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As Teens Take to E-Bikes, Parents Ask: Is This Freedom or Danger?
(www.nytimes.com)
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Sure. Australia has had mandatory helmets since 1990, and there's been endless studies and debates since then, it's still ongoing. I could find no clear evidence that helmet mandates decreased overall harm over any timeframe.
To quote a review I read from 2007
And their conclusion did not find a consensus other than
Given that, helmet mandates are a bad law that takes away our liberties for no proven benefit.
Fair enough. I do like evidence-based conclusions. :)
I'm definitely in favour of good road safety initiatives like traffic calming, enforcement of driving laws, and education for both drivers and cyclists. One of the things I've observed with cyclists is on average they're more unpredictable than other vehicles on the road, and I think education of both types of road user would help alleviate that. Cyclists need consistent signals for what they're going to do, and drivers need to be able to recognise what those signals are. So much of road safety is reliant on everyone being as predictable as possible, and people taking up cycling as adults often skip the cycling proficiency lessons that teach them how to behave predictably, while drivers are never taught to recognise what signals cyclists are taught to use in those lessons. (My "work-around" solution for this is "slow down and keep more distance", which works as well for cyclists as is does anyone else who is behaving unpredictably on the road. Indeed "slow down and back off" is an approach that's hard to go wrong with!)