Car Crashes in the US: Who's Responsible, Who Bears the Costs, and How We Talk About It (with Data!)
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 16 มิ.ย. 2024
- The United States has a road safety problem. Americans die from traffic violence at a far higher rate than people who live in similarly developed countries like the UK, Japan, and Australia.
This video reviews the state of traffic safety in the US, looking at how people die on our transportation system, how trends have changed over time, and how much work is left to be done. While motor vehicles have become heavier and more powerful, auto manufacturers have also dramatically improved features (like airbags and crumple zones) that have led to better overall crash survivability for car drivers and passengers.
At the same time, safety for people walking, biking, and rolling has gotten worse, with few engineering improvements to protect vulnerable road users.
We'll spend lots of time with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's Fatality Analysis Reporting System, looking at how all the data is coded and what it can tell us. And we'll talk about prospects for future transportation safety improvements.
Other CityNerd Videos referenced:
- Top Urbanist Ballparks: • What Is Urbanism? 2022...
- The Problem With Pickup Trucks: • Why Absurdly Large Tru...
- The Stroad Ecosystem Examined: • The Stroad: A Case Stu...
- Cost of Car Dependency 2022: • The All-In Cost of Car...
Resources:
"How the Brooklyn Subway Shooting Unfolded" By Keith Collins, Lazaro Gamio, Evan Grothjan, Marco Hernandez, Taylor Johnston, Eleanor Lutz, Yuliya Parshina-Kottas and Amy Schoenfeld Walker for the New York Times, available at www.nytimes.com/interactive/2...
NTD data: www.transit.dot.gov/ntd
NHTSA Crash Data Systems: www.nhtsa.gov/data/crash-data...
NHTSA Overview of Motor Vehicle Crashes in 2020: crashstats.nhtsa.dot.gov/Api/...
CDC National Vital Statistics Report 2019: www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nv...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...
NHTSA Traffic Safety Facts 2019: crashstats.nhtsa.dot.gov/Api/...
Chicago Vision Zero High Crash Corridors Plan 2018: secureservercdn.net/198.71.23...
NHTSA Fatality Analysis Reporting System: www.nhtsa.gov/research-data/f...
Image Credits:
- Causes of death in the US vs media coverage By Our World In Data - ourworldindata.org/terrorism#..., CC BY-SA 4.0, commons.wikimedia.org/w/index...
- Jan 6 insurrection photo By Tyler Merbler from USA - DSC09254-2, CC BY 2.0, commons.wikimedia.org/w/index...
- Airbags By Pineapple fez - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, commons.wikimedia.org/w/index...
- Crumple zone By Janne. from Finland - Vagi paalattu Uploaded by Antti Leppänen, CC BY-SA 2.0, commons.wikimedia.org/w/index...
- Traffic Strop by Chris Yarzab on Flickr www.flickr.com/photos/chrisya... creativecommons.org/licenses/...
- Traffic Calming By FlugKerl2 - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, commons.wikimedia.org/w/index...
- Tesla dashboard By Ian Maddox - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, commons.wikimedia.org/w/index...
- Crash thumbnail Image By Charles Edward Miller from Chicago, United States - Car Crash 7-1-18 2245, CC BY-SA 2.0, commons.wikimedia.org/w/index...
Music:
CityNerd background: Caipirinha in Hawaii by Carmen María and Edu Espinal (TH-cam music library)
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Contact: nerd4cities@gmail.com - วิทยาศาสตร์และเทคโนโลยี
I hate when I'm walking and I lose control and run into a car. 🤣
Many years ago, my mother's car was hit and dented by a drunk pedestrian while getting ready to leave a White Castle.
I can’t wait for the lane-keeping assist wetware update! My brain is ready for the download!!
@@Sythemn did she survive?
Oh noo, I just killed a driver by running into his car!
Sometimes a vehicle can't see you when you are in the road. Responsibility is a two-way street. Don't step off curbs into the road from behind cover and you'll be less likely to be hit.
*"Oh, no, bridge collapses in the news have me anxious about whether the large bridge I drive across every day to get to work is dangerous."*
_"You don't need to wonder. People routinely die on that bridge in multi-vehicle accidents that don't even make the news."_
Makes you wonder how many lives were saved by those cracks forming on the West Seattle bridge causing it to remain closed for over two years and counting.
@@rokksula4082 Yes thank goodness for our unwillingness to invest money in infrastructure lmao There is a silver lining afterall
Yeah, humans are deeply irrational. It's not a criticism -- it just is.
laughs in Chesapeake Bay Bridge... let's add a third span that'll fix everything
“Pedestrian loss of control” sounds like slipping on ice. Maybe we should be clearing the snow & ice from sidewalks and not just roads
Sometimes something happens that I lose control and start colliding with the passing-by cars. Thankfully nobody has been injured yet.
Loving how Toronto clears sidewalks. It's pretty nice.
We also have to start demanding raised crosswalks, if we're going to have a modicum of safety. Ramps down to street level are hazards in icy conditions.
Reminds me of a sad accident in Astoria, Queens almost a year ago. A delivery worker was killed when a driver crashed her Mercedes-Benz into an outdoor restaurant. The whole thing was caught on camera and the car had had previous peeding violations in school zones.
