In Vancouver, Canada there is another example of placing a 3D image on the street in order to get motorists to slow down. In this case it's an image of a child picking up a ball in the middle of the street.

In a previous post we highlighted a warning symbol on a road outside a Danish school. The child in the middle of the street is taking the idea to the next level.

Good idea? Bad idea? Some criticism includes that drivers will think that all children on the streets are 3D images and just run them over once they've figured out the system. A bit far-fetched. It's fair comment that motorists on these stretches WILL figure out that the 3D kid is just 3D and not worry much about it after a couple of days.Indeed, a test of fake 3D speed bumps in Phoenix had this result a few years back.

"Initially they were great," said the Phoenix Police traffic coordinator, Officer Terry Sills. "Until people found out what they were." According to Boingboing.net.

What about using a constantly changing series of images and placing them on the streets? The whole gimmick has legs because it's cheap to put into place. Stickers are cheaper than speed bumps. So keep switching the stickers.

Martin Lindstrom in his neuroscience book Buy-ology concluded that cigarette warning labels are very effective ads instead of warnings, the suggestion was that cigarette warnings should be changed regularly. So that the consumer was always kept thinking and forced to read the text instead of having a Pavlovian reaction upon seeing the same warning labels all the time.

We could also just cut to the chase and go the whole nine yards:

Or, since city councils are seemingly so unwilling to part with funding that will make serious improvements in traffic safety, why not sell adverts in the middle of the road? A holiday company or a soft drink?

Yeah, okay. Maybe not.Of course, redesigning the roads permanently is the best option to improve traffic safety and encourage cycling and pedestrians. But yuck! That costs money!Okay, here's another alternative from the Copenhagenize thinkthank. We have to be fair and include cyclists in such campaigns, of course. 3D texts with sensible messages for the different traffic users:

Variations could include Stop Fucking Hurting Innocent People!, Stop Fucking Polluting!, You Look Lovely on that Bicycle!, Enjoy Your Bicycle Ride! And so on.Over the top?

Via: the always excellent How We Drive blog by Tom Vanderbilt.

It’s been awhile since we’ve had a good dose of The Car Industry Strikes Back. Fortunately, one of our readers, Stephen, sent us a link to this beauty on twitter. It’s an advert from Australia. A company called NRMA who sell car insurance and provide roadside assistance, et al. This is just fantastic. It says it all. All of this global focus on not only bicycles but public transport, pedestrianiam and other tools for re-building liveable cities are making these people nervous. So nervous that they made an advert trying to hard-sell urban automobile culture. You may have noticed that this blog is rather bicycle-oriented so here’s a photographic response - using photos from our archives - of how all the situations above can be solved with human-powered transport. Off we go…

Situation: The man with the table:

 

Situation: People in costumes at a busstop.

Nothing wrong with taking a bus, but at 0:58 of the City of Cyclists video there’s a shot of kids in a cargo bike wearing costumes heading to a party.

Situation: Father and son going to rugby practice:

I had a load of other football training gear on my bicycle, too.

Situation: High heeled shoes:

Or the Bicycle & High Heels tag over at Copenhagen Cycle Chic.

Situation: Bus passengers:

Nothing wrong with public transport. But here’s a photo of busses and a cargo bike.

Situation: Leaf blower:

The ad agency who developed this advert are already getting kind of desperate and they’re only 14 seconds into their silly ad.

Situation: The man with the umbrella:

Apparently the NRMA advocate high-speed driving in urban areas as well as dangerous driving like buzzing the curb. Sooo last century.

There are loads more bicycle and umbrellas with this tag over at Cycle Chic. If we’re sticking to the theme, here’s a video of an umbrella getting blown the wrong way.

Situation: Science project falling.

Okay, it ain’t a science project, but it could be. There are loads of cargo photos in the Copenhagenize Cargo Bike set on Flickr. (Boy, is this ever an easy blogpost.)

Situation: Shopping bag breaking with a dog.

Loads of shopping … and a dog. Don’t forget the “40 photographs of dogs and bicycles in 6 countries” over at Cycle Chic.

Situation: Man with the shopping cart carrying something.

Yep. Too easy. Once again, allow me to refer you to the Cargo Bike set on Flickr.

More Shopping on Bikes

Since posting about mass-produced motoring helmets and later Protective Helmet-ish headbands for motorists I was curious to learn more about the latter, produced at the University of Adelaide.

It's taken a while but I finally recieved the study done in 2000 at the Road Accident Research Unit at the U of Adelaide, called CR 193: The development of a protective headband for car occupants (Andersen, White, McLean 2000).

A chap at Road Safety Policy, Department of Infrastructure & Transport in Australia was kind enough to send a link to the Australian Government website wherein the study is presented. I don't think cyclists should be bullied with helmet promotion and threatened with legislation when there exists a very real and present danger to car occupants. I think that the car lobby as well as the general population should be presented with more data and facts about the dangers of driving. It's only fair and logical. From the Australian report we can read about the background for the study: "Car crashes remain a significant source of head injury in the community. Car occupants have an annual hospital admission rate of around 90 per 100,000 population. Of drivers who are admitted to hospital, the most serious injury is usually to the head (O'Conner and Trembath, 1994). In a previous study, McLean et al. (1997) estimated the benefits that are likely to accrue to Australia from the use of padding of the upper interior of the passenger compartment. This study specifically examined the effects of the amendment to the United States Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard 201 (FMVSS 201) in which passenger cars have to pass head impact tests with the upper interior. That report estimated the total annual reduction in harm to the Australian community to be around $123 million.

But more impressive were the estimates of introducing protective headwear for car occupants. The authors of the report estimated that the annual reduction in harm would be in the order of $380 million. The benefit of padding the head is that the head is protected from strikes with unpadded automotive components, exterior objects and in vehicles that predate any eventual introduction of padded interiors."

These are Australian numbers so the numbers for annual reduction in harm would be even higher in the EU or US.

The tests were a success, which is great news for drivers and car occupants: "The results from Phase 3 indicate that a headband can greatly reduce the severity of an impact to the head. HIC was reduced by 25 percent [...] when compared with an impact with no headband."

The RARU headband prototype covers 44% of impact points usually suffered by car occupants. You can see on the photos at top that the protective area was actually extended when the prototype was designed so this 44% must be a bit higher. The researchers go on to recommend further work on the subject: "The results from Phase 3 indicate that a headband can greatly reduce the severity of an impact to the head. HIC was reduced by 25 percent [...] with the use of 25 mm of BB-38 polyurethane, and 67 percent with the honeycomb cardboard prototype, when compared with an impact with no headband."

"We recommend that further investigation is made into materials of a honeycomb structure to find a material of the correct crushing strength and durability. We also recommend that prototypes be developed further to be included in a testing program that would include other vehicle structures tested over a range of velocities."

It gets extremely difficult to ignore the bull when you're looking at this kind of science.

If we're serious, as societies, about really saving lives, these headbands should be promoted on all levels. There are two positive effects: One is that there will be fewer head injuries among car occupants. The other is that we would be informing people of the danger of driving and thereby branding driving as dangerous which will only serve the cause of encouraging people to consider safer transport options like... oh I don't know... cycling? Take the Poll:

Here's a link to the Australian Government website about the motorist headbands.

Here's the study as a .pdf: The Development of a Protective Headband for Car Occupants