Scary stuff - complaint to the ASA

Peter C is right - for TfL it's about getting 'normal' people out on bikes.

Personally i do wear a helmet and have also kept one of my husband's, from when he came off on the Mall - popped out of his spds at about 25mph, no cars, no one's fault - and the helmet has a whacking great crack down the middle. They are suprisingly brittle front-to-back (latitudanally? can't spell) rather than side to side, and I have heard of them snapping in bike bags when lugged around by baggage handlers at airports.

But I would rather the helmet had a crack in than my lovely husband's head.

Is there anywhere here I can go on about people wearing earphones on commutes? I need to rant but am new to the forum...

I think the reason why they are not wearing helmets etc on the TFL posters is to show that normal people, ie not people who post on here , can ride bikes in normal clothes .

Exactly and when the 7000 hire bike turn up in London next year the number of people riding without helmets or any form of kit at all will i assume skyrocket.
The message the TFL are trying to promote is that cycling is viable alternative for two/three mile journeys and in most people's eyes helmets = danger = off putting.

returning to the OP: "calm down dear, it is only a commercial"
ASA full code

ASA section 10 (safety)

Marketing communications should not condone or encourage unsafe practices. Particular care should be taken with marketing communications addressed to or depicting children

If the ASA ruled that the adverts had to show helmet use, my personal opinion is that they would be in breach of their own code. A picture of a lovely lady tootling through a park without a helmet isn't the same as a pic the same lady trying to bank at 45mph without a helmet on Oxford st.

If they havent made skateboarders wear them, they wont make bike riders..

Simon L3 , of Friday Night Ride to the Coast Fame, once told me that TFL wanted to increase bike use solely as a way of increasing capacity on buses and tubes. That is , if people ride bikes instead of using the Tube or the bus.
In fact, he said , TFL saw increasing bike use as the only way in the short to increase capacity in the short to medium term.

Simon L3 , of Friday Night Ride to the Coast Fame, once told me that TFL wanted to increase bike use solely as a way of increasing capacity on buses and tubes. That is , if people ride bikes instead of using the Tube or the bus.
In fact, he said , TFL saw increasing bike use as the only way in the short to increase capacity in the short to medium term.

We've been using a couple of variations of this argument, as 'capacity' does not equal 'capacity' when applied to different modes. Where motorised transport capacity is maximised, the results are usually unpleasant and wrong. That could happen with maximising bike capacity, too (e.g. if you tried to send hordes of bike riders down a narrow alleyway), but generally it has pleasant results.

There is of course the problem that if capacity across all modes is increased, radial journeys, of which London already has far too many, rise even further, but if you don't create capacity for the so-called 'mobility modes' (i.e. modes that primarily assist mobility as opposed to accessibility, which means private motorised transport in the main), you have a chance of not only advancing modal shift, but also changing journey patterns--e.g., creating a climate in which people can make more local journeys to access goods, services, and employment, and in which their need to travel is reduced.

So, yes, while 'capacity' talk is often worrying, it can also be beneficial, especially if engineers understand that concepts like 'cycle/pedestrian traffic capacity' are at least equally as important as that of motor traffic capacity.