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Road safety tips from Sweden

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Re: Road safety tips from Sweden

#11

Post by alkonaut »

Pushing a big 3.5yo into a rear facing seat is hard, even in Sweden, and I doubt it's very common to keep kids rear facing up to 4 here. We do listen to authorities but it's nearly physically impossible after they reach a certain length. I believe most start using front facing seats some time between ages 3 and 4 depending on size.

One problem with rear facing seats and large children is that it requires a LOT of space in the car, if you want to fit more people in it. A rear facing seat for a 3yo behind the front passenger seat will make the front passenger space tiny in all but the largest cars.

If you look around europe you'll find that countries that traditionally use small cars (France, Italy, Britain) probably don't use rear facing seats as much. What part of this is cause and what is effect I don't know, but you won't find many families with small children driving compact cars in Sweden like you do in say the UK or Italy. I saw someone in the UK describe a golf as a "family hatchback" at one point. That person hadn't been in the front passenger seat of a Golf with a rear facing child seat behind (The front seat is then nearly touching the glove compartment).

Re: Road safety tips from Sweden

#13

Post by rightnow »

alkonaut wrote: post #11

Pushing a big 3.5yo into a rear facing seat is hard, even in Sweden, and I doubt it's very common to keep kids rear facing up to 4 here. We do listen to authorities but it's nearly physically impossible after they reach a certain length. I believe most start using front facing seats some time between ages 3 and 4 depending on size. One problem with rear facing seats and large children is that it requires a LOT of spa…

Father of two twin kids at 3.5 years. Its not hard at all. They climb in themselves, and if u have a seat with adjustable iso-fix bars you get enough room for the front seats.

Re: Road safety tips from Sweden

#15

Post by ygra »

klausjensen wrote: post #7
bartkappenburg wrote: post #2

Here's a map that shows how many deaths in traffic are occuring per 1 million inhabitants in europe: https://etsc.eu/wp-content/uploads/map_twitter.png

Source for the above, but interactive. Check out the infographic, where you can "turn back time" and see how much traffict deaths have been reduced. Europe goes from almost bright red to green/yellow over 15 years.

I'm assuming you meant to share the following: https://infogram.com/road_safety_progress_2016

Re: Road safety tips from Sweden

#16

Post by hippish »

kalleboo wrote: post #4
bartkappenburg wrote: post #2

Here's a map that shows how many deaths in traffic are occuring per 1 million inhabitants in europe: https://etsc.eu/wp-content/uploads/map_twitter.png

I thought the relevant statistic was deaths per kilometer traveled? Otherwise you get countries where people simply drive more skewed higher despite any given ride being just as safe/safer.

Yeah, that ought to skew the results a bit. Looks like the top countries remain the same though https://read.oecd-ilibrary.org/transport/road-safety-annual-...

Re: Road safety tips from Sweden

#17

Post by sdhgaiojfsa »

kalleboo wrote: post #4
bartkappenburg wrote: post #2

Here's a map that shows how many deaths in traffic are occuring per 1 million inhabitants in europe: https://etsc.eu/wp-content/uploads/map_twitter.png

I thought the relevant statistic was deaths per kilometer traveled? Otherwise you get countries where people simply drive more skewed higher despite any given ride being just as safe/safer.

There are a lot of ways to slice the data, and each of them tells a different part of the story. Suppose two countries have the exact same number of fatalities per km, and the same population, but one country drives twice as much. It is still a relevant fact that the country that drives twice as much has twice as many deaths. Policies that discourage driving will help reduce death rates in that country.

Re: Road safety tips from Sweden

#18

Post by sjwright »

TomK32 wrote: post #9
bartkappenburg wrote: post #2

Here's a map that shows how many deaths in traffic are occuring per 1 million inhabitants in europe: https://etsc.eu/wp-content/uploads/map_twitter.png

In Greece you can buy little metal plugs for your sealtbelt socket so you don't have to use the seatbelt and don't get the error beeps from the car. I'm sure it does contribute to the fatality rate.

I don't get why anyone would want that. At no time in the two decades I've been driving a car, I've never, ever, ever thought to myself "This seatbelt is annoying, I wish I didn't have to use it."

I don't even recall ever thinking that as a child passenger.

Re: Road safety tips from Sweden

#19

Post by distances »

icc97 wrote: post #5

90% of the article is about forward/backward facing child seats. But also the article spells out the the paper it was based on falsely claimed there was a significant difference between them and was retracted, restudied and agreed to not be statistically significant. Then it goes on to say, that Sweden does use rear-facing seats as though that somehow proves that there is a statistical significance. Seems like the ar…

> Because accidents are inevitable, Swedish regulations aim to make them nonlethal.

I sometimes wonder how it would be possible to just adopt new laws and regulations wholesale from countries that have aimed to do a thing well, and succeeded. I know countries take ideas from each other, but it always seems to be small things and adapted with local modifications. Laws are obviously not for "move fast and break things" approach, but feels like we could achieve so much more.

Re: Road safety tips from Sweden

#20

Post by jopsen »

This article talks a lot about child seats... And only mentions the important parts speed bumps, separation of traffic and requirements for driving licenses.

I like speed bumps, bus lock, and round abouts... These features are self-enforcing and violators are punished with swift justice.

When you run over a speed bump too fast, the good old laws of physics will meter out an immediate punishment :)

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