I have fallen off my bike twice. 1989 and 2003. Both were embarrassing stops where I couldn't pull my feet out of toe straps in time. I feel that clipless pedals are much, much safer than straps and cages.

With straps, I had to anticpate my stops and reach down and loosen them or risk falling. Otherwise, I had to ride with them so loose that they really didn't do anything for my pedal stroke. With clipless, I need to anticpate them a little, but I can still unclip quickly. The only time I ever felt unsafe with clipless was on a technical offroad descent on a mountain bike. But straps would have been even worse.

I ride clipless in traffic a lot. If I ever needed to stop so fast that I didn't have time to unclip, I'm probably going into a skid and will be going down anyway.

I'm trying to put into words the benefits of clipless over straps and cages, but I just can't.