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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

#481

Post by whelp_24 »

pnutjam wrote: post #397
VohuMana wrote: post #345

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This has been my experience, in my area people have even found ways around the newly installed red light cameras, they just remove their license plate. Usually you would get hit with a pretty big ticket for that but the police are not enforcing any sort of traffic laws and relying on cameras to do the enforcing.

This is what happens when every traffic stop is billed as a combat situation. Cops feel like their dangerous (and they are) because America can't pass sensible gun restrictions.

Cops don't actually get shot all that much. Most deaths were covid-19 during the pandemic.

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

#482

Post by fargle »

roflyear wrote: post #268
fargle wrote: post #254

We've definitely seen a lot more pedestrian deaths in our area in the last couple years. But it's not the prevalence or size of the cars, SUVs, trucks. What's happening here is that there's an explosion of homeless living and walking in and around the very fast two-lane roads and one highway in particular. They are drugged out of their mind and oblivious. Just about every couple weeks there's a fatality where someone…

If you are making claims you have to back them up somewhat.

doesn't that go for the "experts" (especially Martin) in this article, too?

while unsatisfying, the evidence that i put out is from first-hand experience and is at least better than the hand-waving correlation/causation. especially when it's easy to point to at least one obvious factor that isn't mentioned.

I found this which does goes into it partially:

http://publichealth.lacounty.gov/phcommon/public/media/media...

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

#483

Post by InSteady »

ascagnel_ wrote: post #145
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…

As someone who lives in a pre-car suburb, I don't feel that at all. Road design goes a long way towards that, and roads that _feel_ safe counter-intuitively make drivers behave in less safe ways, while most drivers (broad generalization) will behave more cautiously when the roads they drive feel unsafe. The fact that your subdivision is statistically likely top have wide roads with plenty of visibility, few (if any)…

Gold star for using the term scofflaws.

Residential speeders are bunch of no-account ruffians if you ask me.

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

#484

Post by masklinn »

Scoundreller wrote: post #429
masklinn wrote: post #291

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And really most people, even families, can make do with a regular sedan. That’s still the norm in Europe. Every summer you see the Dutch migrating through France in station wagons. A roof carrier or a small trailer does wonder (when you don’t just go with a camper).

Even the same sedans are built with different engine options between North America and Europe. Europe models will start with smaller engines that are just unavailable in US models. No idea why given Europe has mountains too and 120 and 130km/h speed limits are the highway norm but often with shorter on-ramps.

American cultural sensibilities making small engines a hard sell?

Historically the torque converter gearboxes were a big problem for small euro engines, but nowadays I’d assumed the gearboxes either are DCT or have lock-up clutch so it should be a non-issue.

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

#485

Post by foxyv »

VirusNewbie wrote: post #424
foxyv wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pedestrian and bike bridges are car infrastructure. You can tell because they make the person who is moving under their own power, climb a set of stairs, walk across the bridge, and then walk down the stairs. In the meantime, the most vulnerable road users (Disabled people) have to cross 2 miles down the road at a deadly intersection. All the while, people who are sitting in air conditioned motorized vehicles have a…

Considering how much of the country is suburbs with large streets or freeways separating housing tracts from shopping centers, is your proposal really to close those freeways and arterial streets down? Or just demolish all the homes that are there and move those people to higher density areas? I'm sympathetic to the idea of building new large developments in a non car centric fashion, but how do you do this with the…

To be honest, the majority of existing areas will probably go bankrupt as densification happens, plunging the value of cookie cutter, match stick homes to be bulldozed and hopefully re-wilded. Most of suburbia is already going bankrupt. The roads, sewers, pipes, and electrical wires are falling apart because they are too expensive to maintain. All it takes is one company to move out or the land to run out before they start to spiral. San Bernardino CA is a good example.

https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2020/5/14/americas-growt...

https://www.businessinsider.com/10-american-cities-that-are-...

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

#486

Post by pnutjam »

whelp_24 wrote: post #481
pnutjam wrote: post #397

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is what happens when every traffic stop is billed as a combat situation. Cops feel like their dangerous (and they are) because America can't pass sensible gun restrictions.

