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As an American, whenever I see articles about Dutch cycling culture, the thing that stands out to me is that nobody is wearing helmets. In the US, I wouldn't d

As an American, whenever I see articles about Dutch cycling culture, the thing that stands out to me is that nobody is wearing helmets. In the US, I wouldn't dream of doing that - it's just too dangerous, because there's too much risk of being involved in a high speed collision. But, after having spent some time in the Netherlands, it's come to feel like a minor injustice every time I put my helmet on. It's a little reminder of how, in the US and much the rest of the world, we have blithely turned our public right-of-way into a space that's fundamentally dangerous for humans to be in.

soared 8y ago
I believe in countries/cities like these its safer to not use a helmet. Drivers see that your being unsafe and give you much more room and are more aware of you. Less accidents and less deaths in total by not wearing a helmet! I couldn't find the study that was posted on hn, but there are lots of articles.
- gowld 8y ago
  It's complicated. https://bigthink.com/neurobonkers/the-bike-helmet-paradox https://bigthink.com/neurobonkers/the-bike-helmet-paradox The short answer is, "wear a helmet if you have one, and try to get one, but if you don't have one, you should still bike anyway."
  - askmike 8y ago
    Not in the Netherlands, see the article ;)
- Scarblac 8y ago
  Also making it mandatory to wear a helmet means fewer people use bicycles, so fewer people get the health benefits of cycling.
- snarfybarfy 8y ago
  I also remember reading this. I think even safer (i.e. drivers keep more distance while overtaking) than no helmet was pretending to be female by wearing a wig with long hair.
watwut 8y ago
Helmet does not help in high speed crash with car and is not designed for it. It helps in small falls.
- drb91 8y ago
  Absolutely not true. Concussions are always a threat, and a helmet provides limited protection even in a high speed collision.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - walshemj 8y ago
    From experience I came off in London at slow speed an definitely had concussion that night. I still managed to walk to train station with the bike which had a puncture - only in the morning when I got up did I notice I had dried blood all down one side of my head
  - ams6110 8y ago
    Helmets have limited ability to prevent concussion. What they do help prevent is cracking your skull or scraping your scalp off.
- bunderbunder 8y ago
  I've seen that stated many times. As far as I can tell, it traces back to a news article that did fun things like cherry picking individual observations from a study to support a claim even though the study's overall findings were contradictory. My own sense is that the science seems pretty clear that, provided you are in a wreck, wearing a helmet greatly reduces your risk of serious injury and death. Helmets aren't perfect, and they may primarily be designed for lower-engery impacts, but even insufficient energy dissipation is better than zero energy dissipation. There's a secondary claim that not wearing a helmet results in safer behavior than wearing one, and that outweighs any potential benefit. I'm not aware of any quality research to back that claim, and you'd never be able to get a study to pin the question down past an institutional review board, so I'm inclined to say that cuts very close to what we called a fundamentally unanswerable question back in my class on experiment design. (Well, actually we used the acronym most the time. ^_^ ) My personal sense is to think that expecting your garden variety distracted, chronically fatigued, or nonzero BAC driver to notice whether you're wearing a helmet in the first place, let alone modify their behavior accordingly, is giving them more credit than they've earned.
kazinator 8y ago
Note that in the USA, it's possible to see children in a playground wearing helmets.
- digi_owl 8y ago
  An idea that, thanks to US mass media exports, seems to be spreading to other parts of the world...
- ebikelaw 8y ago
  That's something nobody should ever do, because the danger of being strangled is significant. https://helmets.org/playgrou.htm https://helmets.org/playgrou.htm
  - lucb1e 8y ago
    That URL certainly looks like it didn't make it. For a minute I thought you managed to cut out a part somewhere in the middle but the link works!
    - skrebbel 8y ago
      It's a DOS 8.3 filename :-)
- nradov 8y ago
  Most children you see wearing bike helmets on playgrounds rode their bikes there and just neglected to remove them. There are also a few children with seizure disorders who routinely wear helmets for protection.
