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Effects of large vehicles on pedestrian and pedal-cyclist injury severity

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Re: Effects of large vehicles on pedestrian and pedal-cyclist injury severity

#101

Post by Neil44 »

sonofhans wrote: post #3

> Findings suggest larger vehicles are involved in pedestrian and pedalcyclist crashes with more severe injuries that result in higher hospital charges. I've commuted 10s of thousands of miles by bike the last 30 years, mostly in an urban environment. This doesn't surprise me. I can't read the whole article, and the excerpt doesn't offer any data or speculation about the causes of this. So, with some experience, I'll…

I think the hight of the driver works both ways as you can see over lower vehicles and see conflicting traffic sooner. ref visibility - one thing I don't like about newer cars in general is they have very thick A and B pillars for crash protection which can completely hide things from you. You have to constantly move your head around to sweep your blind spots.

Re: Effects of large vehicles on pedestrian and pedal-cyclist injury severity

#102

Post by dsq »

jbay808 wrote: post #55
asdff wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, shape. Go look at the front end of a car like a ford F150. The hood is flat and sits 4 feet high. Now go look at a more compact car like a prius. The hood is low, and is angled like a wedge smooth into the windshield. When a prius hits you, its liable that you will just roll up and off of it and not get much of the force from the impact as a result. When an F150 hits you with its 4 foot tall wall of a grill str…

Pedestrian visibility is also compromised. My SO is not a tall person. We've tested - she's quite invisible standing in front of these trucks and SUVs, because their front hood is so high and square. A small child would be impossible to see even some meters away. Worse if the driver of the vehicle is not tall.

I once had a Toyota land cruiser start climbing onto the hood of my Hyundai accent because the driver couldn’t see me over the hood of his engine as he driving up out of a parking garage.

Re: Effects of large vehicles on pedestrian and pedal-cyclist injury severity

#103

Post by VBprogrammer »

egman_ekki wrote: post #92
HailTheGreenOne wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you mean we don't have SUVs in Eastern Europe? Where would you have to live to think that?

Guessing by the name, perhaps Romania. Maybe they mean large ones like Ford F150? otherwise (Eastern) Europeans love their SUVs for sure, 45% of new vehicles bought in Europe are SUVs.

I think it's more of a sliding scale than a rigid dichotomy. The car we drive might reasonably be described as an SUV, the Seat Tarraco.

As a pedestrian or a cyclist I'd take my chances on against it before something like the Chevy Suburban any day of the week.

Re: Effects of large vehicles on pedestrian and pedal-cyclist injury severity

#104

Post by astrobe_ »

Bigger vehicles are heavier; at the same speed as a passenger car, they have more kinetic energy. It is even worse when the victim is lighter, as per the momentum conservation principle. The study confirms the physics. What's unexpected is the last line of the abstract.

Re: Effects of large vehicles on pedestrian and pedal-cyclist injury severity

#105

Post by hawski »

Temporary_31337 wrote: post #57
Ferrotin wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That means yes, they are required by law to be larger. It was also because a fuel economy rule change.

Have you even seen a Smart car or a Toyota Aigo which has all the required safety parts? So tell us exactly which safety parts are so huge again ?

At the same time Toyota Aygo is no longer produced. There is now a Toyota Aygo X - a crossover/mini-suv. From what I have read companies stopped producing most of those smallest cars, because to make good margins within what is required by law in terms of safety and CO2 emissions it does not make much sense to produce small cheap cars anymore.

Re: Effects of large vehicles on pedestrian and pedal-cyclist injury severity

#106

Post by Fricken »

Gigachad wrote: post #56
ocbyc wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're designed to kill?

I wouldn't be surprised if there was some perhaps unconscious trend of buyers picking more aggressive looking cars that are more likely to kill on impact.

There is and car marketers have known it for a while.

Re: Effects of large vehicles on pedestrian and pedal-cyclist injury severity

#107

Post by Fricken »

kqr wrote: post #62
asdff wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The odds are in your favor to be honest. I live in a city of 4 million people. 10-20 cyclist die a year. I'll roll those dice when the variance is that high. I figure I bike safer than the average biker I see on the road anyhow, so my odds of survival go up even higher. Probably not a small number of those accidents involved intoxicated bikers or mentally ill; I see a lot of people, clearly out of their mind through…

Something else that improves your QALYs: cycling. Of course, it's about exercise more generally, but if you don't have time to exercise only, doing it while commuting is clever! In most locations in the world -- my null hypothesis includes the US here too -- people who commute by bike (for all its risks) live longer and are sick less than those who do not.

Your null hypothesis has been born out by study after study.

Re: Effects of large vehicles on pedestrian and pedal-cyclist injury severity

#108

Post by Prcmaker »

Gibbon1 wrote: post #100
jbay808 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pedestrian visibility is also compromised. My SO is not a tall person. We've tested - she's quite invisible standing in front of these trucks and SUVs, because their front hood is so high and square. A small child would be impossible to see even some meters away. Worse if the driver of the vehicle is not tall.

A complaint I have and I've heard from others is the airbags in the A pillars are a menace to pedestrians because they block the drivers view.

I've had an entire Mazda 2 hidden from view in a roundabout, by the A-pillar and associated airbag of a VE commodore. Pedestrians and bicycles required much more effort to see in that car than any other I've ever driven.

Re: Effects of large vehicles on pedestrian and pedal-cyclist injury severity

#109

Post by masklinn »

jbay808 wrote: post #55
asdff wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, shape. Go look at the front end of a car like a ford F150. The hood is flat and sits 4 feet high. Now go look at a more compact car like a prius. The hood is low, and is angled like a wedge smooth into the windshield. When a prius hits you, its liable that you will just roll up and off of it and not get much of the force from the impact as a result. When an F150 hits you with its 4 foot tall wall of a grill str…

Pedestrian visibility is also compromised. My SO is not a tall person. We've tested - she's quite invisible standing in front of these trucks and SUVs, because their front hood is so high and square. A small child would be impossible to see even some meters away. Worse if the driver of the vehicle is not tall.

> A small child would be impossible to see even some meters away.

A US local News did a segment on that recently, they lined up sitting children in front of a truck, I think only the 7th or 8th child in the row was visible and even then barely. You basically can’t see anything shorter than the hood for 10 feet in front of you, and that’s assuming you look at the road from over the driving wheel not between the dash and wheel arch.

Edit: turns out “recently” is optimistic (or more likely this is a recurring segment), found this from 3 years back: https://youtu.be/NDH3FDfVQl0

Tho it’s not the segment I was thinking of.

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