The advertising campaign just rubs me the wrong way. They should be aggressively trying to get people on bikes NOT scaring people off them.
this x1000
public health knows that people have much worse health outcomes from being inactive than from riding bikes
this goes for personal health outcomes, and for health-care system expenditures
given the rising rates of general and childhood obesity, and decreasing rates of childhood physical activity across north america, vch and the like should be doing everything they can to get more people out on bikes
fear-mongering campaigns like this one do exactly the opposite - they frame mountain biking as dangerous, and reduce its appeal, thereby depressing activity, instead of actually improving safety outcomes - and the public health officers at vch know this, which makes this campaign doubly foolish
they should have thrown the money and time at an initiative like trips for kids, which has been working for over 10 years to get underprivelleged kids in metro vancouver out on the trails, and teaching them both how to be safe and to love riding and being active
http://tfkvancouver.org
"Nobody really gives a shit that you don't like the thing that you have no firsthand experience with." Dave