Showing posts with label baby carriers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label baby carriers. Show all posts

19 October 2020

Bringing Up Baby (Carrier)

According to an urban legend, red cars get more speeding tickets than vehicles of other colors.  That's almost true:  Red cars came in second to, interestingly, white cars in a recent study.  Surprisingly (at least to me), gray and silver came in third and fourth, respectively.

I thought of that study when I came across a report of a Belgian study.  According to researchers, bicycles with baby carriers attached to their rears are given a wider berth by motorists, whether or not there's a baby in the carrier.  Cyclists with child-towing trailers are also given more room by drivers, according to this study.

Carlton Reid, the excellent transportation reporter for Forbes, makes an intriguing (and, I believe, valid) point:  Drivers, whether consciously or unconsciously, might give more room to cyclists they deem more "worthy."  Someone riding with a child or baby in tow is seen as doing something that contributes to the welfare and mental health of that child or baby, while the single cyclist--especially if he or she is young--incurs the resentment, and even wrath, of drivers who see us as "privileged."


Photo by Constance Bannister, New York State, 1946


Hmm...Maybe I should attach a carrier--or trailer--to one of my bikes.  Can you see someone weighing down his $12,000 S-Works rig with one?