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I use a bike trailer to tow my children. I take them to and from a playground, which is around a 30 minute ride in each direction.
It is 90% greenway, with some sleepy 2-lane connector roads. While I am of course an incredible pedal pumping engine capable of incredible feats, I average only around 12 mph.
The bike trailer has a 5-point harness and an aluminum roll cage.
The problem: Putting helmets on my kids looks fucking miserable. Their heads are cast downward, they have nowhere to look around, and the youngest is clearly upset after around 15 minutes in the trailer. The oldest still has an OK time but is far quieter than when we rode together with a secondary saddle. FAQ says deal with it.
Assume you're a typical parent (I.E. your children are the most important thing in your life and you can't imagine causing them harm through negligence) but you also loathe the vapid stupidity of "better safe than sorry" in the face of all rationality, would you consider forgoing the helmet?
"Other Site" discussions:
From that FAQ:
I consider this a point against the helmet. I want to inculcate a sense of reasonable decision making and risk assessment, not the pure safetyism of donning a helmet literally every time you're biking.
Personally, I wear a helmet when I'm road biking because I'm going to go fast enough and ride enough miles that there's a non-trivial chance of having a nasty wreck at some point. On the flip side, I never wear a helmet when I'm going a couple miles on a hybrid because I'm not going fast and there's very little chance of me just randomly falling down while tootling along a bike path at 13 MPH. I skip the helmet there for the same reason that I don't wear a helmet in the car or while running. I also just think helmets look incredibly dorky when worn with street clothes, but YMMV there. I have no real interest in encouraging other people to wear helmets more or less often than me, I think people should wear them in accordance with their own risk assessment and personal comfort.
I would want the same flexibility for a young cyclist rather than the obsessive safety of being scared to pedal a couple blocks without getting a helmet.
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I wouldn't bother. Some risk is acceptable, otherwise we would all wear helmets all the time. I am one of the last skiers not wearing a helmet because at the speeds I ski at it wouldn't help me at all. I recently had a bad crash that injured my knee, a helmet would have potentially made me a quadriplegic if it had caused my head to hit the ice wall instead of my leg.
Helmets are not a panacea and have no benefit in many cases. I personally feel like they restrict my field of view and make my neck more likely to be damaged. I have worn one as required for races. This study found no benefit in snow sports. https://journals.humankinetics.com/view/journals/ijatt/28/4/article-p173.xml
This sounds like cope.
I snowboard, fast. I can't count the number of times where I've had "I love helmets" moments on the slopes. Snow is softer than concrete, but it's hard enough that I'm sure I'd have had a concussion if I wasn't wearing one, and instead I got up without a scratch. I appreciate you've linked a study, but my lived experience disagrees.
The objection my European skier buddy always had was "well, you don't catch edges like that on skis, so you don't need one", but no matter what's under your feet, if you bail at any speed, you're still falling vertically at least your own height, then tumbling down the mountain after that uncontrolled. Funny enough, same guy now wears a helmet after slipping on ice and bonking his head hard enough to knock some sense into him.
You can get very light helmets. Most don't obstruct your vision, since the front piece is cut away past where your goggles sit. You can get a glossy exterior that doesn't catch on the snow, and if anything presents more of a smooth surface to glide along and not wrench your head any direction that would hurt your neck.
A cope? What am I coping with? Extra convenience and comfort? It would be a cope if I had brain damage from smacking into a tree with no helmet that a helmet would have prevented. That said I think they may be of some help in avoiding skull or skin injuries to the back of the head for slowboarders like yourself.
Snowboarders tend to spend a lot more time on their backs and close to the hardpack and tend to tip over backward and give their noggin a good smack. But unless you're hitting your head so hard that you're fracturing your skull and exposing your brain directly to the groomer you're on, that concussion comes from your brain bouncing off of the inside of your skull from stopping fast, not from hitting the snow itself.
"Results from the four studies8,9,12,13 evaluated show slightly varying results with the majority of the studies trending toward no difference in head injury occurrence when the snow sport participants are either helmeted or not helmeted. According to Dickson and Terwiel,8 head injury rates did not differ by helmet use status. Porter et al.’s9 study demonstrated that helmeted participants were more likely to suffer an intracranial hemorrhage, but less likely to sustain a skull fracture or scalp laceration"
Without going into every study in that review, the obvious flaw is: people who aren't injured don't show up in the data. They're taking people who already have a head injury, and then noting helmet or no helmet.
