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U.S. pedestrian deaths reach a 40-year high

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Re: U.S. pedestrian deaths reach a 40-year high

#121

Post by michaelsshaw »

blindriver wrote: post #48

Isn't it obvious? Distracted drivers and distracted pedestrians from cell phones. I was just rear-ended last week by a distracted driver, luckily I wasn't injured. There needs to be a measure as to how distracting a car's interface is, and there needs to be regulations around this. Tesla's interface for example, takes far too much time and attention to do simply things like change the fan speed or temperature. I thin…

There are a few more factors that drive this number up. First is the absolute reliance on cars for basically everything; anyone not in a car is a second-class citizen that can be killed at any time without much thought given by the public other than the typical "It's just unavoidable, these things happen. What can you do?" Another factor driving this number up is the massive increase in average car size, as SUVs and pickup trucks are pushed harder on average citizens by car companies so they can skirt taxes and make more profits.

Add on top of this huge roads and extremely anti-pedestrian laws and you have successfully created a death trap for people walking.

Re: U.S. pedestrian deaths reach a 40-year high

#122

Post by ahoy »

jdalgetty wrote: post #33

I live in a subdivision full of young families with kids. I'm also a runner, an avid dog walker and someone who walks his kids to and from school every day. As someone out on foot on a daily basis I am constantly blown away by the amount of people speeding on residential streets and not stopping at stop signs. I don't get it! These are clearly people who live in these neighbourhoods yet they don't care enough about t…

Stop signs basically dont work anywhere. If you want people to drive slowly, you have to build streets that make them do so.

If anyone is interested in this stuff, the youtube channel NotJustBikes talks a lot about this and related topics. Here's a short video on how "traffic calming" infrastructure gets drivers to slow down, and we all know that stop signs just dont.

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/tGOBOw9s-QM

Re: U.S. pedestrian deaths reach a 40-year high

#123

Post by Lukas_Skywalker »

mytailorisrich wrote: post #80
luxurytent wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, some areas in particular the big box developments are almost a lost cause. What needs to happen to those first is large, dense development within the plazas. Build residential on top of the mall, remove parking lots (or move them underground), and densify first. Once you move that needle, you can focus on active transport options. The type of development I describe is happening (two examples in my Canadian city)…

"Densification" can eaily lead to poorer quality of life and oppressive housing, though. There is a middle ground, I think. I like individual houses with gardens (most people do, I think) with a size such that convenience stores are viable and reacheable on foot. It's like that in my area (England): good size houses but it's dense enough that I can walk to 2-3 different convenience stores when I need a few things, wi…

In the parts of Europe I lived in (France, Switzerland, Sweden) there is one additional important thing: there is usually at most one parking space per apartment. This makes everything already a lot denser.

Re: U.S. pedestrian deaths reach a 40-year high

#124

Post by sokoloff »

hermannj314 wrote: post #46

In many states you are required to stop if a pedestrian is crossing the street. What has happened a lot is I will stop to let a pedestrian cross the street at a legal cross walk and the person behind me will assume I am an idiot, honk, and speed around me. My intuition is this is the cause of a significant amount of pedestrian deaths: impatient drivers that assume every stopped car is just an obstacle to zip around.…

The problem with making this jailable (which I do not support in the absence of a collision) is that you stopping to let a pedestrian legally cross is difficult to distinguish from you stopping in a travel lane or bike lane to pick up an Uber fare or stopping to double park near someone waiting for their own Uber. The latter two cases are actually obstacles created by anti-social behavior and are probably more common in aggregate than drivers stopping for pedestrians.

Re: U.S. pedestrian deaths reach a 40-year high

#125

Post by droopyEyelids »

westpfelia wrote: post #77
ethanbond wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would COVID/lockdowns have “changed the way people drive?” Any proposed mechanism? Seems more likely you had a lot of shifting around of people’s driving (e.g. city dwellers moving to suburbs)

I dont have an answer for why. Just it has. I live in a major city in the midwest and its wild how often I see people drive with zero regard for anyone else. Running red lights and almost hitting someone, cutting people off, swerving in traffic erratically to be faster. Its honestly scary some days.

