Lincolnshire Police Give Really Poor Cycling Advice

So this appeared recently as a clipped section from Lincolnshire Police safety advice to children.



I thought the tweet comment was a reasonable summary of their poorly thought out leaflet. I thought it also deserved a lot more analysis and a good run through on how it directly and indirectly contradicts the GOVERNMENT advice on cycling practices, importantly the Highway Code and BikeAbility training.

Lincolnshire Police Leaflet.

The leaflet is here, although I've just focussed on the "on road" statements. It's rather telling that they choose to advertise to children by showing someone falling off. This is well known to play on children's fears and put them off riding. Not exactly a good way to encourage children.

So, the 4 statements they have asserted.

• A. Never ride on the pavement. Keep to the cycling lanes or ride in the same direction as the cars. This is the law.
• B. Before you turn a corner, check the way is clear (look behind you) and signal to tell people where you are going.
• C. Keep a wide distance near parked cars they may siddeenly open a door.
• D. Keep to single file on the roads, this is much safer.

Statement A.
This is just a really poorly written statement and easily misinterpreted. The "This is the law" bit makes it look like all parts of this are legal requirements. They are not.

1 "Never ride on the pavement". Except when it's a designated cycle path. As written in Highway Code rule 62: Cycle Tracks. These are normally located away from the road, but may occasionally be found alongside footpaths or pavements".

2. "Keep to cycling lanes". No, not a legal requirement at all or even good advice. BikeAbility says ride an arms length from the kerb. For multiple reasons this is the optimal position and is often at odds with poorly designed cyclelanes. This is subtly admitted in Highway Code rule 63: "Use of cycle lanes is not compulsory and will depend on your experience and skills".

3. "Ride in the same direction as cars" is the only bit that gets close to a legal requirement. Although I know many places that have one-way streets for cars that allow people to cycle the other way.

Statement B.
Again confusing. "check the way is clear (look behind you)" just doesn't make sense. It's because it's missing the reasoning and talking about what you are acutally doing.

It is good advice to look behind you and signalling is a good idea. However, the reasons why are completely overlooked and may result in riders doing completely the wrong thing. The idea about looking behind is to enable a rider to move out to a controlling position to stop poor overtaking close to a junction. Also, if there's no-one to signal to, don't do it, keep your hands on the handlebars.

Statement C.
The only statement that has my support. Always "a open door and a bit more" when passing a parked car. This is one of the biggest collision risks with people riding. I will note that advise to look behind when pulling out, vital if passing a parked car, is completely missing.

Statement D.
This is just plain wrong. Doubled-up riding is recommended when dealing with hazards. Making a group of riders look more like a car or bus means a great reduction in risky or rushed overtaking and from oncoming traffic (see here for more details why). Reguarly, BikeAbility instructors will move groups of children around on the road, and they'll employ doubled-up riding quite regularly and when appropriate.

In Highway Code Rule 66: "never ride more than two abreast, and ride in single file on narrow or busy roads and when riding round bends". So, that's not more than doubled up, and don't do it when it might be difficult to do. And to complement this, BikeAbility will teach riders to ride in the centre of a lane when narrow or round a bend to stop poor overtaking then.

In Summary.
It's really important that organisations of authority in the areas covering good cycling practices act and promote consistently. Whilst Lincolnshire Police probably were trying to do this, their half-handed attempt is, at best, poorly thought through. At worst it's just downright dangerous.

Here are all the GOVERNMENT sources of this advice for people cycling, which does seem at odds with what Lincolnshire police believe.

• https://www.gov.uk/guidance/the-highway-code/rules-for-cyclists-59-to-82
• https://www.britishcycling.org.uk/cycletraining/article/ct20110110-cycletraining-Bitesize-Bikeability--Part-4--On-Road-Positioning-0
• www.cyclinguk.org/sites/default/files/.../section_6_moving_trainees_15-01-07.docx [DOC]

Compulsory Helmet Laws and Current Safety Measures Shown Up

A study done in Australia a little after the compulsory helmet laws were brought in (early 1990s) shows the hypocrisy and failure to follow evidence. The text abstract is here, but it is a little unwieldy. I've tried to punctuate it into bullet points below, whilst maintaining the full text.

