To think this is so unsafe…

[MyBadHabitsLeadToYou]

Parents with toddlers on the back of the bike, cycling on busy city roads with the buses and the crazy drivers.

Howwww is this legal?! When the rules on car seats are so strict.

And don’t even start me on those flimsy trailer things that are so low down they couldn’t be seen from a large car.

Am I missing something??

Cars are noisy, polluting, people drive them dangerously and they make you fat. I wish it was safer to cycle on the roads so that more people could do it.

@vinoandbrie

Someone can be the best cyclist in the world, but that does not account for the car drivers all around them, who could be dangerous drivers, or drunk or drug drivers. I’m astonished that people put their children in these trailers or bicycle seats.

I've found I've been more at risk from drivers like that as a pedestrian rather than a cyclist. Mainly because I think they will stop and obey the law when I'm in the middle of a zebra crossing or walking through the green man at a pelican crossing.

Tresal

Cars are noisy, polluting, people drive them dangerously and they make you fat. I wish it was safer to cycle on the roads so that more people could do it.

Indeed. So do I. It isn’t, though.
Until it is, small children don’t belong in trailers or bike seats (or ski backpacks 😡)

Cars are noisy, polluting, people drive them dangerously and they make you fat. I wish it was safer to cycle on the roads so that more people could do it.

Totally agreed. I wish there was more infrastructure for bicycles, more public transport, more tax on private cars, and less of a culture of “you have to own a car”.

But MN is a place where women are advised not to date a man who doesn’t drive, so not the best place for saying cars are shit and are killing us all. Better to blame the cyclists, as they’re not on MN anyway!

The problem here is not the cyclists...

Oh fgs. Yes be aware of dangers and have opinions but don't say the trailers should be illegal - I have used one on car-free country tracks and huge cycle tracks in woodlands. Saying they should be illegal is a bit much.

I’m so worried about the environment amd the effects of pollution on health and wish cycling were far more supported in our infrastructure than it is, so that it becomes more feasible for more people.

But this ideological stance doesn’t, unfortunately, change the current practicalities, much as I wish it did.

You can be the most careful cyclist in the world, but you are totally at the mercy of the skill and care of the car, bus, lorry and motorbike drivers around you. And many drivers are careless. If a trailer is hit by a vehicle anybody in it is far far more vulnerable than they would be in a car. The smaller the child, the more vulnerable.

Unlike pedestrians, bikes are on the road, not the pavement. When I cross the road I can take care to be careful and mitigate most (tho not all) of the risks that a careless driver might pose to me or my child. It’s less easy to do on a bike.

There’s no way I’d take the risk of having my DC in one of the trailers as things stand - just not worth it. I do wish the powers that be would make it so it were a more practical and safe option, though.

The stats speak for themselves. It is far safer to transport your child on your bike than in your car. Then there's the convenience and the environmental benefits.

Anyone who agrees with the principle that cycling (or indeed walking) should be safer for children should write to their MP to ask them to consider plans for safer cycling routes in all towns/cities even villages across the UK. IMO city centres should be pedestrianised where possible with routes for public transport and cyclists. This would be safer for everyone, reduce air pollution, allow non cyclists to get into the centre on public transport. Massive overhauls of how we travel are needed if we are going to tackle climate change and our children’s future.

Risk isn't always as clear cut as you think.

In the Netherlands lots of people cycle, yet it's not compulsory to wear cycle helmets. Apparently, when they brought in a law to mandate safety helmets, deaths/injury went up. Why? Because the helmet law put people off cycling meaning more people used cars. The motor traffic increased and so did the risk of accidents. Helmets were made optional again and the accident numbers went down.

That doesn't mean of course that for an individual it's not safer to wear a helmet, but overall a law you'd expect to reduce injury lead to more/worse injuries.

@MyBadHabitsLeadToYou

Parents with toddlers on the back of the bike, cycling on busy city roads with the buses and the crazy drivers.

Howwww is this legal?! When the rules on car seats are so strict.

And don’t even start me on those flimsy trailer things that are so low down they couldn’t be seen from a large car.

Am I missing something??

Sadly car seat rules and laws aren’t even that strict!! Most seats now say you can forward face your children at 9kg and a lot of the seats for sale in Mamas and Papas, Mothercare (when it was open), Halfords (the worst!), supermarkets etc are all done to very basic testing of a 30mph crash. Compared to the Swedish Plus Test etc our car seat regs are shocking.

Children should be rear facing at least until 4yrs old. When the crash statistics and information about what happens to the immature skeleton of young children etc is readily available, it’s absolutely astounding that any parent would turn their child forward facing at 9kg.

But yes I agree with regards to the flimsy little seats on the back of bikes, they offer zero protection to the tiny fragile body of a toddler. And while bike accidents may happen less often than car accidents, they do still happen.

This thread is increasingly reading like Fahrenheit 451

namesnamesnamesnames

Oh fgs. Yes be aware of dangers and have opinions but don't say the trailers should be illegal - I have used one on car-free country tracks and huge cycle tracks in woodlands. Saying they should be illegal is a bit much“

Yes, you’re right, I was exclusively thinking of city and town traffic.

Illegal on A roads and above.

The comments arguing a car could hit you are no less silly than saying that pushchairs are entirely unsafe as they offer no side impact protection and you are gasp walking through the town centre, quite often crossing roads.

