The prohibition on plastic straws drew most of the attention, but the new year also began with a more under-the-radar ban: biking with headphones.
Cyclists caught riding with headphones, a headset, or earplugs in both ears are now subject to a $50 fine. The new restriction is one of several updated traffic regulations that went into effect in 2019, including fine increases for dangerous driving, as Mayor Muriel Bowser’s administration works to fulfill a pledge to eliminate traffic fatalities by 2024.
Last year, 36 people were killed in traffic accidents, including three bicyclists, in D.C. — the highest fatality rate in a decade. In addition to the new fines, the city has also installed pylons to make left turns safer, increased walk times at dozens of intersections, and is working to ban right turns on red lights at 100 intersections.
In the first six weeks the new headphones rule was in effect, no cyclists were fined.
DDOT and the Metropolitan Police Department did not offer specifics when asked how the rule will be enforced. In an e-mailed statement, MPD said it relies on “a combination of education and enforcement in partnership with DDOT.”
“Our intention isn’t to issue an abundance of tickets,” MPD wrote. “We would rather have the public be aware of this new requirement, which was enacted in order to ensure cyclists are more aware of their surroundings and to keep our streets safe.”
David Cranor, a Ward 6 representative on the Bicycle Advisory Council, is doubtful it will be effective or enforced. “As a BAC member, I can say I don’t think this is where they should be putting their time and effort,” he said. ”I don’t think there’s any evidence that this is going to reduce deaths.”
Several other states have similar laws on the books — including California, Florida, and the District’s neighboring jurisdictions in Maryland and Virginia (while the laws in Maryland and Virginia restrict the use of headphones for all moving vehicles, D.C.’s rule only targets applies only to cyclists).
The District Department of Transportation first proposed the rule change in 2017, and it drew criticism from advocates and other observers. The final version that passed the Council acknowledges the opposition during the public comment period, but goes on to justify the rule change based on the agency’s review of the riskiness, enforceability, and “intentionality” of the behavior.
“The headphones thing is sort of like a big question mark,” says Colin Browne, communications director at the Washington Area Bicyclist Association. “How did this end up bundled in with increased fines for driving thirty miles an hour over the speed limit, which is obviously something that kills people?”
But at least one party of cyclists is enthusiastic about the rule’s potential to make city trails and roads safer.
“In terms of the context of the law, I do understand where they’re coming from,” says
David Nghiem, a regular bicycle commuter and the COO of the Bethesda-based startup Conduit Sports.
He finds it frustrating how cyclists wearing headphones often tune out their surroundings to the detriment of others on the road. “I’m yelling out ‘on your left,’ and I yell out for a fifth time, ‘on your left’ — they still don’t hear me when I’m going around them.”
Nghiem’s company designs headphones that allow users to hear music and their ambient surroundings at the same time (the product’s tagline? “Hear Your Music Without Getting Runover”). Conduit’s model sits on the outside of the ear — a potential workaround for the new regulation, which only restricts the use of headphones that “cover both ears.” It isn’t exactly clear if it would pass the scrutiny of an officer out to enforce the new regulation (“We’re trying to get confirmation from the Council on that,” Nghiem said).
Those opposed to the rule still generally agree that riding with headphones is not the safest of biking practices. It’s “probably, like, not quite as great as riding without headphones,” Browne says. But “there’s an important distinction between a good personal decision and good public policy.”
And since the current phrasing of the rule doesn’t make exceptions for hearing aids, advocates are also concerned the rule unfairly sets hearing as a precedent for safe biking in a city with a large deaf bicycling community.
DDOT asserts the headphones rule is designed to “make the roads safer regardless of the modes of transportation,” a spokesperson said via an email.
Scientific data on the subject is almost non-existent. That which does exist is inconclusive, offering limited evidence both for and against such a ban.
“The whole premise of using Vision Zero as a way to guide your policy changes is you’re using data-defined decision-making to target dangerous behavior,” Browne says. “In the case of headphones, we don’t actually have any data showing that this happens with any frequency, that it causes crashes, or that those crashes cause death or serious injury.”
Ward 3 Councilmember Mary Cheh and others believe the rule is at least in part meant to deflect criticism from drivers over the increased fines included in the rest of the rulemaking.
“It’s in part to inoculate themselves against that pushback,” Cheh said. “To say, no no, we’re going after everybody, we want everybody to be safe.”
“This is what they needed to do in order to make this pill swallowable,” says Cranor, the Bicycle Advisory Council representative.
The vast majority of traffic tickets go to drivers: 99 percent of all officer-initiated traffic tickets in the District were given to motorists in 2017, according to MPD.
“If you actually explore it, there are so many better things we could do” to increase safety, says Cheh. “Not that it’s a zero sum game, but why do this?”
This story has been updated to accurately attribute a quote and to clarify that the law applies to cyclists wearing headphones in both ears.