• The first year of the mandatory bicycle helmet laws in Australia saw increased helmet wearing from 31% to 75% of cyclists in Victoria and from 31% of children and 26% of adults in New South Wales (NSW) to 76% and 85%. 
• However, the two major surveys using matched before and after samples in Melbourne (Finch et al. 1993; Report No. 45, Monash Univ. Accident Research Centre) and throughout NSW (Smith and Milthorpe 1993; Roads and Traffic Authority) observed reductions in numbers of child cyclists 15 and 2.2 times greater than the increase in numbers of children wearing helmets. This suggests the greatest effect of the helmet law was not to encourage cyclists to wear helmets, but to discourage cycling. 
• In contrast, despite increases to at least 75% helmet wearing, the proportion of head injuries in cyclists admitted or treated at hospital declined by an average of only 13%. The percentage of cyclists with head injuries after collisions with motor vehicles in Victoria declined by more, but the proportion of head injured pedestrians also declined; the two followed a very similar trend. 
• These trends may have been caused by major road safety initiatives introduced at the same time as the helmet law and directed at both speeding and drink-driving. The initiatives seem to have been remarkably effective in reducing road trauma for all road users, perhaps affecting the proportions of victims suffering head injuries as well as total injuries. 
• The benefits of cycling, even without a helmet, have been estimated to outweigh the hazards by a factor of 20 to 1 (Hillman 1993; Cycle helmets—the case for and against. Policy Studies Institute, London). Consequently, a helmet law, whose most notable effect was to reduce cycling, may have generated a net loss of health benefits to the nation. 
• Despite the risk of dying from head injury per hour being similar for unhelmeted cyclists and motor vehicle occupants, cyclists alone have been required to wear head protection. Helmets for motor vehicle occupants are now being marketed and a mandatory helmet law for these road users has the potential to save 17 times as many people from death by head injury as a helmet law for cyclists without the adverse effects of discouraging a healthy and pollution free mode of transport.

My analysis of this is as follows.

1. Helmets do very little to protect cyclists in car-bike collisions.
2. Reducing head injuries is better done by dealing with misbehaving motorists.
3. Helmets would do an enormous amount more to protect car occupants. Where is the cry to have them wear helmets?

Of course that last point is simply meant as a jibe and not to be taken seriously. From other studies it is known that the more that car drivers (and occupants) are coddled up and protected from the violent disturbance their vehicle is causing outside, the more danger they cause to others. Risk Displacement describes this well.

Talking of other studies, we have Dr Ian Walker's study showing that wearing a helmet increases the danger to cyclists as motorists give less space. And the simple fact that helmets are designed for impacts of 12mph and less, equivalent to a fall off a bike, shows that all this bluster about helmets is a complete distraction from safety on the road.

If the same money used to perpertuate (and police in some places) the myth that helmets help in bike-car collisions was spent on measures that might make a difference, we may have a lot more lifes saved than we do currently. Essentially this focus is costing lifes.

This is also a message for Red Light Jumping policing. Not that I favour jumping red lights, but it such an insignificant factor in safety for cyclists, motorists, and pedestrians as to be another waste of time and money. Why are we spending time and effort on dealing with cyclist-fault collisions (around 7% of all bike-car collisions) whilst generally ignoring the 13 times as many driver-fault collisions? And even looking at pedestrians put at risk by cyclists or drivers, evidence (follow links here) shows that they are 40 times more likely to be hurt by a car than a bike. Again, if the same money was spent on measures that might make a difference, we may have a lot more lifes saved than we do currently. Essentially, again, this focus is costing lifes.

So, in summary, the kneejerk response to helmets and policing we are currently doing is costing lifes. All in a desire to be perceived as making the street "fair for all" whilst perpetuating the inequality of it.