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The deadly rise of giant trucks and SUVs

nytimes.com

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Re: The deadly rise of giant trucks and SUVs

#131

Post by __float »

drnick1 wrote: post #106
californical wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Normalizing by miles driven will take you to the wrong conclusions. It underestimates the extra deaths directly caused by the fact that we’ve built exurbs farther and farther away from where people work over the last 20-30 years. So maybe deaths per mile would be similar, but we’ve pushed people further and further so they have to drive more miles, increasing the deaths due to poor design. Building society in a way t…

> Building society in a way that we increase deaths due to poor planning, like making driving the only option for the majority of people It's not poor planning, it's what Americans want. Americans, by and large, do not want to live in dense neighborhoods or tiny homes like in many parts of Europe. You get that in places like NYC and quality of life in those places is atrocious.

There are millions of people in American cities, and tons of people move from the less dense suburbs to these cities.

There are probably even more people who would move if they could, but our cities are expensive (because housing is expensive when you don't build it) and so they stick with the "default". Staying put, getting a car, and finding a way to make it work.

You can't conflate "this is what Americans want" and "this is largely the only choice most Americans get".

Re: The deadly rise of giant trucks and SUVs

#132

Post by redsocksfan45 »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #111
epistasis wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know the particulars, but if what's going on in WA is like what's going on in my California town, I don't think it's reasonable. I see teens going around on ebikes, and people freak out over them in ways that seem completely inappropriate to the kids scooting around. I think it's mostly a reaction to seeing young people being young people, as far as I can tell. Same thing happens on NextDoor, a few kids hangi…

When the kids decide to take their E-bikes on I-5, you know something is wrong with their decision making skills: https://www.reddit.com/r/Seattle/comments/1sjv7ua/teens_on_e... Yes, people freak out when they see a kid on an e-bike on a crowded freeway.

[dead]

Re: The deadly rise of giant trucks and SUVs

#134

Post by anecd4t4 »

TulliusCicero wrote: post #59

WA state recently passed a law about e-bikes/e-motorcycles to deal with the issue of younger teens on these kinda moped-style e-bikes going very fast around town (and often riding quite recklessly). The law is reasonable, but it strikes me what a double standard there is for biking vs driving. For biking, there's a danger that's noticed, and we quickly pass a law that straight up bans that type of bike for those ride…

[flagged]

Re: The deadly rise of giant trucks and SUVs

#135

Post by Ylpertnodi »

unixuser7104 wrote: post #89
TulliusCicero wrote: post #59

WA state recently passed a law about e-bikes/e-motorcycles to deal with the issue of younger teens on these kinda moped-style e-bikes going very fast around town (and often riding quite recklessly). The law is reasonable, but it strikes me what a double standard there is for biking vs driving. For biking, there's a danger that's noticed, and we quickly pass a law that straight up bans that type of bike for those ride…

How would you react if told you could no longer drive your primary mode of transportation?

Utter disbelief. (will that do?)

Re: The deadly rise of giant trucks and SUVs

#136

Post by trollbridge »

saool wrote: post #75
Sayrus wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then surely Europe shares that trends and shows growth in pedestrian death. But that isn't the case at all, maybe Europeans are immune to smartphones: https://road-safety.transport.ec.europa.eu/document/download...

Anecdotally... Having spent time driving in both Europe and Southern California, I'd say that European drivers are more attentive to their driving and way less likely to be looking at their phone while driving, since it's policed. You can often see drivers in SoCal holding their phone for a video call.

I’m pretty sure I’ve seen drivers in the Bay Area conducting a full blown Zoom call, video and all.

(I used to have a corporate laptop I put a 4G WiMax chip in, and would boot it and connect to corporate VPN, open Lotus Notes, and then start my one hour commute. Then at work my Notes would be fully sync’d which otherwise took a half hour.)

Re: The deadly rise of giant trucks and SUVs

#137

Post by brendoelfrendo »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #111
epistasis wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know the particulars, but if what's going on in WA is like what's going on in my California town, I don't think it's reasonable. I see teens going around on ebikes, and people freak out over them in ways that seem completely inappropriate to the kids scooting around. I think it's mostly a reaction to seeing young people being young people, as far as I can tell. Same thing happens on NextDoor, a few kids hangi…

When the kids decide to take their E-bikes on I-5, you know something is wrong with their decision making skills: https://www.reddit.com/r/Seattle/comments/1sjv7ua/teens_on_e... Yes, people freak out when they see a kid on an e-bike on a crowded freeway.

Ok, but riding an ebike on the interstate is already illegal. If the problem you're trying to solve is kids taking ebikes onto the interstate, then you don't need any new laws

Re: The deadly rise of giant trucks and SUVs

#138

Post by thrownaway561 »

"Our estimate is that about 200 to 400 pedestrians a year would not have died if vehicles had remained approximately the same size over the past quarter-century"

They're making loud noise about nothing. 200-400 people in a country of 200+ million is nothing.

Yes... big trucks and SUVs might have something to do with it. Could also be that people are not paying attention more because of their phones. Could also be that the people in these vehicles suck at driving them.

The data doesn't account for particular instances, it's just a guess at what is the cause.

Re: The deadly rise of giant trucks and SUVs

#139

Post by dnemmers »

jmward01 wrote: post #113

I have long held that larger vehicles should have higher licensing requirements purely based on stats. We see it in the stats that large vehicles are disproportionately dangerous to other vehicles and people so licensing should catch up. We have motorcycle licenses, why don't we have SUV licenses? Similarly, the penalties and limits should be higher. BAC should be lower. Fines higher. Etc etc. You want to drive a big…

Larger vehicles do have different licensing standards:

https://www.fmcsa.dot.gov/cdl

"Driving a Commercial Motor Vehicle (CMV) requires a higher level of knowledge, experience, skills, and physical abilities than that required to drive a non-commercial vehicle. In order to obtain a Commercial Driver's License (CDL), an applicant must pass both skills and knowledge testing geared to these higher standards. Additionally CDL holders are held to a higher standard when operating any type of motor vehicle on public roads. Serious traffic violations committed by a CDL holder can affect their ability to maintain their CDL certification."

- I wonder how things compare for a pedestrian embracing a large SUV vs. a Semi.

Re: The deadly rise of giant trucks and SUVs

#140

Post by roarkeful »

kelseyfrog wrote: post #17
sublinear wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You might be the one saying this right now, but how old is this comment ? I don't think I've ever heard any man ever say that in real life, but even online it's probably been almost a decade since this was memed into the ground.

> I don't think I've ever heard any man ever say that in real life Um, because men get weird when you point out the gender-affirming actions they do? Try it irl and see what the reactions are. There's a reason the only place free of physical intimidation is where this can be safely said. Besides, how old is the privacy comment or the "parents should parent" comment we see dragged out on every kid's social media ban?…

I exhaled through my nose when I thought of reversing your upset sexism. Let's start calling cosmetics "gender-affirming" and mock women who use them.
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