KozmoNau7 8y ago
I've broken two helmets over my years of cycling, quite possibly saving me from at least one skull fracture. So a helmet is mandatory to me. However, I don't want it to be mandated by law. That has shown to keep a lot of people from cycling.
- Scarblac 8y ago
  But were you on a racing bike, going at speed? In that situation the Dutch use helmets too. For normal traffic use, people in the Netherlands use bikes where you sit in an upright position, and they don't go very fast (like 15 km/h). You can take quick evasive action away from the road, or put a foot on the ground to prevent a fall. It's hard to imagine breaking a helmet on a non-racing bike here.
  - KozmoNau7 8y ago
    Normal riding, once was on a flat road on an ordinary city bike (saddle ~same height as handlebars, not full tuck like a racer), the other was downhill on a mountain bike (on asphalt). In both cases I flipped over the front, because the front wheel turned perpendicular to the direction of travel. I average around 20-22kph on my 8km commute riding my current bike. It's nothing particularly special, just an 8-speed city bike, and I certainly don't go all-out, I ride at what feels like a comfortable speed for the bike. Biking in Copenhagen, I definitely see a fair share of people on granny bikes dawdling along, they're much more likely to crash due to sudden mechanical failure, or due to inattention from staring at their damn phones. But either way, we're only talking about solo accidents. You can certainly also hit your head against the hood of a car, for instance. Besides, I like wearing the helmet. It concentrates airflow across the top of my head, and it gives me more area to put stickers on.
- jvannistelrooy 8y ago
  I've a funny anecdote about this: I'm Dutch and do my daily commute on my casual bike without a helmet. In the weekends I ride my road bike and wear a helmet. I've once had an accident on my road bike and broke my helmet (along with my collar bone). A few weeks later I went out on my casual bike (not wearing a helmet) to buy a new helmet for my road bike. On my way back, holding the new helmet in my right hand, my steer got tangled up in the helmet and I fell. Undeniable conclusion: Having a helmet with you on a casual bike actually causes accidents!
yiyus 8y ago
Something I frequently see in the Netherlands and surprises me is how some driver parks his car, takes the child from the special seat with two belts, put him into a wood box in the front of his bike, and gets into traffic while checking his phone. I have a friend who takes her three children in a bike because she does not have a big enough car for three children seats.
- jdhawk 8y ago
  Ah, the Bakfiets. Couple of toddlers, the family dog, and some groceries all rolling around in a box.
billfruit 8y ago
But is such casual cycling something uniquely Dutch? How is it different from the cycling culture in China, Vietnam, India or much of the third world?
- salty_biscuits 8y ago
  Put Japan on that list
- lagadu 8y ago
  It's not, the overwhelming majority of cyclists in Denmark don't use helmets either.
- mcv 8y ago
  I know that Denmark is trying hard to overtake Netherland as the best bicycle country in the world. Also, according to some reports[1], there are 9 million bicycles in Beijing alone. [1] Melua (2005)
magduf 8y ago
It's not just high speed that makes helmets useful: you can get a brain injury just falling over when you're stopped, if you hit your head on something hard (like asphalt or concrete, which most roads and sidewalks and curbs tend to be made of). People's bodies simply were not evolved for a concrete environment. Helmets are how we deal with that.
- Doxin 8y ago
  You'd be surprised at how good people are instinctively at not bonking their head on stuff. In an ordinary bike accident -- e.g. swerving for something unexpected, and then falling -- you'll not hit your head on anything. Road rash is no fun either but you're not more likely to hit your head on a bicycle than you are when just walking around.
  - magduf 8y ago
    >In an ordinary bike accident -- e.g. swerving for something unexpected, and then falling -- you'll not hit your head on anything. You can't say that with 100% certainty. There could be a curb there, and you might not catch yourself properly, and hit your head on it. Sorry, but I'm not going to bet my life on your feelings of "how good people are". Putting on a helmet isn't some kind of huge burden; it's no different than wearing a seat belt in a car. >Road rash is no fun either but you're not more likely to hit your head on a bicycle than you are when just walking around. When you're walking around, your head isn't traveling 10-30 mph. The relative likelihood is irrelevant, what's important is velocity.

