Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

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

construction-physics.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

231–240 of 268 posts

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

#231

Post by ponector »

FridayoLeary wrote: post #87
twelvechairs wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A huge part of poorly designed roads is wider lanes (and parking spaces) that allow/encourage huge cars. Its been proven that narrower lanes correlate strongly with lower crash and fatality rates (e.g. [0] below) yet lane widths are under pressure to increase with larger vehicles, and every time this happens the vehicles get larger again. [0] https://publichealth.jhu.edu/2023/narrower-lanes-safer-stree...

I heard the fire department wants wide lanes so they can drive around in those huge behemoths they love.

But they can easily use more than one lane, why should they care about lane width?

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

#232

Post by merely-unlikely »

ageitgey wrote: post #153
banga wrote: post #30

This morning while jogging in the US I came to an intersection. Green lights and walk on in my direction. A car approaching from my left had a red light, the driver glanced to his left and without stopping or looking in my direction, turned right across my path. I expected this of course, so avoided being run over. If I wasn't watching for this, it likely would be a different outcome. So why do so many pedestrians ge…

This is exactly why this turn is illegal in nearly every country in the world except the US and Canada. [1] If you are in the UK, this turn is illegal always and everywhere, so it basically never happens. I grew up in the US with right turn on red, so I was used to it and accepted it as normal. But after living the UK for 6 years, I'm now physically shocked when visiting the US at how dangerous it is to walk around e…

NYC very sensibly does not allow right turns on red. Our streets are chaotic enough as is.

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

#233

Post by rich_sasha »

ageitgey wrote: post #153
banga wrote: post #30

This morning while jogging in the US I came to an intersection. Green lights and walk on in my direction. A car approaching from my left had a red light, the driver glanced to his left and without stopping or looking in my direction, turned right across my path. I expected this of course, so avoided being run over. If I wasn't watching for this, it likely would be a different outcome. So why do so many pedestrians ge…

This is exactly why this turn is illegal in nearly every country in the world except the US and Canada. [1] If you are in the UK, this turn is illegal always and everywhere, so it basically never happens. I grew up in the US with right turn on red, so I was used to it and accepted it as normal. But after living the UK for 6 years, I'm now physically shocked when visiting the US at how dangerous it is to walk around e…

> This is exactly why this turn is illegal in nearly every country in the world except the US and Canada.

I think variations of this are pretty common in Europe. Your link says this actually. Details vary, but as the GP post says, it is not uncommon that the pedestrian has a green light and the car can still turn right across it. UK, indeed, does not have it. But frankly I find it frustrating, both as a driver and a pedestrian, as I feel waiting time on junctions is always infinitely long.

I'm not familiar with how it works in the US, but in Europe pedestrians have priority in such cases, and it's fairly well respected.

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

#234

Post by port11 »

rich_sasha wrote: post #233
ageitgey wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is exactly why this turn is illegal in nearly every country in the world except the US and Canada. [1] If you are in the UK, this turn is illegal always and everywhere, so it basically never happens. I grew up in the US with right turn on red, so I was used to it and accepted it as normal. But after living the UK for 6 years, I'm now physically shocked when visiting the US at how dangerous it is to walk around e…

> This is exactly why this turn is illegal in nearly every country in the world except the US and Canada. I think variations of this are pretty common in Europe. Your link says this actually. Details vary, but as the GP post says, it is not uncommon that the pedestrian has a green light and the car can still turn right across it. UK, indeed, does not have it. But frankly I find it frustrating, both as a driver and a…

The light will be either green or flashing yellow, and drivers turning right KNOW to look for a pedestrian (or even a bicycle passing them on the right). In the US the combination of a large vehicle and car-prioritising culture makes this much more dangerous.

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

#235

Post by mdip »

CalRobert wrote: post #109

What's even sadder is seeing how many pedestrians are killed _even as far fewer people_, especially kids, are actually walking. It's like watching drownings increase even as fewer people take up swimming. I walked to school in the 90's and even then the curtain-twitchers scolded my mom for letting me. It has only worsened since, as every destination is ages away and involves crossing multiple 45MPH stroads with monst…

I believe this has a lot to do with the problem in my area. We have a bunch of disconnected sidewalks almost everywhere. They've started connecting them. There's more pedestrian traffic at some lights at some times of the day but it's nowhere near consistent.

Driving, especially during commute, becomes an exercise of muscle memory for most of us. We are used to what we see. All year long I might encounter a pedestrian at my most commonly encountered intersections once a year. Most drivers are on auto-pilot, they're used to looking for cars, if people aren't abundantly obvious, they're missed.

They've started connecting sidewalks around me. Foot traffic has tripled as a result. Still, that means I encounter a pedestrian three times a year? That's not going to improve exposure enough to make anyone specifically look any more frequently. It's going to just create more opportunities for people to get hit. And that's what's happened.

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

#236

Post by tetraodonpuffer »

notacoward wrote: post #230
Hemospectrum wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From your link, emphasis mine: > permits the operator of a motor vehicle to turn such vehicle right at a red stop light after stopping Quoting GP, emphasis again mine: > the driver glanced to his left and without stopping or looking in my direction, turned right across my path The driver turned without stopping. That is explicitly and clearly illegal throughout the US. This is one of those rules drivers are supposed…

While it's true that this particular driver probably violated existing law, it's also true that this particular maneuver is inherently mistake-prone. The driver still has to look three ways - across the intersection (for left turners), at the crosswalk, and behind them for cyclists (or fast pedestrians). It's too easy to miss one while checking for another, even for a diligent driver following all laws. The statistic…

any time there is a right turn you can still end up in this same situation, whether it's right turn on red or not, if the driver does not look to their right: there have been plenty of times I have been nearly ran over when a car turning right on green did not notice that the same direction pedestrian crossing light was green also and I was about to cross.

Same thing for cars turning right in front of me riding my bike in the bike lane, it's just par for the course, so pedestrians should ALWAYS make eye contact with the driver before crossing, and cyclists should NEVER be side-by-side with a car when approaching an intersection.

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

#237

Post by lastofthemojito »

What's the vehicle window tint situation outside of the US?

Window tint is a pet peeve of mine - as a long-time small car driver I'm used to being around taller vehicles that I can't necessarily see through or around. But the situation has gotten worse and worse.

The law hasn't changed AFAIK - there's a longstanding regulation that cars are generally not allowed to have dark tint from the factory but trucks, SUVs and vans can have dark tint from the second row back.

So you used to see older "standard" pickup trucks, the ones with a single row of seats, and there'd be no tint - you could see through the truck. Now the typical pickup has 2 rows, and dark tint in the back.

A lot of cars have become SUVs as well - now your Subaru Outback or even Crosstrek are technically categorized as SUVs and come with dark rear tint in most configurations.

As a result, when I sit at a traffic light, I can see much less of what is happening beyond the neighboring vehicles than in years past.

Sure, everywhere with roads has some large, opaque vehicles like delivery vans, etc. But the percentage of my field of view that is blocked by neighboring vehicles certainly seems higher than ever.

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

#240

Post by paulcole »

globular-toast wrote: post #229
paulcole wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm biased because I'm 45 and have never driven a car in my life. I grew up in a very rural area in Florida, went to a big state college, and then moved to Portland, OR because it was a decent place to live without a car. I knew from a very young age that driving a car seemed like a dumb way to live and so wondered why everyone did it and why nobody decided to try something different? My view is that if people really…

People stay in abusive relationships all the time. If they really hated it they'd just leave, right?

People leave abusive relationships all the time, too.
Post reply on HN