That makes sense. I never understood the popularity of fat tire ebikes. They are much heavier than regular bikes and therefore don't hold a charge as long.
Every bike in The Netherlands is automatically equipped with a radio locked on a communist radio station frequency with a loud speaker which cannot be turned off. If the police find you with the radio off or not loud enough, you will be sent to the Gulag called Urk where you will be forced to produce stroopwafels for the glory of the workers!
Healthcare isn't free sadly. I pay 180 insurance fees monthly and have to pay max 385 own-risk per year when I need care. Which I go through every January. But at least most is covered and it includes basic dental (add-on, not standard).
If one isnāt racing, trail riding, or riding on a road with cars, it really isnāt particularly dangerous. Better to have everybody on bikes with no helmets than nobody on bikes.
A trampoline is also not particularly dangerous, but it can be.
The Dutch take safety more seriously than the west, and they've decided not to mandate helmets. It's not like they made that decision by flipping a stroopwafel.
Looking at what Oulu accomplishes, even snowy and icy climates aren't really a cause for mandating helmets. It's primarily a question of whether or not a place has sufficient or insufficient cycling infrastructure and maintenance.
Oulu packs its pathways with snow that is suitable to walk and ride on, and as a result only sees ridership dip of 20% at temperatures below -20C. In the videos I've seen, there are more helmets there than in this clip of the Netherlands, but not by much.
That said, my ski helmet is much warmer than any hat I own and just for warmth alone I wouldn't ride without it in the winter time.
This happens naturally where I live without having to pack anything, still helmets are just smart. If you have a lapse of judgement, or someone else cuts a corner around a tunnel or something, you collide, you can get some pretty serious head trauma, snow or no snow. I could suddenly have a stroke and fall into someone. Any old shit can happen. š«¤ Wearing a helmet is a good thing, is just my point. No harm can come of it.
Well, sure it can; just like drinking water, walking to work, or taking a dump. But it isnāt dangerous enough to warrant wearing a helmet in the view of many. And anything that discourages cycling has a cost as well.
Those things you listed are surely safer than traveling at relatively high speeds with an unprotected cranium, especially in such a crowded place as this. Perhaps the "walking to work" is debatable. š Sometimes "in the view of many" isn't the smartest or safest thing, eh.
All I'm saying is, I would wear a helmet. I wear a helmet regardless of where I'm biking. You never know if you suddenly have an aneurysm and just fall head first into the pavement. Shit happens. š¤·āāļø
I support that. I generally wear a helmet too, but I think it is good to recognize that per km cycled the incidence of severe head injury on isolated bike infrastructure is pretty low. But of course wearing a helmet is going to make that even lower, which is good. I just think more people on bikes is even better for humanity, helmets or not.
Definitely, I'm not debating more people on bikes is bad, I agree it's good. Just surprised at how few are wearing helmets. š Even adults.
Our city is quite hilly though so we get up to higher speeds sometimes, perhaps. And e-bikes are a common thing now as well, which increases the braking distance ever so slightly. I see quite a large share of helmet wearing bikers here, in comparison. At least during winter.
you are right to wear a helmet. It is safer.
But you might aswell have an aneurysm walking down the stairs and bump your head. With the speeds we see in the video, i think that is comparable.
The point is: most dangerous for a cyclist by far is the car. Once you have your own lane, everything becomes optional.
I would like to see the statistics as well, but I would guess they would be lower because bike-bike incidents are more common that bike-motorvehicle incidents, and would be at lower speeds.
correct. By far the biggest death rate is always car/truck related: car-car; car-bike; car-pedestrians and so on.
While it is safer for cyclists to wear a helmet, this recommendation is always blown up to the max by car-propaganda, especially when there is yet another car-bike accident. Never forget how heavy and fast cars get and compare that to the video above
Most traffic deaths are cyclists, but only 42% of those died from a collision with a car. I'm not sure if heavy trucks are included, it might not and that would explain a lot, but even then 31% died without a collision.
That is an interesting article, i was looking for more info like that. It says bove 60, it is mostly a fatal bike-related crash, but below 60 it is mostly a car-related crash.
We do get just a little muddy snow or smalle ice spots in winter. But what mostly kills, lacking a helmet, is when an old drunk falls backwards off his bike, cracking his skull. Or the regular getting run over by a heavy vehicle
The mixed zones (at least in Rotterdam) are anything but great, at least for the pedestrians. If you look up "reckless" in the dictionary, you'll probably find bikers with thermo boxes. Woe to you if you don't jump aside when they come flying.
