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U.S. motor vehicle deaths see biggest two year jump in over 50 years, per NSC

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Re: U.S. motor vehicle deaths see biggest two year jump in over 50 years, per NSC

#51

Post by js2 »

gozur88 wrote: post #4
grouseway wrote: post #2

"it does advise accelerated standardization and introduction of features including automatic emergency warning, blind spot monitoring and lane departure warning systems" If these things actually made a difference wouldn't vehicle deaths be falling unless some other change is offsetting the difference?

I'd be surprised if automatic emergency warnings didn't increase fatalities. The absolute last thing I want my car to do in an emergency driving situation is add an additional distraction.

I just bought my first new car in over 14 years and loaded it up with all the safety features: lane keep assist, advance collision detection and braking, blind spot detection.

I've been driving for 30 years and haven't had an accident in over 25, and I can tell you: I love these features. The blind spot detection mostly offsets the poor visibility on the new car, but the other features are really helpful.

Re: U.S. motor vehicle deaths see biggest two year jump in over 50 years, per NSC

#52

Post by davito88 »

ouid wrote: post #43
davito88 wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is https://www-fars.nhtsa.dot.gov/Main/index.aspx

I meant a database of individual fatalities. That was probably not clear.

Ah. FARS does include data for each crash and each victim. It can be a mess to dig through: https://github.com/wgetsnaps/ftp.nhtsa.dot.gov--fars

Also, California has their own database that includes all crashes in the state down to crash/victim level: http://iswitrs.chp.ca.gov/Reports/jsp/userLogin.jsp (You have to create a free account)

There are other datasets too: http://opendata.stackexchange.com/questions/1755/automobile-...

Re: U.S. motor vehicle deaths see biggest two year jump in over 50 years, per NSC

#53

Post by stronglikedan »

oconnore wrote: post #20
NickBusey wrote: post #6

automated enforcement for speed limit violations That is a concerning recommendation. How would this be achieved? GPS tracking? Speed limit cameras? Both methods can have serious privacy implications.

Automated enforcement of speed limit violations would be fine, as long as our speed limits were adjusted for strict enforcement versus human enforcement. Almost everyone will drive 35-40 in a 30, but you could make a case that anyone breaking 45-50mph for more than a few seconds should automatically get a ticket. Even better, the automated enforcement could account for actual danger, using road conditions, traffic de…

> Almost everyone will drive 35-40 in a 30

I used to, until I learned this [0]:

> If someone is hit by a car at 40 mph they are 90% likely to be killed.

> If someone is hit by a car at 30 mph they are 50% likely to be killed.

> If someone is hit by a car at 20 mph they are 10% likely to be killed.

[0]http://www.safespeed.org.uk/killspeed.html

Re: U.S. motor vehicle deaths see biggest two year jump in over 50 years, per NSC

#54

Post by maxerickson »

finid wrote: post #46
maxerickson wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More or less, yes they do need to be guaranteed to make money. At least on average anyway. Or they will stop writing insurance policies.

The insurance business is the best racket to be in, same as private prison industry. Customers are guaranteed.

That's all hip and cynical, but I'm pretty sure motor vehicle insurance would be a good business even if states didn't mandate that people carry it.

It'd be more expensive for the people that did carry it, but it'd be a large business.

And of course, in many states there is the option to post a bond to prove ability to compensate.

Re: U.S. motor vehicle deaths see biggest two year jump in over 50 years, per NSC

#55

Post by sevensor »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #21
digitalneal wrote: post #17

Wonder how much of this can be tied to the economy getting better and more people buying/driving (used and less safe) cars when they previously couldn't afford to.

Moving 12-Month Total Vehicle Miles Traveled https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/M12MTVUSM227NFWA

That's pretty convincing to me -- more miles driven means more driving deaths. Also, it's not clear to me whether the statistic on motor vehicle deaths includes collateral damage: cyclists and pedestrians killed by vehicles. Either way, yikes, cars kill lots of people.

Re: U.S. motor vehicle deaths see biggest two year jump in over 50 years, per NSC

#57

Post by Someone »

digitalneal wrote: post #17

Wonder how much of this can be tied to the economy getting better and more people buying/driving (used and less safe) cars when they previously couldn't afford to.

Reading http://www.nsc.org/NewsDocuments/2017/12-month-estimates.pdf, half the increase is due to an increase in vehicle miles travelled, which went up because the USA is coming out of a recession.

Re: U.S. motor vehicle deaths see biggest two year jump in over 50 years, per NSC

#58

Post by toss1941 »

AJ007 wrote: post #47

Watch a busy street at night during heavy traffic. You can see from the light shining off driver's faces that 40%~ of them are either using their phones or another system while driving. Given the proliferation of front-facing cameras and velocity sensors in all iPhones and most Android devices, it is unconscionable that these devices remain usable in these circumstances.

I don't want my phone acting as my nanny with an always-on camera. If it would, I'd sell it or break it faster than you can say 1984.

Re: U.S. motor vehicle deaths see biggest two year jump in over 50 years, per NSC

#59

Post by revelation »

oconnore wrote: post #50
revelation wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every speeder ever thinks they can speed until, well, they can't. As air drag increases quadratically with speed so does kinetic energy and pedestrian survival rates in a collision rapidly approach 0% for speeds above even 25 mph. So no, widespread violation of speed limits is not in fact an argument towards allowing the violation of speed limits. Most countries are already much more lenient here than physical realit…

I think you're talking about something else, because we should be designing for pedestrians to not be hit by cars, not making sure that pedestrians might survive the impact. At the same time, limiting modern cars to 25 mph everywhere is ridiculous. In some high density locations, that might mean strictly enforcing a 15mph limit instead of loosely enforcing a 10mph limit, building bike lanes, public transport, pedestr…

I'm sure we can do both. It was you who suggested being lenient on people going 35-40 mph in a 30 zone; 30 suggests the likelihood of encountering pedestrians, hence the mention of the survival rate.

I'm quite with you on what we can do in high density locations, but I think you have not quite thought it through. In high density locations, there should simply not be any cars. The huge compromises are not justified where pedestrians outnumber them 5:1 anyways.

Re: U.S. motor vehicle deaths see biggest two year jump in over 50 years, per NSC

#60

Post by iak8god »

Someone wrote: post #57
digitalneal wrote: post #17

Wonder how much of this can be tied to the economy getting better and more people buying/driving (used and less safe) cars when they previously couldn't afford to.

Reading http://www.nsc.org/NewsDocuments/2017/12-month-estimates.pdf , half the increase is due to an increase in vehicle miles travelled, which went up because the USA is coming out of a recession.

The last recession in the US ended officially ended in 2009. I know the recovery has arguably been sluggish and uneven, but it doesn't seem like the slow & steadily rising GDP over an eight year span should explain much of this shorter-term jump in vehicular deaths.
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