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Higher vehicle hoods significantly increase pedestrian deaths, study finds

arstechnica.com

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Re: Higher vehicle hoods significantly increase pedestrian deaths, study finds

#211

Post by [deleted] »

uoaei wrote: post #206
Stratoscope wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's perfectly legal in California to safely pass on the right on a multilane highway and in some other situations. What is illegal is using anything other than a normal traffic lane to do this, such as the shoulder. Of course this does not excuse GP's practice where "I regularly pass people on the right and then cut them off getting back into the left lane..." Unless I misunderstood GP's comment, that sounds like re…

You were being pedantic up until here, so let's continue with the presumption of pedantry: what GP described is very far from reckless driving because they knew exactly what they were doing. You can cut people off safely, if dickishly, because of how the laws of physics work: cars can't suddenly teleport into where you will be, acceleration (especially at those speeds) is relatively slow for the vast majority of pass…

[deleted]

Re: Higher vehicle hoods significantly increase pedestrian deaths, study finds

#212

Post by tomjakubowski »

jamwil wrote: post #202
bejk22 wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I won't recognize (2) because it's false. Any current - and past - fwd will work just fine in Canadian snowy and icy conditions. Sure if you drive a shitty propulsion car you will get stuck everywhere but those cars are the exception. Edit: you acknowledged yourself that argument is mostly bs later in your comment...

Calgarian here. AWD does help in the snow.

FWD comes standard on the most popular SUVs sold in the US and Canada. I don't know for sure, but it wouldn't surprise me if only a minority of SUVs here are AWD.

Re: Higher vehicle hoods significantly increase pedestrian deaths, study finds

#213

Post by twoWhlsGud »

dysfunction wrote: post #186
stefan_ wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Streets haven't gotten wider since then either. Maybe less of a problem in the US where everything is planned around humongous fire trucks, but in the EU if you had a street that could easily accommodate two moving lanes with parking on either side, that has basically narrowed down to one moving lane. Also reminds me of all the regulation around car lights - you literally specified the beam pattern light intensity co…

Streets may not have gotten wider in a given city/town since then, but there's been a lot of population growth and development in that time in the sunbelt where urban planning has favored very wide roads. So even if roads themselves aren't getting wider, people have been moving to places where roads are wide.

This. I was recently in Phoenix for a meeting and was struck by the state of the roads there. Lots of paint on the roads bike lines on 4 or 6 lane 45 mph streets where lots of folks were doing 55+. I class myself as someone who will bike a lot of places in Seattle but I didn't see a single road (i'm sure there are some somewhere there) that I'd be willing to ride in Phoenix.

Re: Higher vehicle hoods significantly increase pedestrian deaths, study finds

#214

Post by actionfromafar »

havblue wrote: post #24

There are definitely polls that show women find men in trucks more attractive in the US than, say, vans. If you want to signal wealth and refinement get a luxury vehicle. If you want to signal utility and masculinity get a truck.

Great. Tax the trucks more and driving one will be an even better signal!

Re: Higher vehicle hoods significantly increase pedestrian deaths, study finds

#215

Post by twoWhlsGud »

mrguyorama wrote: post #199
TrevorJ wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reason some of these vehicles ARE so big IS the regulations. We could look at rolling back THOSE changes first.

Consumers just prefer larger vehicles here in the US, and those same preferences are also becoming the norm in other countries. You can't blame the modern Camry being gigantic on the Chicken Tax. You can't blame larger vehicles being associated with luxury on efficiency regulations.

Consumers prefer a vehicle that looks like it'll keep them and their family alive on the streets as given - if some other persons kid ends up dead as a result of their choice - well "whateves".

Make the streets less dangerous and they might prefer something cheaper and as a side bonus less deadly to their neighbors.

Re: Higher vehicle hoods significantly increase pedestrian deaths, study finds

#216

Post by twoWhlsGud »

danaris wrote: post #140
FooBarBizBazz wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like the spirit, but don't like the unintended consequence that it would create a stigma around sedans -- "oh, those are the cars for the bad drivers". We need to do something that makes SUV drivers feel ridiculous and humiliated. Or, failing that, just make it expensive: Weight and size dependent tolls, say (using the fourth power of weight, possibly, to match road wear equations?). Or just fewer lanes in which th…

If we're going to try to "punish" SUV drivers for driving those vehicles, then I think we need to both recognize and do some things: 1) We need to recognize that there's a wide variety of vehicles in the SUV category. Many of them have replaced (not supplemented, replaced , because they sell better and car companies are hyperoptimizing their profits like everyone else) old standards like station wagons and minivans i…

Decent points, but it's good to remember that all cars have AWS (all wheel stop) - if you're not careful have AWD can make it easier to miss the transition to where AWS is no longer sufficient. In the NW the main attraction of AWD is not getting stuck in ski area parking lots and not having to put on chains when the roads prematurely force chaining up "except for AWD" because the state patrol knows almost no one has snow tires. (And I've never gotten stuck with snows on my FWD Jetta, but have had to put on chains all too many times before I really needed to - which is enough of a pain that I'll probably get AWD on my next car.)