Yeah not on the same levelā¦ not diminishing the importance of biking in the context of transportation but if you ever went to the Netherlands and Switzerland you honestly cannot say they are on the same levelā¦
you honestly cannot say they are on the same levelā¦
no, i really didn't mean same level. Just want to point out that the nice bike traffic we see is not the result of a flat country, but of good infrastructure.
Sure, flat helps. But so do summer, ebikes etc.
Because itās a flat country every single person has been using bikes for as long as I remember every fucking where from cities to bumfuck nowhere.
Itās important to acknowledge that, they had a huge advantage and thus itās not comparable with other places that might, very locally and recently, have vaguely similar abundance of bikes in the middle of giant mountains.
And, because of this history, they have indeed a wonderfully adapted infrastructure in which I donāt fear for my life every time I bike there.
That's on top. I know the Netherlands city traffic mostly from Rotterdam, and there bikers are actually a pest. They consider signs, traffic lights, and the laws as pure decoration, to be ignored at will. The only other traffic member they actually seem to respect is the tram. Woe to any pedestrian in a pedestrian zone not jumping aside!
Iād hate living in Utrecht. I prefer using my feet and taking the train. Iāve always hated riding bikes and thought it was strange when adults did it. Thereās something childish about them. Kids ride bikes until they get a job and get a car.
This brought up a memory. I rejected a guy when I was in my late teens because he wanted me to jump on his bike so that he could take me someplace. I told him Iād just walk there.
Utrecht and Amsterdam are perfect with public transport. Really the best cities i know outside of Japan.
You prefer walking and taking the train? You could love living in Utrecht even without a bike.
Walking is fine in the video above. Image this traffic but with cars. Would that help crossing the lane?
As long as you don't just dart out onto the street, you can likely just cross the street without issue. I'd probably be looking to try to time it, but I have a feeling that you'd be fine just from the bikers' desire to not collide with anyone, plus their higher maneuverability and lower speed compared to cars.
Even in this video, you see people who are turning doing so without colliding with those who are going straight, despite the intersection being completely uncontrolled and no one being obligated to stop. Managing that is more difficult than just avoiding pedestrians, assuming the pedestrians move predictably and in good faith.
Honestly to some of us this looks like a nightmare. I rather chop of my feet and die in one place than ride a bike, i fucking hate riding bikes. Also, guess Iāll grab my 500lb tool kit and head to work on my bike, gotta throw the kids on my back and drop em off at school on the way.
Edit: stop using bikes to sanitize the Dutch, colonizer trash
That is fine. You can drive a car if that is what you mean. That is the beauty of all this: you can get to anywhere with your car, but you are not forced to, anymore. So many people take their bikes, which leaves a lot of rooms for car drivers who really need it.
Thatās great to know, people on Lemmy want to force you to ride a bike . I personally hate to ride bikes, I hate them with a passion, I just donāt like bikes or scooters etc personally. So telling me I have to cycle to work is torture.
Thereās also people with disabilities and health issues and elderly people etc. but on Lemmy itās like āno fuck you, ride a bikeā
well good thing in the Netherlands primary schools are at walking distance for people that live in the city. And once they go to high school kids are old enough to ride their own bike or take the bus to school. Also cargo bikes are a thing.
Who said everyone? Strawman!
Imagine the usual traffic jam you sit in because everybody needs to have a car.
Now compare that to you driving a car and many others are on bikes on their own lane and in the tram. There are fewer cars in your way. Isn't that better for you?
well then drive a fucking car. It's not like the Netherlands is devoid of infrastructure for cars. Imagine if all these people in the video would drive a car instead of taking the bike then you wouldn't like driving either.
Exactly, you refuse to understand that bikes are only practical for a small group of people. If youāre disabled fuck you, if youāre old fuck you, if you have a heart condition fuck you, take your bike and like it!
Thats the thing with biking, at that speed you dont need signals or anything. People will just figure it out.
And accidents are rarely fatal.
As long as you wear a helmet.
Helmets are promoted in North America so that when a car kills a cyclist they can blame it on the cyclist if they aren't wearing a helmet instead of blaming it on the shitty cycling infrastructure.
These are bikes only, very low speed interactions. The sort where if you do bump into someone, it's just a foot on the ground at worst.
Landing on your head at low speeds is still very dangerous. A helmet is not a bad idea.
Doesnāt even have to be low speed. David Hookes took a fall in an altercation with a bouncer and hit his head, leading to his death. It was used as a warning to guys like me of how easily a āminorā head injury can be deadly. Not to mention the horror stories I get from my mother, a nurse, of kids receiving life long head trauma because they were too cool to wear protection.