The driver insisted that she had been hit from a car behind, but that wasn't true. Then the police said she had had a medical episode, but that wasn't true either. In fact, her husband had said she had been perfectly fine. Finally, the DA declined to prosecute her for criminal charges, despite the evidence. Streetsblog tried to get the video footage but that was declined.
So it's not just about making streets calmer, it's also about getting the law and the police to care about them.
The police are enforcing shared social values
That don't exist.
Well, it has been said that the police mainly protect the rich and the rich aren't exactly famous for taking public transportation lol
Incredible. That hurts -- Astoria is one of my all time favorite places (both the Queens and the Oregon versions)
@@CityNerd Yep, it's home for me. I was surprised they didn't go after the driver.
@@lj2265
Nor having much in the way of morals.
Got hit from behind in February. On my bike. By a large SUV. On a stroad. At an intersection. I was where I should be. Driver lied and told cops I swerved into his path. Cops never asked my side of the story, possibly because I was in the ambulance. Luckily all x rays were negative. "Only" $600 damage to my bike. Out of my pocket. Plus two weeks of pain. I'm a rather bitter man right now. . .
as a survivor of a pretty bad car accident at the ripe age of 19, I appreciate you making this video... I was just driving home and a dui hit me going like 80mph in heavy traffic... my first car was totaled, my elderly sdad was injured, and I was left with permanent brain damage. I hate how I'm forced to drive to do anything in Cali.. for a while I was traumatised... I still love the car, but I wish we had more options in terms of transportation within civilisation... i think I already mentioned in the comments before, but my wifey insists we move to UK (her home country), where, although car centric, one isn't tied to driving everywhere... and city driving is 40 mph maximum... and tbh, I'm going to permanently move from this hell of California. Much love!
I had a similar traumatic situation with my sister. DUI came out of nowhere in broad daylight and slammed into us. We were stopped at a light. Amazing we walked away with no severe injuries because the car was totaled. I just can't help but think how easily that crash could have been prevented and how easily one of us could have died
Many Californians are moving to FL.
@@familykaplan1341 That's just moving to a different flavored slightly cheaper hell, no?
What part of California? I lived in it all my life and it was fairly walkable. NorCal.
Goes both ways. Many Floridians are moving to CA and among other states.
Here's a topic I would like someone to discuss: Most states recognize that driving creates a risk to the public. To accommodate that risk, drivers are, in most states, required to have liability insurance, to protect the public from the harm that a driver can cause.
BUT, most states insurance requirements come NOWHERE NEAR covering the actual risk of harm a driver creates. For example, in NJ, a driver is required to have $15,000 per claimant and $30,000 per incident. Any driver can cause many times that amount of damage at any moment.
BUT, we can't raise the minimum insurance requirements to actually protect the public from crashes, because the premiums would be prohibitive. And, because our society and economy demands that people drive, we can't exclude from the driving population everyone who can't afford these premiums.
So, what happens is that either a. the victims bear the cost of people being under insured and/or the taxpayers wind up bearing this cost as people wind up on disability, medicaid, etc.
this is just another cost of our car dependency which is generally not accounted for. the victims tend to be fairly invisible to our society.
I work in auto insurance in Canada and it really puts the danger presented by cars into perspective. A small mistake by a motorist can easily ruin the lives of a lot of people. That's why we require insurance. It's CRAZY how low the liability limits are in the US. Ontario requires $200,000 of 3rd party liability coverage but no insurance company offers less than $1,000,000. I can't imagine having the legal minimum that some states have. In my experience, even 1 million isn't enough liability coverage and that's in Canada and not the US with high medical costs!
Insurance is expensive here (Average premium is $CA1,634/yr) but that's largely the result of the fact that we have a well-rounded standardized auto insurance policy that is defined by the government. Every insurance company offers the same policy and there is a list of pre-approved endorsements/riders that can be stuck on. Average industry wide profit is 3.8%.
If you went out and bought the absolute bare minimum insurance to drive legally in Ontario you would have:
-$1,000,000 in Third Party Liability ($200,000 is the legal minimum but no company that I know of offers it)
-Up to $65,000 (1 million for catastrophic injuries) for rehabilitation and attendant care costs.
-Up to $100/week for housekeeping and maintenance.
-Income replacement of 70% of your income up to $400 a week.
-Funeral benefit of $6,000
-Death benefit of $25,000 to your spouse and $10,000 to each child.
-(You wouldn't have coverage for damage to your own car unless it was not your fault, that is separate collision coverage)
I can't stress this enough, those accident benefits are no-fault so you get access to them regardless of whether or not you caused the accident and regardless of the circumstances. It's any injury incurred while operating a motor vehicle by anyone involved so if you hit a cyclist with your car that cyclist can claim the benefits listed above. I've even seen cases where people have pulled over to assist a cyclist who was struck by another car and they were able to make a claim under the assisting car's insurance (Not an at-fault so it would not raise rates).
