Why are so many pedestrians killed by cars in the US? • Hacker News Board

Re: Why are so many pedestrians killed by cars in the US?

#61

Post by throwaway173738 » Thu, Oct 09, 2025, 12:43 PM UTC

pretzellogician wrote: post #45

everdrive wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anecdotal, but I've been in some cities where pedestrians don't even look, they just walk right into the road. Yes, I would be at fault if I hit them (in many cases) but I'm also not perfect, and also don't expect them to charge right in front of me.)

Living in Boston 30-something years ago, I found this was required as a pedestrian, because drivers would try to intimidate you from entering a crosswalk by accelerating at you. So... you had to explicitly look away and still be aware of their presence. (Not just Boston, I've seen this in some other cities since.)

This is how it works everywhere I’ve been.

Re: Why are so many pedestrians killed by cars in the US?

#62

Post by ReptileMan » Thu, Oct 09, 2025, 12:43 PM UTC

heresie-dabord wrote: post #50

Since 1930, 30K or more people have been killed every year in car accidents in the US. That's over 3_000_000 people in the past 100 years. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motor_vehicle_fatality_rate_in... (corrected, thanks!)

30000*100 != 30 000 000

are you sure you haven't thrown a zero somewhere when multiplying.

Re: Why are so many pedestrians killed by cars in the US?

#63

Post by ceejayoz » Thu, Oct 09, 2025, 12:43 PM UTC

willis936 wrote: post #38

gdulli wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's more the trend in cars than the roads because the roads didn't change starting in 2009.

And drivers. Readers should ask themselves when they first got a smartphone and if it was around 2009.

You should ask yourself whether smartphones are a US-only phenomenon. From the article:

> Other countries haven’t seen this increase in pedestrian deaths: in every other high-income country, rates are flat or declining. Whatever’s causing the problem seems to be limited to the US.

Re: Why are so many pedestrians killed by cars in the US?

#64

Post by pluc » Thu, Oct 09, 2025, 12:43 PM UTC

Frieren wrote: post #53

Road and street design is the main difference with Europe. A lot of work has been put to make streets safer for everybody. That fact alone acts as a multiplier for everything else. The cars are bigger in the USA? The bad streets make it way worse. People are distracted at the phone? The bad street design makes it more deathly. Fix USA's streets and towns and all kinds of deaths will be decreased. It is the most impor…

This blows my mind considering most North American streets were designed for cars, whereas the same cannot be said for Europe. Maybe it's the reason: streets can be so narrow and winding in Europe that you have to pay attention?

Re: Why are so many pedestrians killed by cars in the US?

#65

Post by potato3732842 » Thu, Oct 09, 2025, 12:44 PM UTC

willis936 wrote: post #33

potato3732842 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Someone didn't read the article. Someone doesn't understand that any article that's drawing conclusions based on a workflow that involves putting a Chevy Suburban (functionally a chevy pickup from the B pillar forward) and a Honda HRV into the same category is sus at best and anyone uncritically accepting said conclusions is also sus at best. If one wanted to be honest they'd look at GVW or some other metric that tr…

Suburbans are on truck chassis and are SUVs. HRVs are on car chassis and are crossovers. The bucket is called "trucks and SUVs" to make this less ambiguous.

>Suburbans are on truck chassis and are SUVs. HRVs are on car chassis and are crossovers. The bucket is called "trucks and SUVs" to make this less ambiguous.

TFA does not use data broken down in that way.

TFA cites "sales by body type" which puts a 'Burb (functionally a pickup for this discussion) into the same category as a 2002 Forester (which is an SUV on paper, but obviously a car).

Re: Why are so many pedestrians killed by cars in the US?

#66

Post by braza » Thu, Oct 09, 2025, 12:44 PM UTC

As an enthusiast of traffic engineering, the most surprising thing in US is how hard is for the engineers to handle so distinct zoning laws according to it's county/city/state, and urbanistic planning in several big/medium cities is more centered on _giving preference to the cars_ instead of _keep the cadency and flow of the cars_.

Not saying it's good or bad, but for instance, in some counties it's way simpler to have a parking lot without any traffic buffer area at the entrance than to get an approval for a roundabout to reduce electronic traffic coordination in feeder roads.

Even simple things like pedestrian passages that do not have any contact with the road (elevated passages or underground passages) are very hard to find in the US.

I really would like to know one day what kind of design philosophy the traffic engineering field follows with so much compromises.

Re: Why are so many pedestrians killed by cars in the US?

#67

Post by throwaway173738 » Thu, Oct 09, 2025, 12:44 PM UTC

alterom wrote: post #31

One obvious direction not explored in the article: looking not just at the type on the vehicle involved in the deadly collision, but also the actual model and its geometry . It's not just that SUVs are deadlier than sedans. It's also that the sedans are becoming taller, wider, heavier — and deadlier. The article says that blunt fronts are what makes a collision more likely to result in a death. Well compare a 2000 Ca…

This is another important point. A pillars are two or three times the size. That’s twice the amount of metal in your field of view where you would be looking for a pedestrian.

Re: Why are so many pedestrians killed by cars in the US?

#68

Post by piva00 » Thu, Oct 09, 2025, 12:45 PM UTC

everdrive wrote: post #22

shusaku wrote: post #19

> We also can’t rule out that increased recklessness or distractedness on the part of pedestrians is playing a role. Or a raw increase in pedestrians on urban roads? Maybe people are more willing to go on a walk at night in the city these days?

Anecdotal, but I've been in some cities where pedestrians don't even look, they just walk right into the road. Yes, I would be at fault if I hit them (in many cases) but I'm also not perfect, and also don't expect them to charge right in front of me.)

One of the reasons to force slower speeds in city streets, more time for reacting to adverse events, less damage in case you hit a pedestrian at 30km/h than 60km/h.

Re: Why are so many pedestrians killed by cars in the US?

#69

Post by globular-toast » Thu, Oct 09, 2025, 12:45 PM UTC

I wish they wouldn't just focus on deaths. The difference between being killed and having your body wrecked is pretty small. I'm curious to know what the numbers look like if we considered some less extreme interpretation of taking someone's life.

Re: Why are so many pedestrians killed by cars in the US?

#70

Post by rglullis » Thu, Oct 09, 2025, 12:45 PM UTC

A4ET8a8uTh0_v2 wrote: post #47

rjbwork wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even moreso than guns, the automobile industry has been waging an incredibly successful propaganda campaign for over a century now equating the ownership and use of a personal automobile with freedom.

Have you tried to move around US w/o it? As propaganda goes, it is pretty spot on.

What is cause and what is effect, and which of those do people can control?