Wear a helmet.
Times are changing though. These days there are loads of annoying kids on fatbikes. Often they go faster than allowed while these kids are even a danger to themselves and others while walking. There's a step rise in accidents but due to the laws they can't do much about it as they fall into the category of bike instead of scooter or moped. Now there's a minimum age (14 I think?) for fatbikes but that barily works preventing accidents. Now with the rise of e-bikes the average cycling speed is also increased which is something everyone needs to adjust to. Drivers too, as cyclists are sooner at an intersection as they used to be. This also causes accidents. This is how I broke my collarbone because a driver thought he had enough time to cross the cycling path but this caused me to crash into him with 25km/h. Without helmets the chance of serious head injuries is greatly increased with speeds of 25km/h. And there are many fatbikes going 45km/h.
Not really that necessary in NL. Most people are cruising the city at 18-20kph. The fietsers on the ebikes obviously go faster, but in heavy traffic, you're not gonna go full speed anyhow.
This is just wrong, head injuries are very common in the Netherlands. https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/jun/16/the-brain-is-very-vulnerable-dutch-cyclists-urged-to-wear-helmets-as-road-deaths-rise
Just wear a fucking helmet, looking like a dweeb is better than brain damage.
FTA:
Seems like a soft position from Fiestersbond and for good reason. I read your article and then followed the sources and looked up the actual numbers. And you need to STFU with your helmet opinion and actually think about the articles you read/link and their sources. According to the same links sourced in the article(!), the CBS says in 2023, people here in NL over the age of six (roughly 15-16m people) traveled over 1000km each by bike in the year. So just shy of 3km a day by bike. Millions upon millions of trips per fucking year. How many of those millions of trips resulted in a crash? 120k. Wow, that seems like a lot doesn't it? How many people cycle on any given day? According to wikipedia, which cites a EU travel report, 36%. So 5.4m-ish people, making at least one trip per day makes it almost 2 billion trips over an entire fuckin year (5.4m * 365 == 1.97b). So, of those 2 billion trips, we have 120k crashes. Which is... hold on, let me paste it from the calculator because it has so many fucking zeros: 0.000060882800609.
Now, let's do some math. How likely is it that you will be in a crash in a given year?
No-crash probability per trip:
1ā0.00006=0.99994.
Annual no-crash probability (365 trips):
(0.99994)^365ā0.9783.
Annual crash probability:
1ā0.9783=0.0217 or 2.17%.
So a 1 in 46 chance of being in a crash in a given year from cycling one trip every day and of those crashes, less than half are serious. Over my 1000km I cycle. Get the fuck outta here with "very common" from your shit article.
Firstly your numbers are wrong, you need double the number of trips (itās at least 2 just for commuting). So letās say 5% chance over your lifetime. And that number is increasing because of the reasons mentioned in the article.
Secondly just cause itās more likely than not youāll never get a crash doesnāt mean you have to be a dumbass and not wear a helmet. Is it really that difficult to take a little bit of precaution for something with a 5% chance of happening sometime in your lifetime? Seems like a no brainer to me.
So you get out of here with your self-destructive attitude. Wearing helmets saves lives.
encouraging people to ride bikes with or without a helmet saves more lives. Cars are the real danger, even with a helmet.
At least my hair will look good while I have brain damage
I don't live there, but I've often heard that the common rationale for not wearing a helmet is that bike-bike or bike-human accidents usually don't result in head injuries. Usually, it is a bike-car accident that can result in head injuries, and if you get hit by a car at speed then you have other issues.
You are correct either way, but the problem wouldn't be as bad if bike lanes are completely separated from cars. I do not have a source, but I'd assume that places like 's-Hertogenbosch, Houten and Utrecht have less head injuries due to the better (completely separated from cars) bike infrastructure compared to Amsterdam or Rotterdam.
Like the commenter you're up against, most Dutch people are very feral when wearing a helmet on a bike is concerned. Everyone considers themselves a master of biking and therefore impervious to damage.
Opinions claiming otherwise are very toxicly brushed aside. Even though numbers increase, specially with electric bikes becoming more common.
It's the darker side of our bike prowess.
They actually found that both cyclists and drivers tend to take more risks when helmets are abundant, which in turn leads to more serious accidents instead of fewer.
Moreover the Netherlands don't have comparatively more head injuries each year than more car-centric countries, suggesting that cycling doesn't contribute that much overall.