The system was designed so that the costs fall to insurers before they fall to the government or tax payers. We factor the cost of paying out these claims in the rates we charge insurers, my experience with the Canadian insurance industry is that they're not out to deny valid claims for stupid reasons. Pretty much any claim that isn't obviously fraudulent is approved and the cost of doing so is factored into the rates. Worst case scenario, there's a Motor Vehicle Victims Fund set--up for people harmed by accidents that would otherwise not be covered.
It's not perfect, costs in some cities like Brampton and Vaughan are extremely high due to rampant fraud but other provinces are similar in terms of insurance and have even better systems. Several provinces like Saskatchewan, Quebec, and Manitoba legally require drivers to purchase basic liability insurance from the government.
@@jacobfalardeau676 wow.. thanks for that thoughtful detailed reply! the only thing I take issue with is calling that premium expensive! I pay $675 a year for far less coverage (in NJ). My liability limit is $300,000 and it is only at fault. All of the other benefits are less although I don't have the data handy. But honestly, the rate you quote seems pretty reasonable!
To deal with the number of uninsured drivers, NJ now allows people to drive with what are called basic policies with no liability coverage. They specifically suggest buying one if you don't have any assets to protect! (As if the public interest is not a factor). www.state.nj.us/dobi/division_consumers/insurance/basicpolicy.shtml
I can't imagine driving without liability insurance, let alone not requiring everyone to have it that just looks like it's an accident waiting to happen, if you'll forgive the terrible pun.
Ontario is the most expensive place to get car insurance in Canada despite having the safest roads; It's still better than getting into an accident and having my life ruined or even worse, being hit by a uninsured car while walking down the street and not being able to make a claim. Your life is ruined and it's not even your fault, you could sue them but they almost definitely won't have any assets to go after.
North Americans are used to cars like fish are used to water and they don't appreciate the amount of destruction cars can cause, all it takes it one mistake and you have not only ruined your life but the lives of a lot of people. I've seen claims where it's two cars going 40 km/h, one turns left in front of the other, BANG. Unfortunately, the car that got cut off had an elderly couple inside so they ended up needing extensive physiotherapy. Total cost of the accident was over $460,000, and that's for a "minor" left-turn incident, can you imagine the impact a pile-up on the highway would have?
@@jacobfalardeau676 Some people driving without car insurance at all. A couple driving hit my parents car and took off and drove away leaving their car with problems and them with injuries.
@@jacobfalardeau676
After I spent some weeks visiting a friend in Brampton and, consequently, travelled through Brampton and Vaughan regularly I believe that fraud is not the only reason insurance rates are so high there. I'm sure you have a better insight into crash rates but I can't believe they aren't heightened there (given the amount of near-collisions I was in during the stay).
Amazed you kept calm during this video. I was fuming at every passing minute, everything about this data makes me angry. Automobile culture is truly such a scourge on this world
The relationship humanity has with cars is the definition of toxic.
@@beckobert Whenever people talk about North Korea one of the top things people will comment on is how they don't have any cars and like... pretty sure they have worse things to deal with than not having a car lmao We're so obsessed with them we'll look at severely oppressed people and be like "The poor dears... look at them... they don't have cars! They bike everywhere!"
Yeah, I can't actually operate with that level of anger, and it's not really my style -- but I feel you
@@beckobert it's not humanity, it's America. No other rich country is even close. Look at the data he cites at the beginning.
@@stevelewis7501 China is the richest country in the world - it's data is not on that list, but I can imagine that it would be at least as bad if it was both accurate and public. India is not a poor country and its traffic fatality data makes the US look like a walk in the park.
I really respect your consistent use of the term 'traffic violence'.
feels incredibly contrived and pretentious to me
It is consistent, but I disagree with the usage. Not all 'bad thing happens suddenly' is violence, and calling it that waters down the concept of violence.
@@fluuufffffy1514 Well put. I agree with this fully.
@@MathGPT I will be a bit pedantic and say that, if you look it up, violence has a broad range of definitions and in CityNerd's defense his use of it wasn't technically wrong but I just find it to be disingenuous to use in that way when most peoples' inclination is that it refers to an intentional attack. Your view of it is too narrow and covers only some of the definition though. For instance animals can do violence to each other or to people but there's nothing "criminal" about that act.
@@MathGPT The legal definition is flawed then because that means that what the police and military do aren't violent because they're a lawful organization. The general/colloquial definition is better.
Despite my efforts bicycling to work, deep down I know it's a liability for my own safety and it scares me.
We really do need policy to prevent these things.
I feel the same. I've been lucky enough with my biking -- the one time I got injured, a driver ran a stop sign. It happens, but am I supposed to slow down at every opposing stop sign just in case a driver blows through again? Doesn't seem tenable. I hate it.
Cycling instead of driving also adds years to your life, because you are healthier, so instead of being sad about something that you most likely cant control, be happy that you do something positive, that you can control
I had to stop commuting via bike due to a few too many close calls. Many of them in the 25 mph "residential" areas. When they hopefully complete the grade separated bike path near my home, I look forward to being able to go back to that mode of transportation with having only a few blocks on streets shared with vehicles.
