Is it Legal for a baby to ride pillion on a Motorcycle?

Christ on a bike, the militant cyclists are the problem here. I thought the issue was usually cyclist haters (ie motorists, who often own a bike) but perhaps that's just insubstantial accusations levelled by the same militants?
 
Gilly said:
Christ on a bike, the militant cyclists are the problem here. I thought the issue was usually cyclist haters (ie motorists, who often own a bike) but perhaps that's just insubstantial accusations levelled by the same militants?
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Do you own a bike?
 
Gilly said:
Christ on a bike, the militant cyclists are the problem here. I thought the issue was usually cyclist haters (ie motorists, who often own a bike) but perhaps that's just insubstantial accusations levelled by the same militants?
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Those same 'militant cyclists' who want to force nobody to do nothing at all? Some 'militants'.
 
Gilly said:
Christ on a bike, the militant cyclists are the problem here. I thought the issue was usually cyclist haters (ie motorists, who often own a bike) but perhaps that's just insubstantial accusations levelled by the same militants?
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I'm not being militant, I just think bringing up helmets detracts from the actual issues facing both cyclists and motorists and it really frustrates me. A bit like Boris Johnson immediately suggesting headphones should be banned while riding after the spate of London cyclist deaths. Would that law have made a difference? No, not in the slightest.

Edit: to add to that, I am a driver and cyclist and I encounter issues on both sides on a daily basis, largely from those who think that they have a right to the road. I will happily pull other cyclists up on their behavior as I would other drivers, so calling me militant is a long way off the truth.
 
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Gilly said:
Pardon?
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You appeared to be taking issue with 'militant cyclists', who, as far as I can tell are the same people in this thread basically saying that people should be free to choose whether or not to wear a helmet and not be judged on it.

No?
 
One More Solo said:
I'm not being militant, I just think bringing up helmets detracts from the actual issues facing both cyclists and motorists and it really frustrates me. A bit like Boris Johnson immediately suggesting headphones should be banned while riding after the spate of London cyclist deaths. Would that law have made a difference? No, not in the slightest.
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There are various facets to the situation, I think the guy in the news story was particularly stupid. Firstly taking a kid out on the roads using pedal power in central London isn't something I would choose to do, much less more than one child. The fact that he had a problem with coppers trying to improve safety further exacerbates this.

That undoubtably motorists and their awareness is a problem isn't really the issue at hand. It is incumbent upon the individual himself to cover his duty of care as fully as possible. I don't believe he is.
 
lol, helmets don't protect people (be it snow sports or cycling). Just when GD does something really bad, it totally goes and redeems itself!

 
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D.P. said:
It it the same with helmets and snow sports, no clear evidence that they help. Sure there are scenarios that support wearing a helmet but most injuries are to the torso, wrists, knees and ankles. The reduction in head injuries for skiers and boarders has been shown to be not so much different to the reduction you would see if pedestrians walking down the high street wore helmets.

For the religious helmet wearer, would you wear a helmet walking down the street? You have similar odds of slipping or tripping and hitting your head?
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Not according to wiki, but then heck, I just edited it just to prove my point...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ski_helmet

Risks[edit]
As of October 2012, an average of 41.5 people per year have died while skiing or snowboarding in the US during the past 10 years, 1.06 deaths per million skier/snowboarder visits."[4] Most head injuries (74%) occur when skiers hit their head on the snow, 10% when they collided with other skiers, and 13% when they collided with fixed objects.[5] In 188 skiing and snowboarding related deaths, 108 of these had head injury as the primary cause of death.[6][7]

Evidence for effectiveness[edit]
Recent studies conclude that helmet use decreases the risk and severity of head injuries without increasing the risk of other injuries.[8][9] One meta-analysis of twelve studies found that those wearing a helmet were about two-thirds as likely to suffer a head injury as were those not wearing a helmet, strongly suggesting that helmets reduce the risk of head injury among skiers and snowboarders. There was no increase of neck injuries among wearers.[6]
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Gilly said:
There are various facets to the situation, I think the guy in the news story was particularly stupid. Firstly taking a kid out on the roads using pedal power in central London isn't something I would choose to do, much less more than one child. The fact that he had a problem with coppers trying to improve safety further exacerbates this.

That undoubtably motorists and their awareness is a problem isn't really the issue at hand. It is incumbent upon the individual himself to cover his duty of care as fully as possible. I don't believe he is.
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The police's job is not to improve safety though, it's to enforce the law. The guy was doing nothing wrong and therefore shouldn't have been stopped.
 
arknor said:
If he wasn't wearing a helmet the odds are he wouldn't have felt as safe so would have been more cautious
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VoG said:
Risk compensation. >>clicky clicky<<
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Wikipedia said:
In one experimental study, adults accustomed to wearing helmets cycled more slowly without a helmet, but no difference in helmeted and unhelmeted cycling speed was found for cyclists who do not usually wear helmets.
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So if he wasn't wearing a helmet, he might not have crashed assuming only that he would normally be wearing a helmet?
 
Gilly said:
There are various facets to the situation, I think the guy in the news story was particularly stupid. Firstly taking a kid out on the roads using pedal power in central London isn't something I would choose to do, much less more than one child. The fact that he had a problem with coppers trying to improve safety further exacerbates this.

That undoubtably motorists and their awareness is a problem isn't really the issue at hand. It is incumbent upon the individual himself to cover his duty of care as fully as possible. I don't believe he is.
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My read on this is that his issue was that he was pulled over despite doing nothing illegal. If a car driver was pulled over by the police despite having done nothing illegal and was given 'safety advice', I can imagine the uproar about our 'power mad police with nothing better to do'.

The issue at hand is that cyclists are dying on the streets. This might be because they were riding carelessly, it might be because other road users were behaving carelessly, it might be because the infrastructure for cyclists is not adequate. I don't know. I do know that there appears to be a view expressed in some places in the media, and echoed in part by people I've listened to is that 'none of this is a problem we should focus on until all cyclists wear helmets'. This idea that if you die riding a bike on the roads without wearing a helmet, then you 'had it coming'.

Lets stop people having accidents in the first place, rather than focussing on a piece of polystyrene that sits on the top half of your head.
 
growse said:
My read on this is that his issue was that he was pulled over despite doing nothing illegal. If a car driver was pulled over by the police despite having done nothing illegal and was given 'safety advice', I can imagine the uproar about our 'power mad police with nothing better to do'.
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What? I do that all the time.
 
One More Solo said:
The police's job is not to improve safety though, it's to enforce the law. The guy was doing nothing wrong and therefore shouldn't have been stopped.
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Is a policeman's only job to enforce the law?

If he sees something morally reprehensible taking place that isn't breaking the law (struggling to think of an example now, but I'm blaming it on my head cold) is he not able to say something?
 
In my early days of motorcycling and driving, I neither wore a seat belt or a helmet.

Often a car was not fitted with seatbelts and if it was, front seats only.
Seatbelts and helmets were not compulsory.

Ask me now and I would do both. They are both legal requirements and they make sense.

Riding without a helmet on private land or without a seatbelt now feels a tad scary even at low risk of collision or injury. I have become used to both. They exude a feeling of comfort.

I do not yet wear a helmet on a bicycle for my trip into the shops. perhaps I have not seen the sense in that yet.
 
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