And most injuries tend to happen to old people. Drop the 60+ bracket and suddenly head injuries from cycling drops to an inconsequential number.
My experience when wearing a bike helmet in NL is that car drivers seem to take more risks with my safety, they drive closer to me than I normally experience, and I feel less safe than when I'm not wearing a helmet.
But yes, dain bramage would be worse. And yes, an accident hides in small corners, but I'm not sure if wearing a helmet makes me safer, even on our streets.
Nah im not gonna carry a liter of foam around to cut a 10^-5 chance in third, you do you of course, but this risk is small enough and the inconvenience of carrying around a helmet is large enogh for me to not care for cycling as transportation.
I find the fear mongering around this topic to be supremely annoying. Just let adults ride their bikes however they want. If you try to get your child, employee, or participants in a sporting event to wear a helmet, that's completely reasonable. But assuming the vast majority of dutch cyclists to be idiots for cycling without a helmet is just asinine.
Everyone seeing cycling as a normal mode of transport is never gonna work if everyone is scared of cycling to the point of never considering it without a helmet. Mandatory helmet laws seem to be one of the most effective measures to discourage cycling, so don't try to make a bike culture that effectively acts like one.
See what happens when you don't wear a helmet?
Cyclists are the worst where I live, they have zero respect for pedestrians. The city spent millions on bike lanes and these fucks will zip past you and your toddlers on the sidewalk, they never wear helmets, they donāt know any road laws, anyways this would be a nightmare in my city
this is exactly anti-bicylce-propaganda. There are by far more deadly accidents involving cars and trucks than involving bikes and pedestrians. You are afraid of the wrong thing. Also you are describing the results of car focused infrastructure, that hasn't been effectively planned for cyclists nor pedestrians. The dutch people are not much different than you or me, they just made the infrastructure right and assimilated it over the years. The close calls you are describing look harmless in the video, when you realize that even if there were an accident, not much would happen. But we still get many car-related deaths. Do you see what i mean?
Which city are you in and what does the car infrastructure look like in the street you are describing?
Telling people that their personal experiences are propaganda is the fastest way to make them hate your cause even more
Some people put those fears into your head to create a divide between us. They want you to see close calls with cyclists and be mad about it. So that you don't see this:
If you hate my cause because i called out that your feelings are fueled by propaganda, the die was loaded from the start. Propaganda uses hate. I bet you are not telling me the city you are describing because it is a car infested hell with one ineffective bike lane.
Vehicular Cyclists, or Middle-Aged Men In Lycra, or MAMILs, will set that standard.
These aren't MAMILs. These are people who just want to use the most convenient way of getting around in a place where cycling is considered a valid answer to that question.
there will always be bad and good examples in all the groups. You can't blame an entire group. I know a couple of MAMILs and they are all very careful, friendly riders.
Would you be comfortable sharing the lane with things that outweigh and outrun you by two orders of magnitude, where a forgettable bump for them would probably be your death, and where at best there's a chance they might not notice or see you in a decent frame of time, at worst they'll actively try to hurt you. I'd hate to cycle in such an environment.
Vehicular Cycling is the Dark Souls of cycling. Dutch cycling, or Practical Cycling as I'd prefer to call it, is more the Animal Crossing of cycling.
There are probably more people moving unhindered through this short video than you see in an average traffic jam photo.
yes, people counted and compared. This plus trams has waaay more throughput than a usual car intersection. Check out not just bikes video on that topic with various combinations and graphs, and get mad at car infrastructure with us!
Oh yeah no Iāve been in that camp for a long while. Iām actively furious that my state had an approved plan for high speed rail like 15 years ago connecting all the major cities in the area, and connecting to the national line. And then some asshole republican came in and scrapped it even though it was already fully funded and ready to go.
It would be active right now if that hadnāt happened. Instead I have to drive 2.5 hrs to see my friend, 2 hours to go to my specialist doctor, and the same 2 hours in the opposite direction to get to the national line. All of those trips were supposed to be under 45 min on the train.
So so fucking salty about it. I fucking hate driving. I hate having to pay to maintain a vehicle. I hate that car infrastructure means walking is almost impossible. Iād love to ride a bike or bus locally, but the infrastructure doesnāt sufficiently exist for either to be practical in my area (Iām not riding my bike on the road. People here would actively try to kill me.)
I am sorry about that. My place isn't perfect either and we get a couple of deaths every year. Cycling isn't accepted by all car drivers, but it is a normal concept anyway.
But i am happy not to live in the USA for example.