@@CityNerd Know a dude who broke the same leg twice while biking. Im not afraid to admit i wont even try it. Living in NYC I see people biking in the middle of buses and cars along busy streets like fifth ave...couldnt be me
Haha high speed E scooter
"if we had 100 people get killed in public transit every day, we would never hear the end of it."
I really hope this video takes off. It is too important not to.
I have shared it with everyone I can, and I hope you do, too.
If as many died on public transit as do on roads we would put a stop to public transport.
I personally have a belief that heavy car use creates a lack of empathy for other people as you don't see them as people but instead other boxes on the road.
Statistics like this almost prove that though. Drivers going at some 140mph and the reason for the crash is "tyre blow out" because surely it couldn't have been the person making a poor decision and not caring about its impact upon other people. The amount of excuses given for what is basically murder or manslaughter is insane. Heck there was even a reason for the driver being distracted called "Personal Dispute" meaning that the driver didn't like someone and got "distracted" and rammed their car into either another car or a pedestrian or cyclist. Absolutely mental.
I like being on transit cos I get to see other people and see them interact. I get a small glimpse into their lives and get to see that they are just as human as me. I don't get that in a car cos I can barely even see people's outlines through the glass, let alone their faces. I think that sort of thinking needs to be built in people, to show that others have lives just as interesting as yours and that you should care for people. But that's just my two cents on the matter.
Thanks for the video. Almost got hit by a car when walking to school yesterday. I was in a crosswalk and my signal gave me the right of way. It made me reflect on how quickly a car can take someone's life. As a pedestrian you really have to assume you are invisible because if you don't you might get run over.
edit: even if you do pretend you are invisible and are extra careful you are still in danger.
I almost got hit while walking home from school about 2 hours ago 🙃... I was also in the crosswalk and I knew the person who almost hit me 😭
There's this crosswalk I cross everyday on the way to work. Pretty much 9 times out of 10 at least one person speeds through the red light because God forbid they have to wait 10 seconds.
Recently I saw a readers letter in the news paper about her niece that was killed when crossing the road. The thing is, she wasn't following the law and what she did was wrong but the main takeaway was that a small mistake like that shouldn't cost someone their life. Sure she crossed the street wrong but are we really okay with people getting killed because they cross the road the wrong way?
When I'm cycling or walking, my mindset is that the cars are predators and I"m prey. I'm always watching out.
I fly fast and loose on a bike. I've never felt like I was at risk as I essentially pretend I'm invisible as that's the number 1 policy for riding a bike/being a pedestrian in the US. I guess I grew cocky and seemed to forget this rule as a driver just "didn't see me" in broad daylight coming to a stop at a stop sign. Thankfully this was at a stop sign so I was pretty much unscathed as it was low speed.
Lady was alarmed and embarrassed. I now use extremely bright flashing lights at all times day and night.
I've been saying this since last week (from here in NYC): if you get in your car, you're always in more danger than being on the subway.
Translating the "per year" death rate to about 100 deaths per day was, IMO, a much better way of presenting the ubiquitous lethality of car crashes that I hadn't thought of before. Good video
There's a video in which Mikael Colville-Andersen claps his hands at a rate of once a second. And then he explains that each second somewhere in the world someone is struck and killed from an auto collision.
@@georgeemil3618 that’s just morbid
Here in Vancouver its very common in the downtown core for a speeder in a luxury car to jump the curb on to the sidewalk and kill a pedestrian. Its happened multiple times at one intersection, the latest one killing a child who was being carried by her father when they were both hit. The entire place needs to be made in to a pedestrian-only zone and drivers can be told to sit on the middle finger and twist if they're mad about it. Take the train.
Thankfully downtown Vancouver's growing network of barrier-protected bike lanes is reducing that risk for everybody.
I long for the day downtown Van finally goes car-free.
@@AbsolutePixelMaster just takes a few more sky train lines
I would love to see it pedestrian only but you might want to start with widening the sidewalks and making physical changes to slow drivers. It's not always about getting rid of cars, it's about making drivers slow down. Streets can be designed so that it's physically impossible to speed.
Many Mexico City intersections are full of bollards -- solid ones, not flexposts -- to protect the corners. If a death happens _once_ at an intersection they should be put in, let alone multiple times. Pedestrian-only is better but bollards should be a minimum intervention.
Yesterday I, on a motorcycle, had a car start coming into my lane. Truck infront of me, car behind me. Pressed the horn and held it until after about 2 additional seconds of coming into my lane, my horn blaring, he realized I was there.
Accidents is 100% not what most of these should be called....
And "Mistakes" doesn't do it justice.
@@DerrickJolicoeur I'd use "Negligence"
I live in LA and the other day a 77 year old man was killed as he rode in a charity bike event in Griffith Park where the posted speed limit is 25 mph. I haven't heard how fast the drinking driver was going that killed him, but it was fast, and witnesses said the old man "never had a chance". The city's response was basically "yeah, we know Griffith park is dangerous (because people use it as a shortcut when I-5 is backed up) and it is on our list of things to fix". Literally, you could fix this problem by placing a few New Jersey barriers and blocking the through traffic in the park. It's frustrating that people keep dying in my city when the solutions are so obvious. I love your idea about speed governors. There is no compelling reason at all that a private and very fallible citizen should be allowed to drive at more than, say, 70 mph.
