Instead, I'll say, I think that pink bike looks like a Raleigh, actually. Quite similar to my Raleigh Sports (only mine *is* black). Might not be, but the lines and chaincase look very similar :)

It's still just amazing to me seeing so many people on bikes – even here in Portland with the highest cycling rate in the U.S., it's rare to find more than 2 or 3 cyclists together at a time except in very specific places at very specific times (the Hawthorne bridge during morning and evening rush hour, for instance), and it always makes me smile to see a large group (like the other night in the evening when I saw a big cluster of about 10 headlights coming towards me on Ladd Avenue on my way home from the grocery store. Of course, almost every shot you take has at least 10 cyclists in it :)

The first photo and the one with the guy in a pink bike…win!! :)

I like you to know that i have been enjoying this site for quit a while…
I found this link you might find intresting(Maybe you've allready seen it)…
It's about trying to get girls into cycling… In most places not as normal as in Holland..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M88sF-rvul0

Take care,

Gerco

macfred

Having lived in the States and feeling close to your culture I can say it never seized to amaze me how litigation, liability and sheer fear-mongering have influenced how people go about their way and judge others, and not in a good way. The perception of danger and sense of fear has grown to be so different and disproportionate, it has turned into something that is hard to beat/change, so ingrained in the public consciousness. There are a lot of other reasons, of course, boiling down to the realization that automobiles have been given way too much space and priority for too long.

My real point about all this is that emphasis on using bicycle helmets has done damage in mainly three areas. First, it makes cycling look like a dangerous activity to all those who don't cycle. Cycling is not a dangerous activity in itself. Just compare the accident statistics of pedestrians and cyclists (in any city/country), in the US you're 10 times more likely to get hurt walking/crossing the street and you don't see campaigns to have pedestrians wear them. Same goes for cars, which is many times more dangerous. Back to cycling, average Joe & Jane will think twice before picking up cycling when they see 'all the stuff you apparently need', let alone their children. This same logic applies to how a dominant sport cycling industry (that rose to power after 'normal' cycling was effectively eradicated from the daily urban scene) has pushed Joe & Jane into thinking that a bike needs to be very light, you need special clothing, you need special shoes, etc. It's a marketer's ultimate up-selling wet dream.

Second, actual protection and the perception thereof: the bicycle helmet is not suited or meant to save lives, but it IS marketed and promoted that way. There's no scientific proof that bike helmets have any effect. It's also been established over and over again that promotion and legislation of helmet use will lead to a steep decline in cycling, or: it will severely harm any other means to promote cycling in general. “But a helmet saved my life!” No, it didn't.

Quoting Lancaster University sociologist Dave Horton, who wrote the brilliant essay 'Fear of Cycling': “Do helmet promotion campaigns make cycling more or less safe, overall? There is evidence that cycling levels decline when helmets are promoted and collapse when they become compulsory (Liggett et al 2004, 12). Australia, the first country to make cycle helmets compulsory, witnessed a post-compulsion fall in levels of cycling of between 15 and 40 per cent (Adams 1995, 146). According to ‘the Mole’ (2004, 5), in Melbourne 'compulsion reduced the number of child cyclists by 42% and adults by 29%'. Because cycling tends to be safest where there are many cyclists (Jacobsen 2003), and most dangerous in places with few cyclists, and because helmet promotion campaigns reduce the overall numbers of cyclists, helmet promotion increases the risk of cycling. The relationship between increased cycling and increased safety appears to be confirmed by the experiences of the Netherlands and Denmark, which have high levels of cycling, very low rates of helmet wearing, and low rates of death and serious injury among cyclists;”
Here's a graphic from the Bicycle Helmet Research Foundation from some years ago, so you can see the correlation between helmet use, cycling rates and safety.

Third, the helmet has been hijacked by basically all policy makers and politicians to cover up their failures (insufficient infrastructure, prioritizing cars). It's the easy way out. Also, putting all responsibilities for safety on the cyclists and then faulting them for not wearing a helmet should anything occur is just hypocritical, disgraceful and outright treacherous. On top of that, they also perpetuate this through the mainstream media. Just very irresponsible..

Of course I realize that emotions and perceptions rule the day. Unfortunately. Just like with politics, many people still vote against their own interest (because of idealism, custom, tradition, etc). Show 'm statistics or other sort of data and they'll zone out, you've lost them. The most powerful way to educate and inform them is by showing. Over and over and over and over again. Because the way that so many citizens in the English-speaking world got sheepishly manipulated into wearing one, in a better, more positive and substantiated way we can get them to take it off again.

Didn't even feel the cold as I was snapping away.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/41192008@N05/sets/...

That said, it has just been trained into me to wear a helmet. I've been cut off by enough cars and taken enough falls that I want that little extra assurance.. just in case :)

The point of the argument is really about the perception of risk for society as a whole, rather than an individual's perception of risk. However, society is made of individuals. Each one of us decides what we will do based on whether it feels safe. For some individuals in countries like the US and UK riding on a bike feels safe enough without a helmet. For some others the addition of a helmet (or reflective jacket, or perhaps several sets of lights) is enough to make it feel safe.

However, nearly 3/4 of the British population never ride a bicycle at all. Not even once a year. This is in large part due to the perceived risks of cycling. However, it's also due to a bicycle having little perceived utility to people.

To increase cycling it has to become something that the entire population perceives as safe, convenient for their journeys and also a pleasant thing to do. At that point the “need” for helmets largely disappears. That is what has been achieved here in NL, but not in any other country.

As for me, I wear a helmet a few times a year – when I take part in competitive cycling. I don't actually think it makes much of a safety difference then either, but it's not important to society whether people perceive cycle racing as safe or not.

I have fallen on my head twice (my own fault both times). My helmet definitely protected my head on at least one fall (it was bad, my whole body slid across the ground for 10 feet).

I haven't yet read David's subjective safety discussion, but I do see him mention it in almost every article he writes. I also think that helmet legislation should stop.

For argument/statistics sake, I'm close to hitting 40, I've been using my bike every day from the time I could ride without side wheels (3 yrs), I lived and biked abroad (including US), in bicycle-friendly and -unfriendly places. In accordance with NL statistics I've had my share of collisions and run-ins, fell off my bike numerous times (my own fault while drunk or just when shit happens). Some incidents were harmless, some were more spectacular, but I know one thing: I never sustained an injury that needed extra medical care and/or I never hit my head. Which brings me back to statistics: according to those (NL) I should've sustained something or at least died once. :)

All I'm saying is: even for a developing country like the US (bike-wise) the whole helmet fixation is a stretch and figment of safety imagination. People rely on it too much. And don't get me started on the social aspect of it…;)