Thanks :) I see other countries and how they accommodate people who canāt or wonāt or donāt want to drive, and I seriously die a bit inside because solarpunk could be everywhere, it could have, and should have, been here! And instead itās only places I can never live (too disabled and/or unskilled to emigrate) with the places I can live being wildly opposed to making life even the slightest bit better.
At the same time, Iām genuinely thrilled that thatās a thing at least somewhere. Jealousy notwithstanding, Iām intensely happy for areas that arenāt actively hostile to non-car transit. It all has to start somewhere to prove it works. Trickle-down solarpunk :p
And many more mildly hindered, but in a way which is easily and safely resolvable while maintaining flow
See, this is why you shouldnāt encourage bikes. That street looks totally unusable! š¤š¤š¤ššš¦ š±š·
With so many bikes it's going to make it impossible for cars to go through quickly! reeeeee!
True Liberian here
Leave Liberia out of this :)
classic public service inefficiency. If they made the lanes a little wider cars could drive here too. But of course they forgot that.
It's so quiet. š„¹
As NotJustBikes pointed out multiple times, we have the idea that cities are loud, but it's actually cars that are loud.
i hear people talk and laugh. That is what i want a busy street to be like.
Kind of eerie
Hey that's me! I see myself cycling xD
Hi Me!
Hi This Guy!
It's so beautiful.
Fairy sure that you're seeing a bicycle only intersection. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but zero cars is not plausible, not even in Holland.
Source: I lived there for a decade and I've also been watching Not Just Bikes on YouTube: https://youtube.com/@NotJustBikes
This is one of the busiest bike intersections in Utrecht. It is right by the central train station. When the camera pans right, you can see the exterior of the amazing bike parking structure that sits under the plaza in front of the station and shopping mall.
Just 100 meters further this same traffic has to cross with public transport and cars, it's mayhem there. But hardly any accidents. Just a lot of impatient cyclist. Source: It's on my daily commute
Obligatory pedantic correction: this is in the Utrecht region in the Netherlands (same name as the city). So neither South nor North Holland in this case.
Er is er altijd wel eentje ..
Had to ^_^
This looks hilarious but its real. I've seen it with my own eyes. By the way, you see a red colored sidewalk, you get off of that thing unless you want to get run over by bikes.
What's hilarious about it?
To an outsider like me. Its hilarious because you've never seen so many people trying to get somewhere on a bike. Specially when its winter and they get icicles on their face. But also when many are dressed like executives at some large corp while riding comfort bikes in the sitting up straight position.
Here in the us people ride bikes to exercise and have absolutely no heading or reason other than that. In Mexico people side their bikes from work if their old or poor or both. They ride slowly for pleasure, just to not have to walk after a long day. Whistling, looking at women walking because women don't ride bikes, machismo. Its traditional. The bikes are old and are quickly becoming replaced by 2cycle mopeds, which women do ride a lot. Tons and tons of mopeds along with tons of moped accidents. So a bunch of people riding bikes, not wearing spandex or helmets, or wearing helmets and a suit, on special roads to get somewhere useful that's on the hilarious end of things. Because its weird and different.
To me, an european but not Dutch it's uncommon to see so many people on bikes, but other than that it's perfectly ordinary. I'm just a bit jealous of the fact that there's no snow on their bike paths
Or nails....bikes remove nails.
So is this a poor country? Makes me thankful that I live in America where even I can afford my 10 year $1,850/mo 25% APR used 2017 sedan with only 200,000 miles on the meter and no warranty.
š I cannot phatom how insanely stereotypic american this comment is lol. Trying to legitimate your own ball and chain without realizing it.
Remember, all sarcastic comments always come with a
/sat the endI threw up all over my lifted F150 and had to pull over watching this. How do these people get anything done? What if they needed to take a toilet home or a grill?
Sometimes I wonder if I should move to the Netherlands.
Unfortunately, they likely won't have you. I've looked into it; their immigration policies are quite restrictive. :(
Really? I did a quick look a while back and it seemed pretty lenient in comparison to America and Canada, don't know if I missed something tho, but the only thing that was really restricting that I recall was getting paid enough, which can be difficult, but it's not like Canada's and the USA's many many restrictions and hoops you gotta jump through
We had looked into it several years ago; my friends had thought it would be nice to raise children there and were looking to "escape" the first Trump presidency.