Yeah, you're still going to have a bad time if you accelerate your head into something solid at a high enough speed, but given that it might happen, I'm 100% going to choose to put foam and plastic in the way to dissipate the impact. If you had to fall onto groomed snow and land on your head, say from a standing position, not even at speed, and I offer you the choice of wearing a helmet or not, would you really prefer not to wear one?
But as some studies have shown I'm less likely to hit my head in the first place due to overall awareness and a sort of "I'm safe to take risks" feeling from using a safety device like a helmet. Yeah if you're going to hit me in the head I would rather wear a helmet, but the odds of you connecting are less if I'm not. Skulls are built to dissipate force as well, it is just a lot uglier than if the helmet does it.
Interesting quote from an article citing an ongoing meta study, "Studies show that helmets reduced non-serious head injuries, such as minor concussions, by nearly 70 percent in the 17 seasons between 1995 and 2012. But to Shealy’s amazement, there was no change in the number of fatalities. “The question became,”he says, “Why aren’t helmets saving people’s lives?”"
"In the early ‘90s, only about 5 percent of skiers used helmets. Flash forward 20 years, and nearly 80 percent of snow riders opt-in." With no reduction in fatal head injuries.
So I think that strikes a nice middle ground with what we are both saying here. I ski at a pace where a fatal mistake is a fatal mistake. Yes a helmet could mitigate some minor injuries, but who is to say I would even have been in a place to be protected from those if I wasn't wearing it?
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No, he's right -- I also ski very fast and have been doing so since well before helmets were a thing -- I used to ski more in places with a lot of hard things (ie. rocks), where helmets might have been a good idea -- but falling on snow is not a problem that needs solving with a helmet. I ski hard and still fall from time to time -- used to be much more, I was quite silly when younger; I've fallen a lot in my life, and taken some long rides too. No helmets, no concussions.
I do also think that the modern prevalence of helmets has contributed to collision risk -- depending on design it may or may not be peripheral vision related (you know you don't strictly need to wear goggles to ski either, right?) -- but hearing and general situational awareness seem to be much more of a problem now than in the past; ie. I can ski up right next to (helmeted) people on a cat track and they don't notice me until I'm several yards ahead of them. It's like they are skiing in a bubble.
Anyways you are neglecting the 'feels good man' factor -- I am very sad that people growing up in the last 10-ish years will not experience a nice spring day in a sweater and sunglasses with the wind in their hair out of manufactured fear; this is what they've taken from you.
Sure, I'll grant they reduce auditory awareness, and possibly lead to accidents like this (though, snowboarder should have shoulder checked, and skier should have seen them since they were uphill).
On the other hand, accidents like that happen regardless, and if they're going to happen to me, I want to be wearing goggles that won't shatter into my face like sunglasses, and a helmet that will protect my noggin.
Riiight: Just things everyone knew in the 90s
Face it, you've been fed a bag of shit since the day you were born by these safetyists -- retvrn to the 90s, you will not regret it. (nobody worried about people ramming you from behind then either, but everyone also knew that the uphill skier/boarder is the one at fault)
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So it's a car.
I don't wear helmets in my car, not even if I had one with a removable roof.
For that matter, that FAQ more or less just says "they should wear a helmet in the car(t) because normalization of safetyism is important".
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I feel like I have to join any online discussion about bikes and helmets. But I live in the Netherlands and see about a million kids a day on bikes themselves or towed by their parents. Helmet ratio is probably a couple percentage points tops. And it’s almost always neurotic American expats. Is it really worth ruining the whole experience and habit of biking over a minuscule safety improvement? (Assuming you aren’t cycling through infrastructure unsafe for biking)
I'm American but I feel the same way... it's much less fun if I have to wear a helmet, since that makes my head sweat like crazy, and then once I'm done I have to carry the helmet around with me everywhere. But that's just me as an adult, riding on very easy bike routes, I might feel differently about small kids
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On the flipside, though, I will say that the Netherland's helmet culture is a bit of a chicken or the egg situation.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but people are generally riding heavy bikes very slowly in highly protected lanes.
If we're road riding in America, there's a significant cohort of negligent drivers. There's even a small group of drivers who want to actively hurt and kill cyclists. Helmets on public roads for riders - even to my risk-pooh-poohing self - are necessary. Not to mention the sort of downhill mountainbiking I do every once in a while.
Even our greenway, while at least an order of magnitude safer, isn't without hazards. Other cyclists are moving at a huge variety of speeds, myself included, from a drowsy beach cruiser to someone chasing a KOM on a segment. Pedestrians weave back and forth with abandon, huge groups take up the whole path, and dogs on leashes dart in front of cyclists at will.