Yes very frustrating that LA chooses not to just put shit in the road to snag drunk drivers but I don't necessarily agree with speed governors on highways. Any speed above 25 is too fast for a street and any speed below 50 is too slow for a road. The reason to go faster than 70 miles per hour is me wanna get there in 30 minutes instead of 60. Freeways allow drivers to do this by separating other traffic types from the cars, protecting runaway cars from hazards and cutting off access
Perfect timing. Just yesterday I was lamenting WMATA's delayed re-introduction of the 7000 series trains, citing the redistribution of rail riders who won't tolerate 25 minute headways to less safe modalities as outweighing the benefits of their abundance of caution.
The wait times are absurdly high for WMATA, the backbone of the US capital. But I'll still take it every opportunity I have because driving anywhere around the DC metro area is a fool's errand and ridiculously dangerous.
It used to be so effective
@@AJ-sw8uf they love to torment people
People hate the wait times but don't mind involving themselves into a fatal derailment because IF they survive, they can sue Metro to oblivion.
WMATA has gone downhill regarding upkeep but these measures are worth the delay to prevent the inevitable
CDC Code 10: "Looked but did not see" gives me heart palpitations. I ride a bike, and have been told "Sorry, I didn't see you" after a near death experience.
I've only been cycling for 6 months but have already had a near-miss "did not see" incident despite wearing a bright yellow helmet, riding a yellow bicycle and wearing a hi-viz jacket at all times when cycling.
From purely an advocacy standpoint this is the kind of data that I think cements the urgency of doing better the most. Yeah folks want better environments, and yeah if you actually introduce car free or car light areas everyone loves them (for instance in my city the hottest area to live in is along the beltline and from personal experience that area is ALWAYS packed), but really when it comes right down to it, it's impossible to argue with numbers like that.
If you want more bleak videos, I just finished reading "The Color of Law". I'm assuming you've already read it, but I would be interested to know which US Urban Freeways displaced the highest number of disadvantaged people upon construction (and subsequent expansions)
Great question. My first thought is Cincinnati, the West End, amongst many many others was totally demolished for I-75.
I completely agree that this needs to be covered. Every city more or less has one of these highways.
Why should anyone care?
@@HYDRAdude because knowledge is power?
@@HYDRAdude Because legal segregation and oppression are manifest in concrete that most people see as simply background.
Thanks for breaking down the data so well in this video. This has definitely been the case in Chicago of late, where "Danger on the L" seems to be in every headline, but driving fatalities are to be shrugged off. Even lately, the chance of you DYING in a car crash (roughly 1 in 10,000) on an annual basis are 10x higher than being INVOLVED in a crime on the L (1 in 100,000) after accounting for passenger counts, and most crimes people are involved in don't involve death. Doesn't mean it's not a problem to address but just funny how that gets all the attention while driving fatalities are brushed off as nothing we can solve.
There's something deeper in human psychology I was trying to get at, but it's not really my wheelhouse. When you're in your own car, you feel like you're secure and in control of your own environment. When you're in an enclosed subway car with a bunch of strangers, you can imagine any number of terrible things happening and there's no escape. Your brain wants you to be in situations you control, even when that control is largely illusory. OK, that was no better. I do like your comment, though.
erm not to nitpick... but are you sure you got your numbers right? 1 in 10k is 10 times as often as 1 in 100k which would be the opposite of what you said there
@@CityNerd That's exactly it. And it makes sense; if you're subject to some rare occurence (1:10,000 or 1:100,000), the majority of the time you're fine, so you want to feel comfortable and in control. There are many places where people are not so willing to give up freedom for safety.
the actual death rate on subways is probably even lower considering far evaders
@@CityNerd But let’s be honest about the elephant in the room: it requires some thinking to understand the truth vs. how our brain likes to trick us, right? So, is it fair to say that this is a problem of stupidity? Is it fair to make a blanket statement that some people can think fairly well, while others are just not smart enough, and the two groups gravitate towards the opposite end of the spectrum on the transportation debate? And the low-brain-power ones are probably the most likely to get influenced by how the media operates? Is there a more elegant way for me to say that this is a smart vs. dumb sort of conversation?
I found the video entergaging. You got a like.
Telling me to not daydream is to tell me to not be conscious. It can happen involuntarily, even in the middle of a serious one-on-one conversation.
Install the anti-daydreaming wetware update on your brain when you get a minute. Free download
Exactly. We have very little control, if any, of what pops into our conscious minds moment to moment.
Wow! This video finally confirms what’s always been my gut feeling.
In the 15 years of living in the USA I’ve seen way more terrifying crashes than in the 40+ years I lived in Germany.
Flipped over cars, blown tires, dropped freight (whole couches on the road), aggressive driving with constant tailgating and cutting off and blowing through red lights - even though Germany’s traffic has a bad reputation, it’s totally mellow and regulated compared to here in North Carolina.
And we’re not even New York … The fatality rates (12 point something versus 4 point something) say it all. Oh, wait! And cell phones. Don’t even get me started on cell phones.