If you plan to work there, you'll need an in-country sponsor and a job lined up before you arrive. Typically you'll need to be working in a super-educated niche position (holding a doctorate in some specialty). The immigration authorities will investigate and if they determine the position cannot possibly be filled by a Dutch candidate, they'll issue a long-term visa. As long as you remain employed, they'll renew the visa.
Alternatively, you can apply as an "investor." If you have several million dollars to invest into a Dutch business venture, they will let you in. You will still need an in-country sponsor, and you have one year to make the business successful. If the business continues operating they will renew your visa.
You may also "buy in" if you don't plan to work there: If you can prove a few million in liquid cash and that you have the means to sustain yourself for years to come, then they will grant a long-term visa. If the money runs out however then the visa will be revoked.
Finally you can marry in. If you marry a Dutch citizen then you will be issued a provisional visa. Immigration authorities will investigate the marriage and if they are convinced it's legitimate after a year, you'll be issued a long-term visa.
One thing to note about all of these is that they result in a "long-term visa." These can be revoked at any time if you run afoul of regulations or fall outside the criteria and conditions above.
So it's not impossible to move there, but the bar is set pretty high.
I see! I somehow missed the other criteria for a job! So they are just as difficult as Canada, that's a complication
For a second, I thought this was b-roll for NotJustBike's channel š
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC0intLFzLaudFG-xAvUEO-A
Are ebikes not a thing in the Netherlands?
They are a thing. But most people are gonna ride a beater that if it gets stolen, no big deal. ebikes in particular are a big target for theft, especially the shitty fat tire ones. In fact, ebikes are becoming a bit of a nuisance because of the speed difference between them and regular bikes. In Amsterdam, we already force the mopeds (ICE or electric) to be on the street with the cars. And the city will vote soon to ban the fat tire ebikes from Vondelpark because of the nuisance they cause among heavy mixed traffic. There have been complaints to the city that older people don't feel safe on the fietspad any more because of the big speed difference and I agree with them. The fietspad should be for everyone, not only the fastest.
That makes sense. I never understood the popularity of fat tire ebikes. They are much heavier than regular bikes and therefore don't hold a charge as long.
The people who ride them don't want to ride a bicycle. They want to ride a motorcycle that can bypass jammed roads, without license or registration.
Ebikes are less important when you don't have hills to deal with.
You can see some people riding ebikes on the video.
Edit: originally stated that lots of people riding ebikes, but on closer inspection they're less than I originally thought.
Every bike in The Netherlands is automatically equipped with a radio locked on a communist radio station frequency with a loud speaker which cannot be turned off. If the police find you with the radio off or not loud enough, you will be sent to the Gulag called Urk where you will be forced to produce stroopwafels for the glory of the workers!
The only thing the Dutch shoot is Marijuana directly into their veins.
And kaas (cheese)
Healthcare isn't free sadly. I pay 180 insurance fees monthly and have to pay max 385 own-risk per year when I need care. Which I go through every January. But at least most is covered and it includes basic dental (add-on, not standard).
And like [99ā100)% of riders not wearing a helmet. š± What's the accident rate per Capita in this city? And injury severity?
Is it not illegal not to wear a helmet?
If one isnāt racing, trail riding, or riding on a road with cars, it really isnāt particularly dangerous. Better to have everybody on bikes with no helmets than nobody on bikes.
Of course it can be dangerous?
A trampoline is also not particularly dangerous, but it can be.
The Dutch take safety more seriously than the west, and they've decided not to mandate helmets. It's not like they made that decision by flipping a stroopwafel.
I guess the snowy and icy climate where I live caused us to mandate helmets, because our city is very bicycle friendly as well.
Looking at what Oulu accomplishes, even snowy and icy climates aren't really a cause for mandating helmets. It's primarily a question of whether or not a place has sufficient or insufficient cycling infrastructure and maintenance.
Oulu packs its pathways with snow that is suitable to walk and ride on, and as a result only sees ridership dip of 20% at temperatures below -20C. In the videos I've seen, there are more helmets there than in this clip of the Netherlands, but not by much.
That said, my ski helmet is much warmer than any hat I own and just for warmth alone I wouldn't ride without it in the winter time.
This happens naturally where I live without having to pack anything, still helmets are just smart. If you have a lapse of judgement, or someone else cuts a corner around a tunnel or something, you collide, you can get some pretty serious head trauma, snow or no snow. I could suddenly have a stroke and fall into someone. Any old shit can happen. š«¤ Wearing a helmet is a good thing, is just my point. No harm can come of it.
Well, sure it can; just like drinking water, walking to work, or taking a dump. But it isnāt dangerous enough to warrant wearing a helmet in the view of many. And anything that discourages cycling has a cost as well.