I can minimize these greatly by being verbal and passing slowly. When I'm towing the trailer, the risk of me having to emergency stop or swerve is extremely low.
People do wear helmets when mountain biking or cycling on racing bikes as a hobby (probably the most popular hobby around) though
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It’s true most bikes are pretty heavy. But no people definitely don’t ride them slowly. And highly protected lanes depends very much on where you are. Suburbs or newly built cities yes. On more historical cities not at all. Also virtually nobody wears helmets with e-bikes either. Scooters going in the bike lane have to use helmets since last year though.
This is my average everyday cycle in Amsterdam city center to be honest.. but it’s not very safe and with kids in tow definitely understandable to be cautious. Don’t you think something like a “bakfiets” would be safer against rolling than a tow?
They do sell these. I've considered getting some sort of variant of this or a longtail cargo bike for sure.
Truthfully, I'm out of room in the garage for another huge bike (for a total of 3). The price for a new one is $2,500+, wheras this trailer was $100 used. I do have some grocery and playgrounds in pedal distance and it's not out of the question, though.
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I tried to keep my tone neutral to get genuine feedback but for what it's worth, my default opinion is very close to yours.
I think this is insane. I'm taking my kids to the park in what's essentially a stroller with a roll cage and a five point harness and I'm still having this disagreement with my wife//the reddit hivemind suggests I would be a piece of shit.
Riding with my toddler on that Shotgun saddle (wearing a helmet! totally necessary!) has been one of my favorite parenting experiences and he went nuts for it. Now I feel like they're miserable.
I skimmed the reddit threads and most people seemed to say that they wouldn't put helmets on the passengers.
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Ruining?
I love that I can use a bike as almost an extension of me. No planning, extra equipment or hassle needed, just leave the house unlock and go. It’s just fun and increases my mobility greatly. Carrying a helmet would make this much less smooth and fun.
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Probably not. Children can be trained into being comfortable wearing a helmet, and 12 mph is absolutely sufficient speed to cause life altering (if not ending) head injuries. The cost/benefit ratio of helmets is very far into the positive. It might take some work to get them used to it, but teaching your kids to wear helmets when doing dangerous activities like bicycling, skateboarding, etc is a very good idea.
What's the mechanism for a head injury when strapped into a cage?
I can't speak to bicycle trailer roll cages specifically, but in cars with roll cages hitting your head on the roll cage itself is a very serious possibility. Having a roll cage makes you safer from many kinds of injury (crushing etc), but makes you much more likely to have a head injury because it puts hard parts in range of your head. It is typical in basically all motorsports activities that if you have a roll cage must wear a helmet.
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I appreciate the input - thank ya!
The animal-parent part of my brain agrees. My youngest fell off a part of the playground recently, and it makes me want to have him wear a helmet there as well.
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I've towed children in a trailer like that with no helmet but for a total of 30min and perhaps half a dozen times.
If this is a routine transit then it's not a bad idea to optimize safety, and have the kids get used to it/get over it. If it's once every couple weeks, probably not worth the hassle of the helmet.
I expect a helmet to be required only in the case of a collision, as you're probably not going fast enough to do any damage if you had a sudden stop.
If you expect a small chance of a collision on that route it'd probably be wiser to forego the whole endeavor altogether as I don't think these trailers are really designed to take any kind of collision with a much larger vehicle. Or if this is already optimal transportation for you, make peace with the idea that perhaps the kids will get hurt if something bad happens. If having a helmet makes them upset and distracts you from potential road danger, then foregoing the helmet might be the safer option.
I've never been super comfortable pavement road riding by myself (vastly prefer gravel) so minimize road time as much as possible. I believe the chances of us being hit by a car on these roads is adjacent to zero. I agree that being hit by a car is pretty much game over regardless of roll cage etc.
I can see the helmet coming into play if I've forgotten to secure the 5-point hardness and there's a flip.
I do like taking them pretty regularly - perhaps 2x a week?
Great thoughts, thank you!
Oh I didn't consider a flip. Yes in that case a helmet would definitely help, even if they are harnessed.
What I think would happen is that we'd first get into a minor flip and perhaps I'd reconsider the whole idea of pulling them for a whole hour. It probably depends on the terrain because with 4 wheels and quite a bit of weight on the back, I don't really see that thing flipping, but I have a very casual experience with it.
Gotcha - FWIW the hour is cumulative (30 minutes there, then we hang out at the playground till they're tired, then we head back).
Getting it to flip would be really difficult in my experience. There's a flex joint that prevents it from doing so if the bike falls down, and I'm not exactly hopping curbs or speeding around corners.
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