Friday Morning Commute - So much for getting dates on your bike commute

I expect to see everyone wearing one of these as soon as they come on the market. If you don't think it works, try smashing your face into the pavement without one.

• A profile of Proteus Bicycles in College Park. "But while the bike-lined walls and vast inventory have created many loyal customers, the shop is as much a social hangout as it is a business. On weekends, workers and friends take customers on rides throughout area trails and on Thursdays, they gather for a potluck from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m., in line with a long tradition of serving visitors more than spokes and wheels."
• Call of Duty Ride comes to DC. "The 24 cyclists are half Americans and half Australian—united in their call of duty. They are all first responders—pedaling more than 2,600 miles together in memory of the men and women who paid the ultimate sacrifice defending our freedom." They're heading to NYC for the 11th anniversary of 9/11.
• Pittsburgh cyclist stabbed in possible road rage incident. 
• Not from the Onion: A couple of researchers are studying the utility of a facial protection mask for cyclists. 
• Bike crashes in Chicago are up 38% since 2000, but bike commuting is up 140% over the same time. And those 2001 numbers don't include doorings which account for about 1 in 5 crashes. The 2011 numbers do. One problem that Chicago has identified is the short yellow cycle - it may not allow enough time for a cyclist who enters on a green to clear the intersection. "city transportation officials say that the yellow lights there — as well as all others in the city — are set according to federal standards based on the speed limit and that changing them would open up the city to lawsuits in the event of crashes.  Still, the standards “are time-tested recommendations developed over many, many years by many committees, so sometimes they’re not quite up to date in terms of how cities are changing quickly, especially with bikes,” says Luann Hamilton, a CDOT deputy" commissioner.

Comments

[MM]

Seems like changing the yellow timing would be a no-brainer. My understanding is that simply lengthening yellow times helps decrease red light-running accidents by a pretty significant margin, and this is a strategy being employed by a lot of municipalities lately.

[Jim T]

Can you point me to the source for dooring being responsible for about 1 in 5 crashes in Chicago? Advocates need this type of info when trying to persuade officials to reconsider door-zone bike lanes.

An NYC report had dooring (and door-evasion) responsible for 2% of fatalities over a 10-year period.

I imagine that this figure varies greatly depending on whether bike routes have parallel parking.

[washcycle]

JimT, it's at the link above. Look at the caption for the graph "of the 1757 Chicago crashes in 2011, 353 involved dooring")

[Microzen]

I didn't realize the size and color of your cycle could cause crashes. I'll stick to my medium blue cycle.

[SJE]

A lot of cities have shortened their yellow signals at some intersection, and many believe it is an attempt to get more money out of motorist. Whether true or not, it makes it harder for cyclists and especially pedestrians.

[charlie]

20% of crashes, 2% of fatalities.

[UrbanEngineer]

http://www.thecochranelibrary.com/userfiles/ccoch/file/Safety_on_the_road/CD001855.pdf

I read this study a while back and they concluded:
"important future research in bicycle helmet effectiveness might examine the protective effect of helmets with mouth and face guards."

Didn't think anybody was actually going to fund this research.

[SJE]

I am the proud owner of various facial scars from bikes, but nothing so serious that I think justifies wearing this ridiculous helmet.

OK, ifyou are doing downhill mountain biking, you are likely to crash at high speed.

For the rest of us, a high speed crash is most likely from a car striking the cyclist. Perhaps driver education is the better solution.

[Dan]

As to the new bike helmet with face shield - just put a metal grill over the mouth opening for that "Hannibal Lecter Goes Biking" look.

[david]

I am not certian but I think wearing a "mask" is illegal in D.C.
I think it is important to wear gloves,the frist thing most people do is to put thier hand to the ground in a crash in an attemp to break their fall.

[washcycle]

I would have gone with Bane.

[dynaryder]

Been wearing a balaclava over my face for the past 6 winters;never got pulled over by the police.

Have those highly-intelligent scientists ever seen a full-face downhill helmet? You really don't need to reinvent the wheel.

[Michael H.]

Hannibal Lecter, Jason Voorhees and Michael Myers all endorse the face mask. So what's the problem?

[Michael H.]

I noticed a different system in a situation where serious head injuries are likely to occur, i.e., BMX racing. Many of the riders at the Olympic BMX heats wore extensive head AND neck protection that prevented the head from snapping back in a violent collision.

In that situation, I could understand. Almost every heat I watched on TV resulted in one or more riders crashing. While not all of them involved head contact, some of them did.

However, BMX is a very aggressive sport. It doesn't resemble bike commuting or fitness road riding. (Well, at least for most people.) So no, I won't be sporting the Halloween look this fall.

[just another rider]

regarding the legality of masks in D.C., it IS illegal, but only when doing something that would be otherwise illegal or intending on scaring.

See http://www.anapsid.org/cnd/mcs/maskcodes.html, the person compiled a list of related information.

(how strange I should find it today)

[SJE]

But isn't riding on the road and impeding traffic illegal? So many drivers tell me it is.

[contrarian]

The last time I had the little contrarians at the orthodontist there was a poster promoting mouth guard use for all sports where tooth injury is possible. Some you'd expect, like football and hockey, but they also recommended mouth guards for baseball, soccer and biking. Of course soccer is the only one of those sports where helmet use is not now the norm. Not to fear, there is now a movement afoot to introduce head protection into soccer.