Boston follows the style of anti-smoking campaigns with ads showing a bloodied face to convince cyclists to wear helmets. Does the ad do more to discourage biking or encourage helmet use?

Yep.

Looking forward to seeing PSAs with mutilated children who fell on the playground. Also, various injuries sustained while walking.

Might a helmet offer some protection while riding a bicycle? Sure. But contrary to popular belief, riding a bike is incredibly safe. So what problem is this PSA solving?

by oboe on Oct 16, 2012 9:00 am • link • report

The white light link is broken.

by DAJ on Oct 16, 2012 9:07 am • link • report

No joke- I once met with a resident who asked me to move deer signs because he didn't want them crossing through his lawn. I often reference that occasion in interviews as an example of how one practices tact in formulating a response.

by Bossi on Oct 16, 2012 9:09 am • link • report

So how is the helmet supposed to protect that dudes face anyway?

Maybe they should show mangled bikes like they do mangled cars for anti-texting/drunk driving PSAs. They never show a bloody, mangled body in those.

by drumz on Oct 16, 2012 9:39 am • link • report

If Romney wins, WMATA should be cautious about making too many inaugural SmartTrip cards. None of the Romney supporters I know would ever consider taking public transit. I can see WMATA being stuck with a bunch of cards no one wants to buy.

by Rob on Oct 16, 2012 9:39 am • link • report

I'm confused on how a helmet would have kept that guy from getting what looks like a busted lip. If you're gonna go the gory route, go all out and show his skull cracked open.

by Teyo on Oct 16, 2012 9:46 am • link • report

Jim Graham has proposed legislation to limit complaints about bars to residents living within 400 feet.

Huh? It should be the other way around. People withing 400ft should expect noise. They live next to a bar. It becomes a problem when the bar disrupts life more than 400ft away.

Does the ad do more to discourage biking or encourage helmet use?

We don't need more helmets. We need more safety. The solution to crashes is not to minimize the consequences of a crash, but the elimination of crashes. Distracted driving and biking is one reason, but road design counts for quite a bit as well.

A North Dakota radio caller asks the government to move deer crossings.

Please people, listen to this one, and hear it out. It gets worse. Also, notice how after initial restraint, after a while you really wanna bang your head against the table. Yes, people this stupid are allowed to drive.

However, this fragment also shows how little people learn from their behavior and signage in general. The lady mentions that she's hit three deer at deer crossing signs, and she's still not changing her behavior. More signs don't help. The people you're targeting will ignore them, just like they were ignoring the law anyway.

by Jasper on Oct 16, 2012 9:55 am • link • report

I get that a helmet isn't a be all for bicycle protection. I get that helmet laws can discourage biking and hence reduce the critical mass needed for bike safety. I get that often people pushing helmets are often a mix of benign but clueless do-gooders and folks actually trying to reduce biking. Hell, the majority of time I grab a bikeshare I don't wear a helmet.

But folks, at a certain point, it seems like we're advocating AGAINST the use of helmets. We're starting to sound as silly, and at times as shrill, as the anti-seat belt people when I was growing up.

I've ridden a car literally thousands of times. I've been in a handful of accidents. The majority of those a seat belt did little or nothing to help me. Only once did it make a difference.

1 time out of thousands? Why bother wearing a seatbelt then? Oh, right.

by Tim Krepp on Oct 16, 2012 9:55 am • link • report

Jasper,

re: the deer thing. I grew up in the country and it was just expected that at some point in your driving life. You were going to hit a deer. I don't know if the signs mattered because we expected them everywhere

Tim,
The safest thing for cyclists overall is for there to be more cyclists. Things like this PSA make cycling seem much more dangerous than it is which prevents people from cycling. Yes you should wear a helment but the question is should the government be making sure that existing riders are helmeted or are they better off devoting resources to making sure more people can bike?

by drumz on Oct 16, 2012 10:01 am • link • report

"But folks, at a certain point, it seems like we're advocating AGAINST the use of helmets. "

this is why when I take issue with aspect of helmet promotion that I think are anticycling, i make sure to point that I DO wear a bike helmet - whether we wear helmets whenever we bike, or most of the time but skip them for bikeshare, we can still take issue with the points you note above.

by AWalkerInTheCity on Oct 16, 2012 10:03 am • link • report

Note, also, there ARE a few of us who are antihelmet (and there are parallels in the war over bike lanes) How to deal with those folks, as part of our public advocacy, I am not sure.

by AWalkerInTheCity on Oct 16, 2012 10:05 am • link • report

@drumz I couldn't agree more with idea that more cyclists will increase safety. Maybe it's because I bike with my kids, and maybe it's because we've already got one free ambulance ride when biking, but I'm not as cavalier as a lot of people about biking. It is dangerous. People die doing it.