My experience mirrors yours perfectly. When the lockdowns started, people began to drive "crazier" for lack of a better term.

I hesitate to speculate as to what caused it, but the difference was as clear as night and day.

Re: U.S. pedestrian deaths reach a 40-year high

#126

Post by robswc »

johnea wrote: post #82

In this analysis, pickup trucks and SUVs are identical, in that they have high vertical grills that obstruct the driver's view of the area immediately in front of the vehicle. This vehicle configuration is the major cause of the increase in pedistrian accidents. However I was surprised the article didn't mention pedestrian behavior at all, which is clearly increasing the risk of pedistrian accidents in recent years.…

Here's a thread where residents of Albuquerque, the city with the highest rate of pedestrian deaths in the US.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Albuquerque/comments/123uyd3/pedest...

It seems that's mostly the consensus. A combination of bad design and distracted drivers/pedestrians. It seems J-walking is a real issue and I've driven through there and the speeds are pretty fast (which should be fine in theory but ofc not fine if people are J-walking).

Also seems to be a fair amount of people on drugs wandering into the street. Seems like a perfect storm.

Re: U.S. pedestrian deaths reach a 40-year high

#127

Post by jmclnx »

avelis wrote: post #6

It would appear Vision Zero in the US is not working. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vision_Zero

Well in my opinion, "Vision Zero" in the US will apply only to the peons. If you are connected with Law Enforcement or Politicians, you get a free pass unless you kill someone in such a manner that it cannot be brushed under the carpet.

Re: U.S. pedestrian deaths reach a 40-year high

#128

Post by scrollaway »

glimshe wrote: post #114
luxurytent wrote: post #11

I guess pickup trucks fall under the category of SUVs? It's wild how we've lost access to our streets and neighbourhoods for the convenience of mostly suburban vehicle users. Actually not wild, but disgraceful. The majority of roads are too wide and with little options for alternative modes of transport, drivers are growingly frustrated and angry on the road. We continue to make the mistake of thinking the solution i…

My suburb does as much as it can to make itself walkable. There are crossings and sidewalks everywhere, but it's still a low density suburb so it doesn't make much sense to walk almost anywhere (my kid does walk to school as it happens to be close, but that's it). So while they are trying to address this problem, very few people actually walk. But all of this said, I want low density. Having lived many years in a hig…

A walkable city doesn’t have to be an ant colony. American exceptionalism really is hard to grasp sometimes.

Take a look at a city like Brussels to understand how a capital city can be both walkable and high density without being Seoul.

Re: U.S. pedestrian deaths reach a 40-year high

#129

Post by lotsofpulp »

pkulak wrote: post #109
lotsofpulp wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the handful jurisdictions where I am familiar with zoning laws and the permitting process, low cost and low effort is not how I would describe any part of even a straightforward approval. Lord help you if you need a variance, and I cannot even imagine what eminent domain on that scale would look like. I do not see how the change would even be possible without tearing buildings down and building new ones closer to…

I meant stuff like city counsel passing a new zoning law. Maybe some concrete bollards to make a protected bike lane. Run a few more busses and trains. That kind of thing.

My point is that does nothing, because the root problem of destinations being too far from one another is not addressed.

A few more buses and trains are not going to cut it. You need to outcompete the convenience of a personal car. The bus or train has to run at least every 10min, otherwise one missed connection and you’re wasting 20min+ with your refrigerated groceries.

And that type of frequency is simply not economical without density. Chicken and egg at this point. Best case scenario is to build outwards from already dense areas, but it will involve eminent domain and demolishing buildings and parking lots to make new ones that are pedestrian friendly and hostile to cars.

Re: U.S. pedestrian deaths reach a 40-year high

#130

Post by pizzafeelsright »

I would be most curious to see the data. From my reading of the news in my surrounding 30 miles the details are almost always: 1. downtown or country road late/nighttime driver hits transient 2. daytime freeway driver hits transient 3. rural biker/runner gets hit by drunk or early morning commuter
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