For a car travelling at 30mph to hit you they must be doing something seriously wrong, in which case they could just as likely hit you when you’re walking across the road.

You can’t even compare a car seat designed for cars travelling up to 70mph to a bloody bicycle travelling 15mph at most.

The comments arguing a car could hit you are no less silly than saying that pushchairs are entirely unsafe as they offer no side impact protection and you aregaspwalking through the town centre, quite often crossing roads.

If someone had put their child in a pram really low to the ground and was pulling them along behind them I'd also think that was reckless.

@Totallydefeated

I’m so worried about the environment amd the effects of pollution on health and wish cycling were far more supported in our infrastructure than it is, so that it becomes more feasible for more people.

But this ideological stance doesn’t, unfortunately, change the current practicalities, much as I wish it did.

You can be the most careful cyclist in the world, but you are totally at the mercy of the skill and care of the car, bus, lorry and motorbike drivers around you. And many drivers are careless. If a trailer is hit by a vehicle anybody in it is far far more vulnerable than they would be in a car. The smaller the child, the more vulnerable.

Unlike pedestrians, bikes are on the road, not the pavement. When I cross the road I can take care to be careful and mitigate most (tho not all) of the risks that a careless driver might pose to me or my child. It’s less easy to do on a bike.

There’s no way I’d take the risk of having my DC in one of the trailers as things stand - just not worth it. I do wish the powers that be would make it so it were a more practical and safe option, though.

Agree with all of this. I care about the environment and I would love to start cycling again. Would never put my kid on the back though. You have no control if there's a reckless driver behind you- anything could happen. Not worth the risk whatsoever

@starpatch

Well I did this with DS but admittedly never on main roads. Only on quiet roads where traffic was pretty slow. I am astounded though that we are not making anywhere near the changes we need to make to prevent climate change. As a result of that it seems to me that my grandchildren are going to starve. Doesn't that bother anyone?

it bothers me.

I say this to DH EVERY single time I see one of those things. I can't believe someone would put their child at risk like that.

But, to be fair, I think in country parks and bike trails (i.e where no traffic is allowed) they're OK. Wouldn't use one myself because I'd still worry about crashing the bike, but at least you're not at the mercy of terrible/drunk drivers.

@Mumtwoboys90

i absolutely hate trailers too most of the time kids have no helmets and aren't strapped in properly they are not designed for busy roads and i think its mental that parents think its ok to put their children at risk..totally different story somewhere like holland where everyone cycles and there armt many cars

they are not designed to be used with helmets.

It’s so weird to see this thread as I saw a really tiny baby in one of those low trailers today and mentioned it to DH.

The parents were cycling up an incredibly busy road in the middle of a major city. Buses, scooters, cars, people absolutely everywhere you looked. It just felt like a lot of unnecessary risk.

I agree that the pollution and the poor visibility of these at such a low level is scary. Children on proper bike seats behind their parents look a lot safer.

I’m not sure which type of trailers people are talking about then… our bike trailer is the same height as my stroller! The children are also strapped in, with helmets on, and then it is zipped up so none of the ‘flailing around’ ‘arms sticking’ out that posters seem to suggest here.

The posts about emissions are even more ridiculous. Your child walking along the pavement is also at exhaust height.. but I’m guessing that doesn’t cause you much lost sleep at night?

The comparisons on this thread are really ridiculous and have completely lost the sentiment of the original thread. I personally wouldn’t take my children on a dual carriageway in a bike trailer like some of these comments suggest, but then I wouldn’t walk with a pushchair on a dual carriageway either. In the city where I am frequently crossing the road anyway, why an earth would I not use my bike with a trailer in the cycle lane?

The stats speak for themselves. It is far safer to transport your child on your bike than in your car.

How are you assessing this? Simply looking at numbers of deaths and serious injuries per year in cars v trailers is meaningless.

Stats are only useful if they’re sufficiently granular, ie adjust for things like miles travelled, number of journeys, type of road, etc.

Eg, if you compare two head on collisions where one vehicle is travelling at 45mph and the other at 30mph and one involved a trainer and one a car, then you can make a meaningful comparison (though you’d need to compare far more journeys to get robust data). Which child suffers worse injuries- the one in the car going at 25mph or the one in the trailer going at 25mph (I’d be surprised if it’d be the one in the car...)? THAT’S a meaningful comparison.

Simply looking at deaths per year and ignoring the fact that there are many more car journeys and miles travelled in cars and that a proportion of those will be on motorways and dual carriageways, whereas the trailers will mostly be ridden on smaller, slower roads, tells you absolutely nothing about relative safety.

@SeaShoreGalore

I think they look great. If you’re bothered about their safety, maybe have a think about driving more carefully in future.

This. This times a million

@Booknooks

Also at a nice height to breathe in all of those lovely fumes from traffic, mmm. I agree OP, some of those trailers are ridiculous, I wonder how stringent the safety testing is?

don't drive then and think of the children

I saw a woman cycling along a main road, with a child in a car seat behind, one balanced in front of her and shopping bags on the handlebars. None of them wore helmets.

Aside from any other concerns, I would have thought that the centre of gravity would be altered, making the bike more difficult to control. All the nearby drivers were giving her a very wide berth.