Yolo County, California, is a suburban and rural county with a large percentage of children who use their bicycles to travel to school. In addition, the City of Davis and its surrounding area are well-known as the nation's "bicycle capitol," where bicycles are used both for recreation and as a primary source of transportation. The city contains 37 miles of bicycle lanes and 20 miles of bicycle paths for a population of 46,000. Consistently, Yolo County has had a much larger percentage than the statewide average of motor vehicle collisions involving pedestrians and bicyclists. In the county, 88.5 percent of the people reported injured in bicycle collisions were not wearing a bicycle helmet at the time. Of those who did not wear helmets, 40 percent were under the age of 15. Helmet use in the general population was well under 50 percent.

GOALS AND OBJECTIVES

Yolo County has a Bicycle/Pedestrian Injury Prevention Program whose goal is to establish a long-term, community-based, self-sustaining traffic safety program responsive to the problems and priorities identified by the Yolo County Bicycle and Pedestrian Injury Prevention Committee. The goals of the bicycle safety education program are to:

• Increase the use of bicycle helmets by Yolo County bicyclists at least 10 percent over a three-year period
• Reduce financial barriers to bicycle helmet purchase
• Conduct bicycle safety education programs, including presentations and rodeos, for children and parents
• Train community members as instructors for project continuation
• Establish bicycle helmet policies for Yolo county schools.

STRATEGIES AND ACTIVITIES

The program, implemented in 1993, targeted elementary school youth, parents and other adults. The focus was two-fold: increasing helmet use to prevent injury and death and knowing and following the laws regulating bicycle use. Classroom presentations and bicycle rodeos heightened students' and parents' awareness of important bicycle handling skills. Volunteers and other bicycle safety agency personnel were trained on how to provide bicycle safety presentations to youth.

RESULTS

During the three-year project, 85 presentations were made reaching 2,281 students. Almost 550 children were provided with a bicycle rodeo program and 536 bicycle helmets were provided to low-income youth and adults. Bicycle helmet use by youth increased well over the goal of 10 percent. At one unannounced survey done at an elementary school after the program, helmet use was 99 percent!

All 37 public and private elementary schools in Yolo County were provided with an elementary school curriculum guide developed as a result of the program. All schools implemented a bicycle helmet policy.

In addition, a program was developed to train trainers to conduct the bicycle safety presentations and rodeos. Ten additional counties participated in the training program.