I have actually seen "pedestrian loss of control". Thankfully he avoided a nasty fatality by centimetres. (Of course it should not be punishable by death.)
An older guy with a heavy backpack walking out of a parking lot 3 metres from the road tripped on the uneven sidewalk edge. He might have just fallen but his reflex to right himself with the pack on his back literally launched him more than 3 metres and over the curb in an involuntary sprint. He fell half into the street in front of a car racing down the curb lane. It was amazing to see the fast reaction of the driver in a skidding stop. The guy's head was under the front end maybe 10 centimetres from the tire.
We really need fewer places where the road is so close to the sidewalk and reduced speed limits where it can't reasonably be avoided.
In Toronto, there has been heavy news coverage lately regarding transit safety. This last week, we had a story regarding a lady being pushed into the subway tracks. As unfortunate as that incident is, the media here definitely took it to another level. When a car here kills a cyclist or a pedestrian, it does get some news coverage, but certainly not to the same amount as transit incidents. You're a traffic engineer, so I'm sure you can look up Toronto data yourself. But here's the spoiler: the amount of deaths, or even injuries, that occur within our transit system is no where to the same level that cars inflict on pedestrians/cyclists in this city. I really appreciate the work you've done here to highlight the heavy media bias and compare it with hard stats. Your timing seriously could not have been any better. Obviously, transit safety is still a concern, but I really do think that we're missing the big picture - which is that car-centric urban infrastructure literally kills.
Toronto doesn’t strike me as car centric. Canadian cities are ver similar to Australian cities on about every level and although they are automobile heavy. transit infrastructure is definitely viewed as important, compared to American cities which are not only very car centric but also ridden with crime and shootings that walking isn’t any safer than driving
A perfect opportunity to invest in transit and add platform screen doors...
Or just deem transit as "unsafe"
this. So many people i talked to mentioned that subway is scary now while also saying they commute 2hrs to get to work everyday while dosing off in the car like wtf??
@@shaylenpatel69041. Toronto is very car centric.
2. In the U.S. every city is different. Not every city crime ridden like you make it seem and when in crime ridden cities, not every neighborhood is dangerous. I've been walking and biking in Chicago for over 20 years, never owned a car. But I don't walk around in the hood. I walk where it's safe and watch my back just like I would anywhere else. Never had a problem except for one time when I was hanging with the wrong people.
This is a big thing in NYC now too. As a dedicated transit rider and someone who was run over by a car walking home from work one day - it makes me furious that the media is scaring even more people out of transit and into cars.
Could you do a "safest" and "unsafest" cities in the US based on traffic fatalities? Might be one where using city limits rather than metros is actually the better metric since it would judge the walkability of the urban core.
Baltimore & Washington, DC would be your Top 5 right off the back
Speed Governors/limiters could potentially become a legal requirement in new cars in the EU and potentially here in the UK. The comparisons on with e-bikes and scooters is very apt.
I know, I've been reading about it! I might make a video just on that topic.
@@CityNerd please do!
As much as I hope to, it seams those won't be the kind of limiters that e-bikes or scooters have. Looks like all those "limiters" would do in cars is make a noise.
Which is a shame really. It might have been okay if after a few seconds of making the noise car would just turn the engine of and slam the brakes until it does a full stop. But we can't have that. Apparently bikes are more dangerous then cars it seams looking at those limiters
As a German I am very much afraid that the German government will do everything it can to prevent that. They can't even get a legal speed limit on highways (despite public support), so getting an actual speed limit in cars feels unimaginable.
@@michdem100 turning off the engine at high speed and slamming the brakes is a recipe for an immediate crash if there is anything approaching from behind - so no that would absolutely not be okay
similar issues can arise if you do some sort of grace period for exceeding the limiter to overtake a vehicle
if you do hard limiting like that, it needs to be consistently applied...anything else will cause problems when the behaviour of the vehicle suddenly changes at high speeds
Great video, as a Mexican it didn't surprise me a bit to see us there, we as a country and the US share a pathological fascination of cars and violence, awful combination, roadrage in Mexico is just another thing, if often devolves into motorized murder I guess. As a personal note, besides that one time someone literally attempted to murder me, my closest experiences with death have been as a pedestrian in Mexico, I've been almost ran over around 20 times, and I was riding an intercity bus when the driver killed a cyclist. Although I survived and now live in Canada's walkable city some of my acquaintances didn't make it.
Yeah, I’ve seen the road rage there and it’s not good. Even so, the US is still worse at traffic deaths according to the data.
Sorry to hear about all your close calls. Parts of Mexico are pretty tough for road safety!
As someone who basically only knows stereotypical things of Mexico, I don't think it's a country that the US wants to be on par with in pretty much anything.
The US should want to be on par with places like Canada - not that Canada does all that well compared to western European countries, but it's a massive step up from the US and Mexico.
Even without taking into account the gun related violence down here, the recklessness of all drivers is just overwhelming... As a rule of thumb for most drivers anything smaller than their own vehicle is invisible and fair game... And that is not a cultural trait that anyone should aspire to.