Those things you listed are surely safer than traveling at relatively high speeds with an unprotected cranium, especially in such a crowded place as this. Perhaps the "walking to work" is debatable. š Sometimes "in the view of many" isn't the smartest or safest thing, eh.
All I'm saying is, I would wear a helmet. I wear a helmet regardless of where I'm biking. You never know if you suddenly have an aneurysm and just fall head first into the pavement. Shit happens. š¤·āāļø
I support that. I generally wear a helmet too, but I think it is good to recognize that per km cycled the incidence of severe head injury on isolated bike infrastructure is pretty low. But of course wearing a helmet is going to make that even lower, which is good. I just think more people on bikes is even better for humanity, helmets or not.
Definitely, I'm not debating more people on bikes is bad, I agree it's good. Just surprised at how few are wearing helmets. š Even adults.
Our city is quite hilly though so we get up to higher speeds sometimes, perhaps. And e-bikes are a common thing now as well, which increases the braking distance ever so slightly. I see quite a large share of helmet wearing bikers here, in comparison. At least during winter.
you are right to wear a helmet. It is safer. But you might aswell have an aneurysm walking down the stairs and bump your head. With the speeds we see in the video, i think that is comparable.
The point is: most dangerous for a cyclist by far is the car. Once you have your own lane, everything becomes optional.
Cycling is much faster than walking. Strong disagree. I ride my bike probably 30 km/h on average on flat ground. But that's just me, of course.
i never said walking was the same speed as cycling. If you ride 30kmh i strongly recommend a helmet.
What are you disagreeing on? That cars are the bigger danger?
I would like to see the statistics as well, but I would guess they would be lower because bike-bike incidents are more common that bike-motorvehicle incidents, and would be at lower speeds.
correct. By far the biggest death rate is always car/truck related: car-car; car-bike; car-pedestrians and so on.
While it is safer for cyclists to wear a helmet, this recommendation is always blown up to the max by car-propaganda, especially when there is yet another car-bike accident. Never forget how heavy and fast cars get and compare that to the video above
Rider stuck by car. Ride died of head injuries. Rider wasnāt wearing a helmet.
It was the lack of a helmet that killed them, not that they were hit by a car. /s
At least in the Netherlands it seems to be more nuanced than that: https://www.cbs.nl/nl-nl/visualisaties/verkeer-en-vervoer/verkeer/hoeveel-mensen-komen-om-in-het-verkeer-
Most traffic deaths are cyclists, but only 42% of those died from a collision with a car. I'm not sure if heavy trucks are included, it might not and that would explain a lot, but even then 31% died without a collision.
That is an interesting article, i was looking for more info like that. It says bove 60, it is mostly a fatal bike-related crash, but below 60 it is mostly a car-related crash.
Y'all don't live in snowy climates huh. Sometimes all it takes is the one person.
We do get just a little muddy snow or smalle ice spots in winter. But what mostly kills, lacking a helmet, is when an old drunk falls backwards off his bike, cracking his skull. Or the regular getting run over by a heavy vehicle
I mean, why are we only talking about accidents that kill? I don't want to get any kind of head injury, deadly or not.
sure
Absolutely terrifying.
So many bike lights, this cannot be real :)
... in a bike only zone.
Exactly. And the mixed zones are great too.
The mixed zones (at least in Rotterdam) are anything but great, at least for the pedestrians. If you look up "reckless" in the dictionary, you'll probably find bikers with thermo boxes. Woe to you if you don't jump aside when they come flying.
And in a completely flat countryā¦
Bern in Switzerland also has many cyclist, but with hills. With good infrastructure, you get these results regardlesss.
Yeah not on the same levelā¦ not diminishing the importance of biking in the context of transportation but if you ever went to the Netherlands and Switzerland you honestly cannot say they are on the same levelā¦
no, i really didn't mean same level. Just want to point out that the nice bike traffic we see is not the result of a flat country, but of good infrastructure. Sure, flat helps. But so do summer, ebikes etc.
Because itās a flat country every single person has been using bikes for as long as I remember every fucking where from cities to bumfuck nowhere. Itās important to acknowledge that, they had a huge advantage and thus itās not comparable with other places that might, very locally and recently, have vaguely similar abundance of bikes in the middle of giant mountains. And, because of this history, they have indeed a wonderfully adapted infrastructure in which I donāt fear for my life every time I bike there.