There's a lot of things that are more important than helmets. Road design. Cultural shifts of all road users. More people biking. But yes, a small slice of the bike safety plan should be helmets.

It's just a PSA. Do we critically analyze ALL PSA that way, or are we singling out an obscure Boston one because it's about helmets?

by Tim Krepp on Oct 16, 2012 10:08 am • link • report

@Rob, the WMATA plans for 100,000 SmarTrip Inauguration cards is about 1/2 of the number they ordered for 2009, so they are being on the cautious side. If Romney wins, there will be many Romney supporters taking the Metro. Many may complain about it, but given the traffic restrictions and security, the only way to get there will be by bus or Metro.

I question whether Metro should be adding campaign type slogans to the cards with "A New Future for America" on the Romney design. Keep it neutral with a pic of the smiling President with dates and a line about 44th or 45th President of the US.

by AlanF on Oct 16, 2012 10:10 am • link • report

Tim,

Well beside my obvious complaint that his injury is on his face which isn't covered by the helmet I do think its worth analyzing because it still shows that cycling is inherently dangerous.

I wish I could find it, but I recently saw a McDonalds commercial where the spokesperson (wearing a helmet) rolls up on a guy riding to work (sans helmet) and they ride abreast for a while and and the spokesperson gives him McD's breakfast. I thought it was a wonderful commercial in the sense that it showed biking along city streets as a perfectly normal thing to do.

I'd like to see government outreach be similar in showing people wearing helmets and simply riding to get to where they need to go. PSA's are usually effective over time. Let them show how people should ride rather than what to fear.

by drumz on Oct 16, 2012 10:21 am • link • report

Out of curiosity, is there any way to request bicycle citations in a specific location? The level of salmon in the 17th Street NW bike lane between New Hampshire and Massachusetts avenues is getting ridiculous; I live around there and I swear I see more and more every day. I ride that bike lane often and my personal biggest cycling safety fear is how often I have to play chicken in that specific stretch, with oncoming cyclists who seem to have not the slightest clue that they're doing something wrong. I kind of want to press the cops who are always hanging out around 17th and R into service impressing the law upon the confused upstreamers.

by iana on Oct 16, 2012 10:30 am • link • report

Has anyone seen this movie?

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1547234/

It's the only bicycle action movie I've heard of, but I wonder how its depictions fit into the bicycle safety/promotion discussion. Presumably it shows biking as an inherently thrilling and dangerous activity, but maybe someone who's seen it could elaborate.

by Thaddeus Bell on Oct 16, 2012 10:31 am • link • report

"PSA's are usually effective over time." There's really more evidence to the contrary. PSAs work best when they are tailored to the audience. This sort of ad tends to have little impact on the riskiest folks. they are the ones who nitpick the injuries and mock the dire tone.

by Rich on Oct 16, 2012 10:32 am • link • report

It's not quite right to say that nobody outside the 400 feet can file a noise complaint, it's that they can't be parties to an official liquor license protest. Right now that limit is 600 feet.

by TM on Oct 16, 2012 10:37 am • link • report

In terms of low hanging fruit, salmons and lights would seem a better subject of PSA than helmets. And stop using the damn crosswalk for bikes! That is for us foot users.

The 15th street-superhighway could use some low, bike specific lighting at night as well.

by charlie on Oct 16, 2012 10:38 am • link • report

Rich,

You're right. They will be effective at convincing people they should wear a helmet on their bike that they'll never take out and actually ride.

Thaddeus,

There was a longer Mercedes commercial where a guy in Mercedes races a bike messenger from Harlem down to the Brooklyn bridge. It was meant to show that riding in a mercedes in calm in serene (even if you are driving on the BQE) while being on a bike was hectic and loud. The cyclist actually wins though.

http://www.cyclelicio.us/2010/mercedes-vs-bike/

by drumz on Oct 16, 2012 10:39 am • link • report

@Thaddeus

Any child of the 80s would be familiar with at least two other bike-themed movies: Rad, and Quicksilver.

by TM on Oct 16, 2012 10:41 am • link • report

@Tim K,

Hey, I wear a helmet most of the time. Usually skip it when I use Bikeshare, but not always. But if you want to stop hearing from people helmet skeptics, enough with the ridiculous, anti-cycling scaremongering.

Seatbelts in cars is a poor analogy, since they come standard, and are pretty unobtrusive. What I find truly puzzling is the smug sanctimony that comes from the helmet absolutists on this issue. It's not enough to say, "Hey, think about wearing a helmet. It might help keep you safer."

I don't know what it is that drives this effort to try to compel people to wear the safety lid, but it seems like a lot of folks take it quite personally that they can't dicate others' behavior. And their passion is out of all proportion to the risk-to-benefit of helmet use.