@@MrMartinSchou Well, our countries are connected and the worst aspects of Mexico and the US are interconnected, which is gun violence and drug-related crime, we are going to share a lot of bad stuff for a long time due to that, and that reckless violence compounded with fucked up motorphilia and weird class dynamics are part of the mix that we share and make our countries so unsafe for transit. Having lived in all three countries, I can say that Canada benefits a lot from having less population, which makes things easier to manage, not being in the midst of drug routes, and less hierarchical class dynamics, however it still needs a lot of work regarding public transit, there we all should learn from European countries.
Kind of scary, I don't know anyone who has died in a car accident. I'd be looking over my shoulder but I ride public transit. Easily a 7k a year savings just from the payment and insurance.
You’re lucky. For me it’s at the point where when I see somebody has died or somebody tells me, I guess “car accident?” And I’m usually right.
@@PhiloFery I don't fuck with Facebook either, so that might me a reason
I have often remarked how the moment ebikes started becoming popular, legislators the world over reeled. "My god, we've got to stop these things from going too fast! Somebody could get hurt!" And then they'll approve some gargantuan highway expansion the same day. It's like a satire of itself, like a joke you'd expect to see on a show like The Simpsons.
Other countries have figured out how to keep automobile deaths down, and it is to design better streets and roads, and not count on people to change their behavior.
We need no new stroads, we need slow safe streets where drivers feel uncomfortable and if they get angry from the discomfort, they won't be moving fast enough to kill eachother and pedestrians.
We also need fast, forgiving, direction separated roads, where the drivers don't have to think about driving, they can be relaxed and not have to worry about pedestrians, cyclists, or oncoming traffic
I'll have to say this. When people point to an instance like the subway shooting and say that they would be safer in a car, try looking into how many freeway shootings there are each year. They are far more common than you'd believe.
The older I get, the less I want to drive, and the less I want to be on or near a roadway.
My dream is to live in one of those places where people go around in little golf carts lol Thats the closest I want to be to something resembling a car these days
That's my trajectory
We have a sprawling local political fight over trying to make our nearby stroad safer, and there are so many people fighting against even incremental changes, despite the fact that it's well-documented that it's recklessly dangerous for all users of that stroad. 10:00 "They think they're in control of their own destiny and the averages don't apply to them" sums up that do-nothing, I-don't-care attitude so well.
Great video. Now I can pre-fill my insurance forms for when I get distracted deciding what to eat for lunch, trip over an uneven sidewalk, and get fatally flattened by an icecream truck.
I mean the reason they include ice cream truck is because kids probably literally get hit running across a street when they hear the music. I mean if this was 1973 anyway
This video made me realize that we REALLY need to start rallying behind speed governors in all vehicles. I don’t know why we’ve been sleeping on this idea. The impact would be far reaching
I think most vehicles do have speed governors: about 160km/h or 100MPH.
Maybe they are just power-limited by that speed.
“Pedestrian loss of control” - I guess that is known to laymen as ‘stumbling’.
Could maybe also refer to when you get boogie fever and dance your ass off?
I've been almost hit by cars most often when trying to catch a bus in a stroad setting. I briefly worked at city hall in Toronto and in that short time, I realised this is actually very common. Cars are a danger to basically everyone that's near them. I now work in the healthcare industry and there are a large volume of people in their 60s that complain of pain in their neck etc. due to a fender benders in their 20s and 30s. Almost makes me happy that I've been too perpetually poor to even get behind the wheel. I think I shall avoid getting a car as long as I am able.
Great video! One thing I would add, the driving test and education in the US is shockingly easy by comparison to other developed nations. I did my first test in the UK and it was a massive time and cost investment to get through it, with the average person failing the test twice before passing. It would be great to see a video comparing driver education standards between different countries. Motorcycle tests were even worse!!
Many years ago I moved from California to Maryland. For good reasons (at the time) I didn't transfer my driver's license in time, so I had to take the full driving test again, both paper and behind the wheel. [I had been driving for 15 years at that point.] The paper test was typical. The "road" test ....
My husband took my car from the parking spot to the test start. The examiner and I got in and I drove to the DMV driveway. There was a traffic light for me to cross into a large, completely empty lot. I drove forward a couple hundred yards, backwards 50. I turned left, then right. I put my headlights on, turned them off. I was then directed to drive back across the street into the DMV parking lot and park my car.
That was the entire test.
When I took my driving test in California, I was surprised it was all done on quiet residential roads, plus a couple blocks on a stroad. It should have included freeway driving, much more stroad-work, hill parking ... But compared to what I needed to o in Maryland... no wonder the drivers in the Washington DC area were so bad.
Yes to Roadway classification! If you could include Canada that would be great.
Oh interesting -- comparing and contrasting, also with something like Netherlands would be super interesting.
I appreciate periodic data driven education videos like this one (and the traffic is exponential video). I wouldn't know where to begin with digging through this data, so being served a digested version is really helpful. Thanks!
You're the target customer
"Nobody's dying in a pedestrian on pedestrian collision."
Picturing how mundane and harmless a pedestrian-on-pedestrian collision would be both made me chuckle and made me sad about the priorities of NA infrastructure.
