{"id":133686,"date":"2016-02-18T16:53:03","date_gmt":"2016-02-18T14:53:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/?p=133686"},"modified":"2016-02-18T16:53:46","modified_gmt":"2016-02-18T14:53:46","slug":"australians-to-cycle-without-helmets","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2016\/02\/18\/australians-to-cycle-without-helmets\/","title":{"rendered":"Australians to Cycle Without Helmets?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>You might soon be able to cycle in Australia\u2019s capital without using a helmet. ACT Road Safety Minister Shane Rattenbury came up with this radical idea and has a quite unique explanation for it.<\/strong><br \/>\n<!--more--><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u201cThere is clear evidence that wearing bicycle helmets does reduce the rate of head injuries. There&#8217;s also evidence that it can reduce the number of people who cycle,\u201d he said for <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">the<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"> ABC News.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Rattenbury believes that potential health risks are worth the benefits this move could bring to Canberra and its citizens.<\/p>\n<div class=\"embed-controller-wrapper\">\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"500\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Proud to see change in ACT&#39;s policy on police pursuits, after 5 yrs campaigning in Assembly <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/LKIxAuatJD\">https:\/\/t.co\/LKIxAuatJD<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/ccvFgfK0On\">pic.twitter.com\/ccvFgfK0On<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Shane Rattenbury MLA (@ShaneRattenbury) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ShaneRattenbury\/status\/700149331312050176?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">February 18, 2016<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async data-src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/div>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">&#8220;We will engage an expert to look at options for low-speed areas<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">.<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">.. <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">W<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">e&#8217;ll sit down and have that research done for us over the next couple of years and weigh up the relative benefits. If we have more people out there cycling it actually makes people safer, because cycling is more visible, there&#8217;s more people doing it and drivers become more used to having cyclists on the road,&#8221; claims the Road Safety Minister.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Other changes would follow this unusual plan &#8211; increased fines for drivers caught texting, expansion of <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">40-kilometre-per-hour<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"> zones in town centres, automatic license for serious offences and lowering the number of demerit points <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">for<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"> each driver.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">You might think it\u2019s crazy to let people cycle without helmets, but there is at least one expert who expressed support towards Rattenbury\u2019s plan. Gordon Waddington, professor of sport and exercise medicine at the University of Canberra, believes there is another side of using helmets nobody talks about. He said there is <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">a<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"> proof that when cyclists wear helmets, they tend to behave more dangerously and take more risks, because they believe to be protected. That is<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">,<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"> however<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">,<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"> not always the case.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/d2p6e6u75xmxt8.cloudfront.net\/2\/2016\/02\/profimedia-0136631750.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-133689\" src=\"https:\/\/d2p6e6u75xmxt8.cloudfront.net\/2\/2016\/02\/profimedia-0136631750-600x400.jpg\" alt=\"You might soon be able to cycle in Australia\u2019s capital without using a helmet. ACT Road Safety Minister Shane Rattenbury came up with this radical idea and has a quite unique explanation for it.\" width=\"600\" height=\"400\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">&#8220;Looking at larger scale research studies now, we can actually see that in fact when we see helmet use go up, we actually don&#8217;t see an increase in protection occurring. We do see an increase in protection from lacerations and cuts and damage directly to the skin of the head, but we don&#8217;t see protection from significant head injury the way we&#8217;d like to have thought it might happen,\u201d said Waddington.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">What do you think? Could cycling without a helmet be actually more safe?<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>You might soon be able to cycle in Australia\u2019s capital without using a helmet. ACT Road Safety Minister Shane Rattenbury [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":133690,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[328,334,330],"tags":[],"global-categories":[],"class_list":["post-133686","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-outdoor-mountain","category-socialising-and-culture","category-urban-cycling"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v25.3 (Yoast SEO v25.9) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Australians to Cycle Without Helmets? - \u0160koda We Love Cycling<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"You might soon be able to cycle in Australia\u2019s capital without using a helmet. 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