When I go for a mountain bike ride without a helmet, I have perfect strangers yelling, "Where's your helmet!?!" at me. Sometimes 2 or 3 times a ride, if I'm riding somewhere with a lot of people. The equivalent just never happened with seatbelts. It's bizarre.

And, yes, after a while, you just want to tell these perfect strangers to mind their own fucking business.

by oboe on Oct 16, 2012 10:43 am • link • report

@drumz, I just don't see this PSA having the dire impact you do (and yes, I agree with the bloody face ridiculousness of a helmet). Much as I imagine wildlife poaching PSA's on my local bus stop are probably going to have zero impact on trafficking of rhino horns.

by Tim Krepp on Oct 16, 2012 10:44 am • link • report

Bike movie: Breaking Away. With young Dennis Quaid. Really good Oscar winning sentimental favorite -- won best picture 1980.

by goldfish on Oct 16, 2012 10:46 am • link • report

Sorry, it was nominated for best pic, it did not win.

by goldfish on Oct 16, 2012 10:47 am • link • report

I wouldn't say its dire. But its just more evidence that we still have a long way to go in how we talk about bicycles and making the simple act of riding more normal.

by drumz on Oct 16, 2012 10:48 am • link • report

I wouldn't say its dire. But its just more evidence that we still have a long way to go in how we talk about bicycles and making the simple act of riding more normal.

Things don't have to be "dire" to a) have an impact; and b) irritate the hell out of you.

by oboe on Oct 16, 2012 10:49 am • link • report

Note on the video I posted a little ways up. That cyclist does a lot of things that I wouldn't dream of doing.

by drumz on Oct 16, 2012 10:51 am • link • report

@oboe. Couldn't agree more. That's exactly how I feel about the anti-helmet discussion (not just on this post today, btw). Not at all dire. Not a big deal, but it has an impact and it irritates the hell out of me.

by Tim Krepp on Oct 16, 2012 11:01 am • link • report

Tim

I also wear a helmet whenever I bike (I have not yet used bikeshare)

I am certainly not antihelmet, and have the same issues with actual antihelmet positions as I do with the more extreme versions of the vehicular cycling POV. However, its hard not to see some of the prohelmet messaging as of a piece with lots of anticycling messages - which I see on message bds, in MSM, and IRL - and there seem to be more and more of those as cycling grows (backlash, I guess)

by AWalkerInTheCity on Oct 16, 2012 11:07 am • link • report

@AWIC, perhaps, but I think we're inclined to see a cacophony of voices and assume there's more coordination than they're really is, and assign unified motives where none exist. We're doing a good job of fostering biking. Blocking helmet laws - good. Going off the deep end when a city (not even our own) makes a random PSA - maybe a diffusion of our effort.

by Tim Krepp on Oct 16, 2012 11:11 am • link • report

re: Microunits. Its not true these will be the first in DC. I Know of many apartments <400 sqft in pre WWII buildings. Maybe these will be the first since the zoning code of 1959...but not "the first".

by Tina on Oct 16, 2012 11:13 am • link • report

biking movies: Breaking Away is my fav, but I also recommend "The Flying Scotsman" (based on a true story). "American Flyer" was ok, not as good as the two former (starred a young Kevin Costner and Rae Dawn Chong), and of course there's "PeeWees Big Adventure"!

by Tina on Oct 16, 2012 11:31 am • link • report

But folks, at a certain point, it seems like we're advocating AGAINST the use of helmets. 

Unlike for seatbelts, there is no scientific consensus that helmets definitively are a net safety enhancement for bikers. Helmets reduce the likelihood of less serious injuries (like a concussion but increase the likelihood of paralysis. On balance, helmets are probably worth it but it's far from a slam dunk like seat belts.

I also know of condos less than 400 square feet. In fact, i know of several studios in a building that was gutted and converted in 2010 that are about 350 square feet.

by Falls Church on Oct 16, 2012 12:09 pm • link • report

@ iana:is there any way to request bicycle citations in a specific location?

Sure, you can call the cops. And the cops will then way your request with all the other enforcement requests they get. And you will never see cops.

Salmons are annoying though. When biking, I yell at them. I like that. Reacting with bad behavior on bad behavior. I'm sure it helps. At least it's relieving.

by Jasper on Oct 16, 2012 2:29 pm • link • report

I don't think the deer thing is limited to rural areas. I grew up in New Jersey and a good chunk of people I know have hit deer (or been hit by them.) Hell I saw a deer get hit by a car while walking across Wisconsin Avenue a few years ago.

by Alan B on Oct 16, 2012 4:03 pm • link • report

Thaddeus: For a bicycle ACTION movie, see BMX Bandits.

One problem with the "wear a helmet" campaign is that every argument you can make for wearing a helmet on a bike is just as valid for wearing a motoring helmet or a walking helmet.

by David C on Oct 18, 2012 4:31 pm • link • report