Cops don't actually get shot all that much. Most deaths were covid-19 during the pandemic.

Oh yeah, that's 100% true, but take a look at the way they train each other.

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

#487

Post by JeremyNT »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #30
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…

In many areas, it would take a ton of work in the effort of making destinations closer to each other. Huge parking lots, setbacks, wide roads, and detached houses on their own quarter, or even eighth, of an acre lot make it so the choice between walking/bicycling and using a personal car is not much of a choice. Public transportation is also not an option due to how inconvenient it is due to how infrequently it would…

Fixing bad infrastructure takes time, but you don't even need that to reduce pedestrian deaths. If only people had smaller vehicles the rate of survival would go way up.

I could pretty easily imagine a sliding vehicle tax scale where safer, more practical sub-compacts and minivans are subsidized by the mega-lifted land yacht SUVs and pickups. Sure it doesn't fix the design problems of cities, but it at least means the vehicles that are traversing them aren't as likely to kill and maim people while we sort out the other problems.

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

#488

Post by Vecr »

pnutjam wrote: post #397
VohuMana wrote: post #345

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This has been my experience, in my area people have even found ways around the newly installed red light cameras, they just remove their license plate. Usually you would get hit with a pretty big ticket for that but the police are not enforcing any sort of traffic laws and relying on cameras to do the enforcing.

This is what happens when every traffic stop is billed as a combat situation. Cops feel like their dangerous (and they are) because America can't pass sensible gun restrictions.

What do you mean by "sensible"? People would probably start carrying Glocks with a suppressor, stock, vertical front grip, and micro red dot. That's only sort of safer for police as long as people don't look up how to make an armor piercing bullet.

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

#489

Post by InSteady »

jeffrallen wrote: post #284
Eumenes wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Transition to trail running if you can. Ive stopped taking chances with road running because of the insane drivers. Same with biking. Added benefits of being in nature and getting off pavement helps your joints a bit.

If you are a small woman and there are cougars in your area, trail running is also dangerous. You look like prey and trigger the hunting instinct. Pepper spray won't save you either, because they attack your neck from the rear. You're already dead before you are reaching for the spray! Source: the signs outside Northern California open spaces (and the newspaper)

Since we have began keeping records in the late 1800s, there have been 26 confirmed deaths from cougar attacks in the US. Which is not to say one shouldn't be smart and aware of the situational risks of any activity, but calling it "dangerous" on that basis seems a bit extreme. In the past 30 years, despite a steady increase in hiking and trail-running, there have been 62 attacks total.

It is estimated that 50 million Americans go hiking each year, and of them 25,000 will die out on the trail. Hiking has some inherent risks. Cougar attacks should only be slightly higher than "swarmed to death by killer bees" on the list of reasons you don't go hiking or trail running.

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

#490

Post by ascagnel_ »

raverbashing wrote: post #389
CaptainMarvel wrote: post #256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don’t forget there have been massive loopholes in vehicle emission regulations which favour larger SUVs and pick-up trucks. If regulations actually focused on MPG, these vehicles would not be the size and weight that they are. https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/post/cafe-lo... Right target. Bad implementation. Going forwards, with widespread electric vehicles, focusing directly on size and weight makes a…

Blaming regulation removes agency from people. Or maybe yeah, most consumers just mimic other people and cost be darned. Then when gas eventually becomes pricier they complain because they had the foresight of a goldfish. (And theoretically no efficiency laws need to be passed. Increase taxes on fuel and there you have it)

I disagree -- I'd love if my last car was a station wagon, but there were eight station wagons on the market in the US at the time, made by five manufacturers. And of those eight, four have an MSRP under USD$50,000, and only two have an MSRP under USD$30,000. And the market hasn't substantively changed (Jaguar and Buick have dropped out of the market, but Mini entered the market and Porsche added a second model) since 2020, when I got my car.

I'm calling this out specifically because, in another era, the station wagon would have been the preferred option for a "family vehicle" that needed more space than a sedan. But since it's "easier" for an automaker to get an SUV on the road, the regulatory environment dictated how the market went.

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