soared 8y ago

I believe in countries/cities like these its safer to not use a helmet. Drivers see that your being unsafe and give you much more room and are more aware of you. Less accidents and less deaths in total by not wearing a helmet! I couldn't find the study that was posted on hn, but there are lots of articles.

gowld 8y ago
It's complicated. https://bigthink.com/neurobonkers/the-bike-helmet-paradox https://bigthink.com/neurobonkers/the-bike-helmet-paradox The short answer is, "wear a helmet if you have one, and try to get one, but if you don't have one, you should still bike anyway."
- askmike 8y ago
  Not in the Netherlands, see the article ;)
Scarblac 8y ago
Also making it mandatory to wear a helmet means fewer people use bicycles, so fewer people get the health benefits of cycling.
snarfybarfy 8y ago
I also remember reading this. I think even safer (i.e. drivers keep more distance while overtaking) than no helmet was pretending to be female by wearing a wig with long hair.

watwut 8y ago

Helmet does not help in high speed crash with car and is not designed for it. It helps in small falls.

drb91 8y ago
Absolutely not true. Concussions are always a threat, and a helmet provides limited protection even in a high speed collision.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- walshemj 8y ago
  From experience I came off in London at slow speed an definitely had concussion that night. I still managed to walk to train station with the bike which had a puncture - only in the morning when I got up did I notice I had dried blood all down one side of my head
- ams6110 8y ago
  Helmets have limited ability to prevent concussion. What they do help prevent is cracking your skull or scraping your scalp off.
bunderbunder 8y ago
I've seen that stated many times. As far as I can tell, it traces back to a news article that did fun things like cherry picking individual observations from a study to support a claim even though the study's overall findings were contradictory. My own sense is that the science seems pretty clear that, provided you are in a wreck, wearing a helmet greatly reduces your risk of serious injury and death. Helmets aren't perfect, and they may primarily be designed for lower-engery impacts, but even insufficient energy dissipation is better than zero energy dissipation. There's a secondary claim that not wearing a helmet results in safer behavior than wearing one, and that outweighs any potential benefit. I'm not aware of any quality research to back that claim, and you'd never be able to get a study to pin the question down past an institutional review board, so I'm inclined to say that cuts very close to what we called a fundamentally unanswerable question back in my class on experiment design. (Well, actually we used the acronym most the time. ^_^ ) My personal sense is to think that expecting your garden variety distracted, chronically fatigued, or nonzero BAC driver to notice whether you're wearing a helmet in the first place, let alone modify their behavior accordingly, is giving them more credit than they've earned.

kazinator 8y ago

Note that in the USA, it's possible to see children in a playground wearing helmets.

digi_owl 8y ago
An idea that, thanks to US mass media exports, seems to be spreading to other parts of the world...
ebikelaw 8y ago
That's something nobody should ever do, because the danger of being strangled is significant. https://helmets.org/playgrou.htm https://helmets.org/playgrou.htm
- lucb1e 8y ago
  That URL certainly looks like it didn't make it. For a minute I thought you managed to cut out a part somewhere in the middle but the link works!
  - skrebbel 8y ago
    It's a DOS 8.3 filename :-)
nradov 8y ago
Most children you see wearing bike helmets on playgrounds rode their bikes there and just neglected to remove them. There are also a few children with seizure disorders who routinely wear helmets for protection.

KozmoNau7 8y ago

I've broken two helmets over my years of cycling, quite possibly saving me from at least one skull fracture. So a helmet is mandatory to me. However, I don't want it to be mandated by law. That has shown to keep a lot of people from cycling.

