OPP, McDonald’s promote safe biking

What do bicycle helmets and ice cream have in common? Well, if you’re a student in the district, wearing one can win you the other.
The OPP, in conjunction with McDonald’s, has been conducting a series of safe cycling clinics at various schools here over the last month and will continue to do so throughout July.
The bike rodeo is designed to teach young people (Grades 1-4) the basic rules of the road and how to operate a bicycle safely.
“We’re trying to teach them at an early age how to develop safe habits,” explained Fort Frances OPP Cst. Dereck McLean, who is one of the officers in charge of the program.
Yesterday, Cst. McLean and Cst. Caroline Spencer were holding their “road show” at Wal-Mart. With them were a group of Grade 3-4 students from F.H. Huffman School.
The officers had laid out a course in the parking lot that duplicated a miniature section of streets—complete with stop signs.
The children were shown the proper hand signals to indicate turns and stopping, as well as how to ascertain the condition of their bicycles.
Each of them also had their bikes evaluated from a safety perspective and were given some basic maintenance tips.
And to keep things from becoming too dull, coloured chalk was provided, which many of the students put to good use by drawing pictures, patterns, and hop-scotch courts.
But the overriding theme was safety and that, said Cst. McLean, begins with bike helmets.
“We’d like it [wearing helmets] to become automatic, something they don’t even have to think about,” he remarked. “It’s like seatbelts. When it becomes a habit, you don’t tend to forget.”
Bike helmets are mandatory in Ontario for all cyclists under the age of 18, but Cst. McLean said he’d also like to see more adults wearing helmets since it sets the example.
The bike rodeo clinics will continue until the end of the school year, to be followed in July by at least one big clinic to take in all the people who have been missed.
Then the fun starts.
“Throughout the summer, officers will be stopping kids on bikes who are wearing helmets and giving them gift certificates from McDonald’s,” he noted. “It’s a kind of reward system.”
These certificates are redeemable for an ice cream cones at McDonald’s.