And trailheads around here also often are a lot easier to get to with a bit of extra ground clearance. So I may well give in and get an SUV for my next car. But the real driver (so to speak) will be that given the predominance of trucks on the road, not driving one yourself becomes a risk. (You can see the signal in the IIHS results.) So I'll be looking at how small I can go to meet my needs and minimize externalities, I suppose.

All of that said, the more threatening the roads look to potential bikers and walkers the fewer we'll get of them. And whether it's happiness, health or efficiency you're trying optimize, more of those are pretty clearly a win.

I've biked and walked American cities and country roads for over half a century, and while there have been many improvements over that period, the last five years have seen a series of what feel like steady reversals in the NW US. More and bigger trucks are part of a complex set of setbacks but feel like a key one to me. It doesn't take too many aggressive moves by monster trucks to make you wonder what you're doing out there.

If we want further progress, we'll have to figure out how to mitigate this problem.

Re: Higher vehicle hoods significantly increase pedestrian deaths, study finds

#217

Post by Nifty3929 »

tomaskafka wrote: post #208

It seems that no one has yet posted the famous article linking SUVs to immaturity and low self esteem, so here we go. > Car companies managed this remarkable feat because they ran—and continue to run—quite possibly the most sophisticated marketing operations on the planet. They knew what people really wanted: to project an image of selfish superiority. And then they sold it to them at a markup > Who has been buying S…

Judgement and condescension are unlikely to change minds or behavior, or add anything else of value. It will only make people wonder who really has an issue with immaturity and low self esteem.

Re: Higher vehicle hoods significantly increase pedestrian deaths, study finds

#218

Post by toast0 »

RangerScience wrote: post #20
porphyra wrote: post #5

Vans are a lot better for both transporting people (more spacious compared to SUVs) and goods (easier loading and protected from the weather compared to pickups), plus of course having vastly better visibility. It always seems odd how trucks and SUVs are seen as status symbols in the US whereas in, say, Hong Kong, it is the MPV that is the status symbol. I suppose certain tax and emissions regulations in favor of tru…

AFAIK, exactly this - something about how trucks and SUVs are classified differently and so have different emission standards, which results in other effects that are then appealing to consumers. Plus, of course, marketing.

Minivans are light trucks for fleet purposes, so they can also get bigger engines and what not, if that's what people are looking for.

Re: Higher vehicle hoods significantly increase pedestrian deaths, study finds

#219

Post by devilbunny »

Zancarius wrote: post #172
stefan_ wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Streets haven't gotten wider since then either. Maybe less of a problem in the US where everything is planned around humongous fire trucks, but in the EU if you had a street that could easily accommodate two moving lanes with parking on either side, that has basically narrowed down to one moving lane. Also reminds me of all the regulation around car lights - you literally specified the beam pattern light intensity co…

> Great, now everyone in a sedan is being blinded by all sorts of SUVs and trucks. Utter failure. I drive a truck and live in a mountainous area. Trust me, it's not just sedans. Nearly everyone drives around with their brights on and it seems they no longer bother to turn them down when approaching traffic (automatic dimming features don't work well up here). Consequently, night time driving is dangerous. I don't kno…

> automatic dimming features don't work well up here

That's disappointing to hear, but a counterpoint: the first car I ever drove that had auto-dimming was a Ford Escape rental in Utah. I drove from SLC to Moab and back, plenty of night driving in mountains, and it performed far beyond my expectations. I really never had to adjust the lights manually.

Which is to say, probably more to do with the specific implementation than the terrain.

Re: Higher vehicle hoods significantly increase pedestrian deaths, study finds

#220

Post by TheCoelacanth »

jetrink wrote: post #54

My proposed regulation is to introduce a hazardous vehicle license for large trucks and SUVs. Everyone is automatically granted one alongside their normal drivers license, but if you're caught driving recklessly (weaving through traffic on the highway, aggressively tailgating, speeding through residential or urban areas), you lose it and you have to drive a normal-sized car. Perhaps there's a way to earn it back thro…

They should just be outright banned. The high hood doesn't serve any practical purpose.
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