Scarblac 8y ago
But were you on a racing bike, going at speed? In that situation the Dutch use helmets too. For normal traffic use, people in the Netherlands use bikes where you sit in an upright position, and they don't go very fast (like 15 km/h). You can take quick evasive action away from the road, or put a foot on the ground to prevent a fall. It's hard to imagine breaking a helmet on a non-racing bike here.
- KozmoNau7 8y ago
  Normal riding, once was on a flat road on an ordinary city bike (saddle ~same height as handlebars, not full tuck like a racer), the other was downhill on a mountain bike (on asphalt). In both cases I flipped over the front, because the front wheel turned perpendicular to the direction of travel. I average around 20-22kph on my 8km commute riding my current bike. It's nothing particularly special, just an 8-speed city bike, and I certainly don't go all-out, I ride at what feels like a comfortable speed for the bike. Biking in Copenhagen, I definitely see a fair share of people on granny bikes dawdling along, they're much more likely to crash due to sudden mechanical failure, or due to inattention from staring at their damn phones. But either way, we're only talking about solo accidents. You can certainly also hit your head against the hood of a car, for instance. Besides, I like wearing the helmet. It concentrates airflow across the top of my head, and it gives me more area to put stickers on.
jvannistelrooy 8y ago
I've a funny anecdote about this: I'm Dutch and do my daily commute on my casual bike without a helmet. In the weekends I ride my road bike and wear a helmet. I've once had an accident on my road bike and broke my helmet (along with my collar bone). A few weeks later I went out on my casual bike (not wearing a helmet) to buy a new helmet for my road bike. On my way back, holding the new helmet in my right hand, my steer got tangled up in the helmet and I fell. Undeniable conclusion: Having a helmet with you on a casual bike actually causes accidents!

yiyus 8y ago

Something I frequently see in the Netherlands and surprises me is how some driver parks his car, takes the child from the special seat with two belts, put him into a wood box in the front of his bike, and gets into traffic while checking his phone. I have a friend who takes her three children in a bike because she does not have a big enough car for three children seats.

jdhawk 8y ago
Ah, the Bakfiets. Couple of toddlers, the family dog, and some groceries all rolling around in a box.

billfruit 8y ago

But is such casual cycling something uniquely Dutch? How is it different from the cycling culture in China, Vietnam, India or much of the third world?

salty_biscuits 8y ago
Put Japan on that list
lagadu 8y ago
It's not, the overwhelming majority of cyclists in Denmark don't use helmets either.
mcv 8y ago
I know that Denmark is trying hard to overtake Netherland as the best bicycle country in the world. Also, according to some reports[1], there are 9 million bicycles in Beijing alone. [1] Melua (2005)

magduf 8y ago

It's not just high speed that makes helmets useful: you can get a brain injury just falling over when you're stopped, if you hit your head on something hard (like asphalt or concrete, which most roads and sidewalks and curbs tend to be made of). People's bodies simply were not evolved for a concrete environment. Helmets are how we deal with that.

Doxin 8y ago
You'd be surprised at how good people are instinctively at not bonking their head on stuff. In an ordinary bike accident -- e.g. swerving for something unexpected, and then falling -- you'll not hit your head on anything. Road rash is no fun either but you're not more likely to hit your head on a bicycle than you are when just walking around.
- magduf 8y ago
  >In an ordinary bike accident -- e.g. swerving for something unexpected, and then falling -- you'll not hit your head on anything. You can't say that with 100% certainty. There could be a curb there, and you might not catch yourself properly, and hit your head on it. Sorry, but I'm not going to bet my life on your feelings of "how good people are". Putting on a helmet isn't some kind of huge burden; it's no different than wearing a seat belt in a car. >Road rash is no fun either but you're not more likely to hit your head on a bicycle than you are when just walking around. When you're walking around, your head isn't traveling 10-30 mph. The relative likelihood is irrelevant, what's important is velocity.