ny times helmet article

I received an email forward of this article in the New York Times about the town of Milton, WA, which is dropping its helmet laws to reduce their risk of lawsuit and liability. (Link is to NT Times, which is a good source, but their online-access rules are a bit Byzantine; it's not your fault if you can't get in.)

From the article:

For 15 years, until June 1, Milton, population 7,000, 45 minutes south of Seattle, required helmets for all bicyclists and skateboarders. But with its 12-officer police force stressed by an increase in domestic violence, alcohol abuse and property crime, all of which surged through the recession, law enforcement priorities now go way beyond hectoring people about their headgear.

And an inability to enforce a law on the books, the town’s insurance consultant argued, created administrative unevenness that — in the event of an accident by someone who was not nagged or cited about helmet use — posed a liability risk that could bankrupt the community with one swipe from a punitive-minded jury.

The article goes on:

Milton’s decision on helmets has also tapped into an old and divisive debate in the broader bicycling community about how best to get people out of their cars and onto saddles.

Some bike advocacy groups in fact oppose helmet laws for adults and have applauded Milton’s new path. They say the focus must be on pushing communities to create safer biking conditions through more bike lanes and trails, car speed-limit reductions and other measures, and that helmet laws put the onus on bikers to be safe, letting cities off the hook in making safer terrain. For both sides, though, it comes back to money.

“Is it worth passing something that you’re not going to enforce?” said Andy Clarke, the president of the League of American Bicyclists, one of the nation’s oldest biking advocacy groups, which has maintained neutrality on the helmet law debate. “That’s a responsible question to ask, especially in this day and age when the role of government is questioned at every turn,” added Mr. Clarke, who says he sometimes goes bareheaded.

I "replied all" with an email that included this:

Noted. It should also be noted, as Grant Petersen points out in his new book, Just Ride, that there are two other points about helmets: first, that in many cases helmet laws actually reduce riding (either because they're a pain, or they're too dorky, or they cause helmet hair, or people just object to being told they have to wear helmets when they ride); and second, that there is evidence that people actually are more careful riders, AND get more deference from drivers, when they DON'T wear helmets.  It's anathema and blasphemy to say such things, I'm sure, but to a certain extent, we wear helmets because those around us do, or because they're required, or because we feel like we ought to. Even if riding with helmets is five times safer than riding without (and the numbers are nowhere near that high)... how many of us actually change behavior based on research?

After all, in the article quoted, the president of the League of American Bicyclists admits he rides without a helmet sometimes.

As for me, I invariably wear a helmet on club rides, sometimes wear it and sometimes not when I'm riding the fast bike on my own, and generally don't wear it on the commuter bike (on which I usually wear street clothes).