That's on top. I know the Netherlands city traffic mostly from Rotterdam, and there bikers are actually a pest. They consider signs, traffic lights, and the laws as pure decoration, to be ignored at will. The only other traffic member they actually seem to respect is the tram. Woe to any pedestrian in a pedestrian zone not jumping aside!
Its funny that Rotterdam is considered to have the worst cycling infrastructure in the Netherlands. Wonder if that is the reason for what you mean.
Even in a city with a good infrastructure, reckless ebikers with thermo boxes on the back do not belong in pedestrian zones.
Iād hate living in Utrecht. I prefer using my feet and taking the train. Iāve always hated riding bikes and thought it was strange when adults did it. Thereās something childish about them. Kids ride bikes until they get a job and get a car.
This brought up a memory. I rejected a guy when I was in my late teens because he wanted me to jump on his bike so that he could take me someplace. I told him Iād just walk there.
Utrecht and Amsterdam are perfect with public transport. Really the best cities i know outside of Japan. You prefer walking and taking the train? You could love living in Utrecht even without a bike.
Walking is fine in the video above. Image this traffic but with cars. Would that help crossing the lane?
Youād try to cross the lane here?? Really? It looks really dangerous with so many bikes close together. I hope there are frequent red lights.
As long as you don't just dart out onto the street, you can likely just cross the street without issue. I'd probably be looking to try to time it, but I have a feeling that you'd be fine just from the bikers' desire to not collide with anyone, plus their higher maneuverability and lower speed compared to cars.
Even in this video, you see people who are turning doing so without colliding with those who are going straight, despite the intersection being completely uncontrolled and no one being obligated to stop. Managing that is more difficult than just avoiding pedestrians, assuming the pedestrians move predictably and in good faith.
you see pedestrians crossing there. But you wouldn't see people crossing a street with that much car traffic.
I get that it is hard to imagine but as soon as you get used to this, you'll realize there is much less danger in the video than it might seem
It reminds me of Asian countries where people cross the street with cars that go like that.
Don't worry! No cars here.
Lmao
There is something childish this line of thinking.
Honestly to some of us this looks like a nightmare. I rather chop of my feet and die in one place than ride a bike, i fucking hate riding bikes. Also, guess Iāll grab my 500lb tool kit and head to work on my bike, gotta throw the kids on my back and drop em off at school on the way.
Edit: stop using bikes to sanitize the Dutch, colonizer trash
That is fine. You can drive a car if that is what you mean. That is the beauty of all this: you can get to anywhere with your car, but you are not forced to, anymore. So many people take their bikes, which leaves a lot of rooms for car drivers who really need it.
Thatās great to know, people on Lemmy want to force you to ride a bike . I personally hate to ride bikes, I hate them with a passion, I just donāt like bikes or scooters etc personally. So telling me I have to cycle to work is torture.
Thereās also people with disabilities and health issues and elderly people etc. but on Lemmy itās like āno fuck you, ride a bikeā
But nobody here is forcing anyone. I just said you can drive a car. Where is the problem?
well good thing in the Netherlands primary schools are at walking distance for people that live in the city. And once they go to high school kids are old enough to ride their own bike or take the bus to school. Also cargo bikes are a thing.
Don't forget that gravity in the Netherlands is 1/10th of the gravity in Murica, so their tool kits are not as hard to carry...
Or perhaps gravity is the same and they found a way around it?... no, gravity is less I am sure
What if I hate bikes? Or if Iām disabled? Riding a bike isnt for everyone
Who said everyone? Strawman! Imagine the usual traffic jam you sit in because everybody needs to have a car.
Now compare that to you driving a car and many others are on bikes on their own lane and in the tram. There are fewer cars in your way. Isn't that better for you?
well then drive a fucking car. It's not like the Netherlands is devoid of infrastructure for cars. Imagine if all these people in the video would drive a car instead of taking the bike then you wouldn't like driving either.
All this thread is telling me is that the Dutch and cyclists are intolerant assholes, Iāll steer clear
why are you insulting? I wasn't insulting you!
The thing is, you don't need to drop off the kids at school because they can go there themselves on their bike.
Iāll toss my toddler on a bike and send em off on their own!
^ this is what it looks when people just don't want to understand
Exactly, you refuse to understand that bikes are only practical for a small group of people. If youāre disabled fuck you, if youāre old fuck you, if you have a heart condition fuck you, take your bike and like it!
no, you refuse to see the outside of your colon
nobody is saying bikes or deathā¦ if more people use bikes, those that HAVE to use cars benefit too
you are like the idiots that say medical equipment would suffer if we ban plastic straws