David Roberts
The Dutch don’t wear bike helmets. How safe is it to ride a bike in the Netherlands?
Chris Bruntlett
We — like you — live in a place where helmets have been mandated by law, because they’ve been accepted as a commonsense safety device, normal as a seatbelt. But the Dutch show that [for them], safety in infrastructure, safety in slowing cars, and safety in numbers are all far more important than safety in body armor.
David Roberts
Yeah, the US approach seems to be to up-armor the cyclist so that cars don’t have to change.
Chris Bruntlett
Exactly.
Less than 0.5 percent of Dutch cyclists wear helmets, which is one in 200 people on bikes. And that’s really just the sport cyclists. Virtually everybody else, from children to old people, doesn’t even think about helmets. It’s just not present in their culture, because they’ve ultimately decided that it’s far more important to build this culture of everyday cycling, and to build safe streets, instead of requiring people to protect themselves.