City of Atlanta Releases Draft of New Transportation Plan (Between: 2013, schools)

[cqholt]

Originally Posted by jsvh

Good reminder of the importance of the need for enhancing safety, slowing cars, and providing alternatives to driving in this transportation plan:

Motor vehicles are the leading cause of death of children in this country, killing more than twice as many as cancer:

https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMsr1804754

https://www.nbcnews.com/health/healt...-shows-n950091

https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsan...than-elsewhere

For some reason traffic fatalities are just seen as a side effect of doing business in America. Even though more of America's youths are killed in car crashes than school shooting, there is little push to do anything about it.

[bu2]

Originally Posted by cqholt

For some reason traffic fatalities are just seen as a side effect of doing business in America. Even though more of America's youths are killed in car crashes than school shooting, there is little push to do anything about it.

Drunk driving laws, raising the drinking age, car safety requirements....

Of course, traffic fatalities are down tremendously with all those improvements over the last 40 years.

[jsvh]

Originally Posted by bu2

Drunk driving laws, raising the drinking age, car safety requirements....

Of course, traffic fatalities are down tremendously with all those improvements over the last 40 years.

Yet our vehicular death rate is still multiple times worse than other developed countries.

Minor incremental improvements to a dangerous activity (driving) don't come close to making up the difference when you still do that dangerous activity way more.

We got to stop prioritizing car dependency. It is literally killing our children.

[bu2]

Originally Posted by jsvh

Yet our vehicular death rate is still multiple times worse than other developed countries.

Minor incremental improvements to a dangerous activity (driving) don't come close to making up the difference when you still do that dangerous activity way more.

We got to stop prioritizing car dependency. It is literally killing our children.

It hasn't been minor incremental improvements. 1967 5.26 deaths per 100 million miles. 2017 1.16.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motor_...n_U.S._by_year

And many countries have higher death rates than the US. Tiny Belgium has a rate equal to the US at 7.3 per billion KM.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...ted_death_rate

[samiwas1]

Originally Posted by bu2

It hasn't been minor incremental improvements. 1967 5.26 deaths per 100 million miles. 2017 1.16.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motor_...n_U.S._by_year

And many countries have higher death rates than the US. Tiny Belgium has a rate equal to the US at 7.3 per billion KM.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...ted_death_rate

Even in the last year, vehicle miles traveled increased by 1.2%, while deaths decreased by 1.8%. The number of deaths in passenger cars and of pedestrians and cyclists declined quite a bit, while those involving large trucks increased somewhat.

Also seeing that fatalities in urban areas increased somewhat in the last ten years, while rural areas saw decreases. However, population statistics represent this same increase and decline, suggesting that the areas defined as urban have grown.

[samiwas1]

Originally Posted by Street Advocate

A timely article.
Why the U.S. Leads the Developed World on Traffic Deaths
https://usa.streetsblog.org/2018/12/...raffic-deaths/

Reading comments like this...

The evidence is that 100% of pedestrian/vehicle fatalities are the fault of the driver, and that the cops deliberately miscode them.

...is why it's so hard to take some people seriously on this subject. The histrionics displayed overshadow any actual argument.

[jsvh]

Originally Posted by samiwas1

Reading comments like this...



...is why it's so hard to take some people seriously on this subject. The histrionics displayed overshadow any actual argument.

Maybe you should read the actual article and not just scan the comment section for things to be offended by.

[samiwas1]

Originally Posted by jsvh

Maybe you should read the actual article and not just scan the comment section for things to be offended by.

I did read the article. And in fact, read it while comparing it to stats from the NHTSA.

For instance, the article states the US "[resists protecting] pedestrians in crashes, even as their fatality rates soar". However, the stats show that there were fewer pedestrian fatalities this past year, even as vehicle miles were higher. Admittedly, one year is not indicative of a trend, but it's not "soaring". In fact, there's a graph in the NHTSA piece showing that while percentage of pedestrian deaths increased somewhat between 2002 and 2012, it's mostly leveled off.

The article states that the US is "going backward relative to speed limits", referring to states raising the top speed of interstates to 70 in many locations. However, this is mostly in rural areas and the stats show that fatalities are down in rural areas. Also, it says that this led to "deadly results" as states did this after 1995. However, fatalities did not rise much after 1995 in numbers, and went down by every other measure. Also, the article links to another article in that section which shows speeding-related deaths going down.

In addition to that, they claim that our speed limits are higher than elsewhere. At least according to this graphic, this is not true at all, and a cursory look at a London speed limit map showed most small residential streets at 20, city center and minor arterials at 30, and larger roads at 40 and up (much like us). Texas has the highest speed limits in the country, but is in the middle of the list for per capita deaths, while having amongst the highest alcohol-related.

They do correctly point out the lack of seatbelt usage, the ease of getting a license, and of course, the large amount of auto-related fatalities linked to alcohol. I think getting a drivers license should be far harder, and drunk driving dealt with more harshly. Of course, they never mention anything regarding pedestrians or cyclists being careless.

So, yeah...I read it. And analyzed it. Then I read the comments to see what people were saying about it. And when I read stuff like "100 percent of pedestrian-related deaths are the driver's fault", I understand why those types of people get ignored.

[samiwas1]

Originally Posted by jsvh

You are correct there.

Pedestrian deaths remain U.S.’s highest since 1990

Not that even "leveling off" at those sort of levels should be acceptable.

Nope. But, just like we don't look at traffic deaths solely by number, but by either percentage per capita or by vehicle miles, we should look at pedestrian deaths in regards to the number of pedestrians, which has likely grown a LOT in the past decade to see how it measures up. But, this is practically impossible to count.

However, your article brings up a fascinating point:

Interestingly, the state of Hawaii, where Honolulu lawmakers are ticketing people for using phones in crosswalks, has the lowest rate of pedestrian deaths per resident, according to this data. There was just one walker killed in the entire state in the first half of 2017.

So, the state which has started issuing tickets for not paying attention as a pedestrian has the lowest rate of pedestrian fatalities. And seeing as pedestrian deaths have risen quite a bit while the roads have not really changed (many actually made safer), cars have not changed significantly in the last ten years, and most other fatalities have gone down quite a bit, it would suggest that the pedestrian might actually be the problem.

Seems like it is the main thing you paid attention to.

Sure. My entire four paragraphs discussing details of the article show that.

[bu2]

Originally Posted by Street Advocate

A timely article.
Why the U.S. Leads the Developed World on Traffic Deaths
https://usa.streetsblog.org/2018/12/...raffic-deaths/

The US may lead in deaths per 100,000 among first world countries, but it would be because we drive more miles. Again, as I showed, we are not out of line in relation to vehicle miles travelled. Its a specious article. It talks about vehicle safety. If it was talking about alternative transportation it might have made sense. Its safer for every mile in the US than in South Korea or New Zealand. Its the same as Belgium which doesn't have the long rural highways. Germany is a little better and they have autobahns with no speed limit.