The Helmet Debate

In the cycling arena, nothing has been more hotly debated or more polarizing than the debate about the merits of mandatory helmet laws.

Carla Danley is a former emergency room nurse who has seen her fair share of head injuries. She has also been a daily bicycle rider since 2009 when, at age 50, she moved to Portland, OR, and launched headlong into the city’s vibrant bike scene. In Portland, bicycling verges on the mainstream.

Danley is one of many who choose to wear a helmet every time they ride. “It’s in my marriage contract,” she said. Her husband lost his teenage sister after she was struck by a car while on a cross-Canada bike trip. “One of the things I give him credit for is: when we moved to Oregon, I was like, ‘I’m going to get rid of my car and ride a bike’, and he has always been behind me 100 percent,” she said. “But he is really clear that he wants me to use bike lights at night and have a helmet on all the time. And I’m good with that.”

Across the globe, in Western Australia, Sue Abbott, a 50-year-old mother of four who has cycled for transportation for 46 years, has never worn a bike helmet. Even after 1991 when Australia became the first country to pass a law requiring them for adults and children, she rode helmet-free, an act that soon earned her a stiff ticket.

Abbott emerged victorious last August from a string of court battles over her right to cycle bare-headed in her town of Scone, New South Wales. Aiding her suit was the embattled and contradictory state of scientific research on helmet use.

Since the helmet question is one of the most fiercely debated and polarized issues in transportation bicycling, the question is, which is more important: personal freedom or a precautionary approach that mandates defensive cycling? Should the government step in to enforce head protection or should the onus be on the individual? The science is murky, but the political philosophies in question are sharply delineated.

A Brief History of Helmets and Laws

For much of the history of the bicycle there were no helmets, only protective leather caps occasionally worn by bike racers, motorists, aeronauts, rugby players and mountaineers.

Helmets, as we know them today, did not exist until 1975, when Bell Sports introduced the first polystyrene model to the United States market. First constructed to protect the skull by crushing on impact, there has been little aesthetic or material innovation in their design until recent years.

Now, in North America, fanciful or sleek helmet shells with minimal venting, such as those made by Nutcase and Bern, are becoming popular among utility cyclists. In Europe, the Ribcap – a knit hat with soft inserts that harden on impact – is all the rage for bicycling and skiing.

The first mandatory bicycle helmet laws that went into effect in California in 1987 and New York in 1989 applied only to young children who were passengers on a bike. Since then, laws passed across North America and the world mostly govern children under 16 years of age.