California to begin ticketing driverless cars that violate traffic laws

> Sure, it's possible for a pedestrian to be at fault, but even if they step out from behind an occluded object, if a driver is fast enough to kill them, then the driver is almost certainly already at fault because they were driving faster than conditions warranted.

That's not true: 30km/h is enough to kill, and that's a very sedate speed.

Whether we like it or not, pedestrians and cyclists have to also follow the rules.

If you want change the rules, well that's a different argument to the one you appearing to make which is that certain entities should not be bound by any rules.

Cool beans. We seem to be sufficiently agreeable.

Suppose we set forth on straightening out the laws (because the existing laws are bullshit compared to reality, and they're not even made of paper these days so they're easy to adjust), while concurrently working on a better solution than a 4-way stop.

What do we aim for?

I love roundabouts, but as-implemented they're very often big-enough to create property-acquisition issues. In previous discussions, I've heard of such things as "mini roundabouts" that can make that a non-issue, but AFAIK I've never actually seen one with my own eyes, much less driven through one. And while I love roundabouts and understand them well, I keep seeing people screw them up even in places where they've existed for over a decade, now.

I've heard from Norway that painting sharks teeth on the pavement is sufficient (which, I guess, is functionally like a US-centric Yield sign), but that seems like a complete non-starter since that's a completely new construct and continuing-education for licensed drivers is rather completely non-existent.

And Yield signs can work, but they're also unusual so people screw those up, too. I live directly next to a busy intersection that uses a yield sign in an unusual town in Ohio that has several intersections that are controlled by yield signs. Crashes are surprisingly rare, but the cacophony of car horns [even when things are actually flowing properly] is sometimes rather amazing to behold.

But this is a strange and unusual little city, and as far as I can tell, the last time anyone looked at the traffic situation here with a strong engineering mindset was circa 1953. It has clever intersection designs that I've never seen anywhere else (and some of them are good, but many are confusing).

And when an old friend was a driving instructor, he told me that he'd take students through the intersection next to my house to demonstrate that yield signs are things that actually exist, and teach them how to use them. But he didn't get to teach everyone (and has subsequently died).

I've studied thousands of intersections, both by driving for decades and reviewing how they work, and also by having spent way too many hundreds (thousands?) of hours fixing maps on Waze.

So that's a non-exhaustive list of some possible solutions, and some possible detriments, and some background on my perspective.

What do you have for options? Your perspective surely differs from my own.

(And remember, whatever it is: It needs to be able to let a giant US-centric fire truck pass through. Maybe the size of these things isn't really ideal either; maybe smaller trucks would be better. But giant is what we've got right now.)

> No one said that it's not possible for a pedestrian to be at fault in a collision; they said the opposite.

The intention of the comment you accused of replying to a straw man was meant to point out that a pedestrian could be at fault instead of the driver.

That reply is pretty clearly arguing that even if the pedestrian was at fault, the driver would still have to be at fault anyway. Summarizing an argument after quoting it isn't misquoting it.

> A pedestrian could be at fault in other scenarios, like running into the middle of the street in dark clothing at night.

There is nothing to distinguish this from the original argument where the driver could still be be accused of "driving faster than conditions warranted" because visibility is lower at night.

> In California, if a pedestrian is in a crosswalk then the driver is legally at fault

And strict liability rules like that often lead to ridiculous outcomes, e.g. if someone jumps out of the back of a truck into an intersection and you then hit them, technically they were a pedestrian in a crosswalk. Or there is a pedestrian standing next to a crosswalk but they're stationary and talking on their phone without seeming to want to enter the crosswalk, so you start to proceed and then they step in front of your car.

I also hope AV will reduce road deaths in the future but I don't think what will make the difference is regulatory. Rather the tech will advance from doesn't work to works in Waymos but is expensive to works in most cars and has become cheap.

We've had public transportation for a couple of centuries and no where has it really led to a road death free utopia. I like public transport but no harm trying something new.