Originally Posted by Observer

I always ride on the sidewalk especially when just cruising on through. If I wish to ride fast, I ride either on a bike trail, or in the alley. From my point of view, riding in the street is far more dangerous than riding on the sidewalk, especially a sidewalk in a residential or industrial neighborhood. Street bikers face too many hazards when riding in the street, for instance, getting whacked by an opening car door, getting broadsided and/or even rear ended by a reckless driver, getting crushed between vehicles at a left turn, and getting mowed down by truckers, especially when it is an 18 wheeler. And in many of those kinds of cases, a helmet would provide no protection, as when you are on a bicycle, an impact as low as 25 miles per hour can and will still kill or maim you by breaking your neck. And I am sure that there are hundreds of quadriplegics out there who were once avid bikers and then one day while riding in the street and wearing their helmets, they got hit by a motor vehicle and the impact left them permanently wheelchair bound. Even outside of Illinois, not all drivers will watch where they are going, and in fact, Illinois travellers have driven through every single other state in the nation, including Alaska and Hawaii.