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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

#531

Post by cucumber3732842 »

rconti wrote: post #469

We've already lost the war on outward visibility. Virtually every bit of our safety regulatory system encourages or demands vehicles that you can't really see out of anymore. Side impact standards and higher door sills all around, curtain airbags, etc. Hell, they encourage (more profitable) SUVs because they don't have to be built to passenger car safety standards. And the market's doing the rest. The only response f…

We've lost a more general war against the social acceptability of demanding something must be done while simultaneously being stupid to think a few steps ahead.

All these concerns were raised back when vehicles were getting crappy to see out of in the late 00s but "something must be done" and "the statistics say" screeched the exact same demographics if not literal individuals, and so, things were done, and now here we are.

And this is just the tip of the goddamn iceberg. Seems like every axis of discourse and policy is afflicted by this. I have no idea how we fix it.

Re: The deadly rise of giant trucks and SUVs

#532

Post by Marsymars »

somerandomqaguy wrote: post #509
Marsymars wrote: post #483

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The Crown Victoria was considered a regular sized sedan for it's day [...] Are you sure about that? In North America, other than the Crown Vic in its heyday, Ford also had the Escort, the Festiva, the Tempo and the Taurus for sedans, all of which were smaller than the Crown Vic, which was the largest car they sold.

As far as I was aware the others didn't sell in any close to the same numbers. The Crown Vic and it's Panther platform siblings were the basis for taxis and police cars across the US and Canada for a long time, and they could be had second hand for for a few months pay cheque back in the day.

> As far as I was aware the others didn't sell in any close to the same numbers.

Per wiki, Crown Vic sales peaked at 114k in 1999. In the same year, the Taurus sold 368k and the Escort sold 260k. (The Tempo was discontinued by then, but was typically moving 200k+ per year.)

Re: The deadly rise of giant trucks and SUVs

#533

Post by seabird »

xnx wrote: post #23

Unfortunately, in the car size arms race, bigger and heavier cars are safer for their occupants. "Everyone outside the car be damned" is the expressed preference of US buyers.

Thumb through IIHS numbers and you'll see that "bigger is better" doesn't pass a sniff test.

https://www.iihs.org/ratings/driver-death-rates-by-make-and-...

Re: The deadly rise of giant trucks and SUVs

#534

Post by tzs »

cucumber3732842 wrote: post #92
trollbridge wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This study didn’t nearly enough to disambiguate for widespread phone use while driving, which IMO is the biggest factor. Self driving AI is the answer.

Would've been trivial to just run the same calculations on 1990s numbers when SUVs first became popular but long before smartphones. I think it speaks volumes that they didn't.

SUVs started becoming popular in the 1990s but there is significant lag between becoming popular among new car buyers and becoming a significant fraction of cars on the road.

For example SUVs and light trucks rose to 30% of new sales in 1990 but it wasn't until 2003 that they were 30% of vehicles on the road.

Re: The deadly rise of giant trucks and SUVs

#536

Post by infecto »

epistasis wrote: post #154
infecto wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My anecdote only but the contraptions being sold as “e-bikes” are actually motorcycles. Like all things a few bad apples ruin it for everyone but in what I have seen it’s more than just a few bad apples. From maintained mountain bike trails, to riding at speed on walking paths. They are far more than just some kids being kids. It is ultimately a lack of parenting these days but I don’t believe the new laws coming int…

Your description is not accurate for my state, California, there are clear tiers of ebikes with regulations on when and where they can go, with very clear explanation at purchase, and no weird marketing like you're talking about. I've tried to go buy them, I have experienced the lectures! Perhaps we can let the few bad apples killing lots of people with their massive hood height lead to better regulation of such hood…

I am not arguing for one over the other but that these e-bikes are motorcycles and I know from experience nobody actually enforces those rules.

Re: The deadly rise of giant trucks and SUVs

#537

Post by Swizec »

decimalenough wrote: post #477
simplyluke wrote: post #262

The problem is that other countries have seen nearly identical trends in vehicle market share trending towards larger vehicles and have seen sustained declines in pedestrian fatalities. John Burn-Murdoch went deep on this in the FT a couple of years ago (archive link at bottom). > Most of the explanations commonly put forward for why US roads remain so deadly focus on broad structural factors such as vehicle size or…

While vehicle sizes are indeed trending upward in Australia and Europe, giant SUV and especially giant truck penetration in both countries is still far behind US levels, and particularly in Europe are unlikely to ever reach the same figures (good luck parking your Ford F-9000 Testosteroneo in Rome or Paris).

> While vehicle sizes are indeed trending upward in Australia and Europe, giant SUV and especially giant truck penetration in both countries is still far behind US levels

Many big SUVs are flat out illegal in Europe, you’d need a small truck license. It’s hard to comprehend how large American cars are unless you’ve lived in both places.

For example:

we took an Uber to the airport for our annual pilgrimage back home. We had 4 suitcases this time because new babies need gifts. In USA we got picked up by a sedan and everything fit in the trunk. In Europe we rented an SUV and had to break down the rear seats to fit everything.

Re: The deadly rise of giant trucks and SUVs

#538

Post by ryandrake »

decimalenough wrote: post #468
tzs wrote: post #399

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait...is the massive problem that it should be more than an order of magnitude more people killed than those killed in mass shootings, or is it that it should be less than an order of magnitude more? They are such completely different categories of ways to die I'm having trouble understand how to compare them in any sensible way.

Neither. The OP's point is that shootings consistently make headlines and occasion a lot of passionate debate, while grandma or toddler getting mowed over by a SUV or monster truck doesn't and as a consequence nobody really cares.

Hence the saying: If you want to kill someone and get the lightest possible punishment, kill them with your car!

Re: The deadly rise of giant trucks and SUVs

#539

Post by iknowstuff »

asdff wrote: post #500
simplyluke wrote: post #262

The problem is that other countries have seen nearly identical trends in vehicle market share trending towards larger vehicles and have seen sustained declines in pedestrian fatalities. John Burn-Murdoch went deep on this in the FT a couple of years ago (archive link at bottom). > Most of the explanations commonly put forward for why US roads remain so deadly focus on broad structural factors such as vehicle size or…

Smartphone use is a compelling case: https://old.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/1ubbfrv/oc...

Nah thats the same everywhere. Stroads and piss poor urban design, largely due to objections from stubborn fire departments chasing the wrong metrics and refusing to downsize, are a compelling case.

Re: The deadly rise of giant trucks and SUVs

#540

Post by kube-system »

tinfoilhatter wrote: post #296
baron816 wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, probably the right thing to do for large trucks and suvs is to reclassify them so that you need a commercial license to drive them.

[flagged]

The problematic designs are primarily post-2009, as this fine article points out. Families had no issue finding transportation in 2008 or prior.

A 47” high hood line does not provide any utility to transporting children. Children are not stored under the hood.

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