Apples and oranges. EU roads and cities are not US roads and cities and never will be.
I see. So you believe that if Europeans designed their streets to be less safe for pedestrians, like they are in the U.S., then their overall vehicular death rate would go down. Is that right?
You made a stupid jump and conclusion there mate. EU streets are nothing like US streets. Go lookup the rates in every EU country and come back with some data and we can compare it to the top and bottom US states. Apples and oranges.
I expect energy dissipation scales in a similar way... e.g. I'd expect a head-on crash of two light cars to be roughly comparable in severity to occupants to a head-on crash of two heavy cars. Is my intuition off here?
For the same speed, the total energy would be Car-v^2 vs SUV-to-Car-v^2 But the smaller cars are probably more carefully designed for "crunch" zones, preserving their occupants by maximizing the effect of available material. The nominal energy involved vs Cars would simply scale as Mass of SUV in Cars.
Right, I'm aware of the energy the calculations give, but I don't see a good reason to assume that smaller cars have more efficiently designed crumple zones. I'd expect crumple zones on larger cars to scale in energy dissipation roughly linearly with mass. (Assuming similarly structured cars - e.g. I'd expect cars with safety cages and body on frame vehicles to perform differently from unibody vehicles.)
I like Teslas Forward Collision Warning system which alerts me if it sees the obstacle such as car, a corner, or pedestrian on a path. there is also Active collision avoidance that will adjust vehicle if it senses a car on the nearby lane about to hit my side I think these safety systems need to be mandatory
There have been several studies showing driver assistance systems cause a psychological shift that leads to drivers not paying attention. I guess we have to ask ourselves if we want to encourage people to pay attention while driving, or just leave it up to the latest vibe-coded OTA update Tesla's pushing out. I'm glad backup cameras are mandatory, though.
Nothing that cant be solved with another sensor inside cabin )))
I see. So you believe that if Europeans designed their streets to be less safe for pedestrians, like they are in the U.S., then their overall vehicular death rate would go down. Is that right?
You made a stupid jump and conclusion there mate. EU streets are nothing like US streets. Go lookup the rates in every EU country and come back with some data and we can compare it to the top and bottom US states. Apples and oranges.
Sorry, I'm just trying to understand your point of view. I live in the US and spend a lot of time in the EU. I'm a citizen of both. It couldn't be more obvious to me that our street designs differ (as implied by my previous comment). I'd genuinely like to know where you're coming from, but your responses so far are shallow tautologies. I initially responded to your comment, "Fixing on the pedestrian safety yields higher death counts overall" (I assumed you meant "fixating on pedestrian safety," but perhaps this was a mistake). I'm curious how you came to that conclusion. Can you please elaborate, and what was my stupid "jump and conclusion," precisely?
my point is, in germany it takes longer than a test to get your license, unlike the US.
Is it common in other states that you only need a test for a license. Where I live (in the US) if you are a new driver (under 18) you need 30 hours of classroom instruction, 18 hours of trainer-driving time, a 6 month learner permit period with many restrictions and then a finally test, iirc.
Only Florida, Maryland, and New York require adults who are new drivers to take any kind of class/instruction. (Most states require it under 18, with a few under 21 or 25.) Everywhere else you can just walk in and take the test.
The perhaps greater problem though is that those tests are completely trivial.
The mountainous parts, particularly if you aren't driving on the interstates. You can end up in a freak blizzard in the passes from September through May. Some roads do not have frequent, regular snow clearance in winter. Localized torrential rains from thunderstorms temporarily dump debris on or wash out the road surface. In the western US, unpaved highways are relatively common in some areas. Random unexpected road…
>A lot of locals just drove old Subarus. AKA a large SUV or truck is not necessary.
For normal people AWD and high ground clearance will work. Good range also strongly recommended but these vehicles usually have that by default.
A large 4WD will handle conditions a Subaru will not but a Subaru is fine for getting around the area if you typically stay off most ranch/mining roads. It is illegal to maintain the ranch/mining roads for historical reasons, so they get a bit spicy.
There have been several studies showing driver assistance systems cause a psychological shift that leads to drivers not paying attention. I guess we have to ask ourselves if we want to encourage people to pay attention while driving, or just leave it up to the latest vibe-coded OTA update Tesla's pushing out. I'm glad backup cameras are mandatory, though.
Nothing that cant be solved with another sensor inside cabin )))
Kafka was way ahead of his time when he wrote Der Bau!
Australia had plenty, yet mysteriously has far fewer deaths.
You're either grossly misinformed or you're being disingenuous; try installing 40" mud tires and a 6" lift kit on your truck in Australia and see what happens. In the U.S. it's just another brodozer and no cop will ever bat an eye.
Australia has plenty of crossovers which are the bulk of these deaths.
Vehicles with 40s on them and a 6” lift are so rare in America they have no statistical significance in regard to accidents.
> most commonly sold CUV's today are smaller length and width wise then station wagons or sedans You didn’t mention height and isn’t that the actual issue?
The article says height of the hood and massive A pillars. People like big and boxy. Increased hood height kills people and creates an absurdly large blind area. Massive pillars add roll safety but create horrible blind spots in left hand turns.
Which is strange to me. I hate the big and boxy look.
A sedan is the perfect shaped car in my opinion. Wagons are nice too.
The times article hand-waves away distracted driving by saying that other countries haven't seen a similarly large increase. The problem with that is that vehicle sizes in all other countries have also been increasing, and other countries like Canada and Australia have seen almost identical market shares of those large vehicles without the surge in pedestrian fatalities . The large factors are phone use (more prevale…
Thank you, I hadn't even considered that smartphone use may differ between drivers in developed countries.
Australia has both smart phone and seat belt cameras. These are "portable" (mounted high on a road side trailer) which peep into your cabin from above to detect phone usage.
Being caught using a phone whilst driving imposes a $1,251 fine. In fact, even a phone off, but touching any part of your body (including on lap/leg) will incur this fine.