Video idea: Zoning differences between US and Europe and other countries. Just learned that in a lot of europe zoning focuses more on what a building looks like, not its function. So you have a lot more mixed uses. Like it's perfectly fine to open a small convenience store in a house on the corner whereas US it's more exclusive. Many areas in US won't allow mixed commercial and residential for example. Heaven forbid you build housing on top of a strip shopping center --- even though the parking issue is spread out. Most spots taken during the day by shoppers, then the residents come home and park for the night -- hence no long hours of wasted empty parking spots.
I commute by bicycle on a quiet off street path with no cars, co-workers are always telling me to be careful out there. I should be telling them it's more dangerous to drive!😇
Great topic. Most of the time when I actually leave home I’m a pedestrian/transit user. But once every week or two I drive our car for an errand.
It has smart cruise control, aka adaptive cruise control. I turn it on right after starting the car, set it as soon as I hit 20mph (minimum to set it). It keeps me a safe distance from the car ahead, will slow/stop if necessary. It can detect a cyclist or motorcycle, but not a person running into traffic (it’s a 2015 model).
I typically set it to the speed limit, though we have a few roads in the St. Louis area I don’t feel comfortable doing the limit. I get passed often on arterials, interstates.
Our built in navigation system and Apple CarPlay both know the speed limit, even where it changes.
What I’d like to see is a system so smart it limits the set speed to the posted speed limit…and adjusts automatically when it goes from say 35mph to 30 mph.
You should watch a video about how the speed limit is set 😄
So I'm newer to your channel and I've been going back through your older videos. Though I've been enjoying them all, this is my favorite so far after seeing a couple dozen. Thanks, for this one and all the time you spend making these videos.
Excellent video. thank you for helping me to understand the true scale of this issue.
12:45 my mother is a police officer and she once came across a fatal pedestrian-on-pedestrian collision. 2 elderly people ran into each other and one fell badly, broke his hip and actually died
Exceptions prove the rule
Driving while sleep deprived increases the risk, and sleep deprivation is very common. Being able to use public transport to get to work would help a lot
Thank you for digging into the data. One of my favourite TH-cam channels :)
This is seriously one of the best videos you've made. Thank you for all the work you do making these videos, and I wish you continued success in these endeavors!
I really appreciate what you do Ray, this is stuff that really needs to be talked about. I was thinking about this exact topic while I was taking a walk yesterday in what should (theoretically) be a particularly walkable urban environment.
I just found your channel a few days ago and I've been binge watching ever since. Thanks for taking the time to produce all this wonderful content 😉
Catching up on old videos and I really appreciate this one. You can really apply these same principals to the way other dangers are reported on.
This is one of my favorite videos you've made, if not my favorite. A really important topic that people don't want to hear about "because driving is a fact of life".
I love the point about everyone thinking they are an above average driver. I literally laugh when I hear someone say that; I've heard it too many times. I'm going to keep rewatching/ commenting/ sharing this video because it should be the most watched video on this channel. Let's go yt algorithm.
Excellent video. Thanks for making!
Thanks for sharing what you know on this. It helps a lot to put things in perspective!
You know, it really stuck me in your video of stroad-stroad intersections when you showed the picture of the instructions for the cross walk light. It said that the little green walking man meant "Cross, watching for traffic". Yet somehow that's supposed to provide pedestrians a safe point to cross where vehicles won't be driving straight into them, so why do they have to watch out? It's weird how it seems the expectation is that drivers can just assume there's nothing except vehicles on the road.
I live in Italy right in the middle of a city of 300.000. The expectation here (as in most places in Italy) is that as a driver you always have to watch out for things other than cars. We have points where there are intersections between pedestrian-only streets and busy roads. You just walk into the road and cross behind the first car. On a lot of roads there are cars, scooters, mopeds, electric bikes, the other kind of scooters all as mixed traffic. In most parts of town, if I feel like walking in the middle of the road, I do. Sure, there's a sidewalk, but if there's a vehicle that needs to get through and there's not space I can always move. It's not a world for cars. It's a world for people. And I'm grateful for it.
This is such a wonderfully made and argued video. I will be sharing widely with loved ones so they can better understand traffic violence!
The calmest delivery I have ever seen, of troublesome vehicle violence statistics. ;-) Thanks for sharing. Cheers.
Love your videos. Keep them coming!
5:40 this is actually an interesting statistic. In Poland cars are overall older and less safe. They have a lower death rate than the United States (Poland has 7.7 fatalities per 100k.) At the same time they have great public transportation so they can actually afford to not to give out licenses like candy and train drivers. They enjoy standard rural divided highway speeds of 87mph (140 km/hr) and still have death rates much lower than the US! They also have a bit less funding in general and like I said, cars that on average are much older and less safe.
This video explains why we free Americans have embarrassingly slow speed limits usually at 70mph on our divided rural highways.
It's not speed that kills (although it does usually make crashes more deadly), but cars and forcing everyone into cars.
I very much agree that Americans feel safer in cars because we think we are in control there. Of course the data shows differently, but we feel it, so it must be true, right?
On a more serious note, thanks for sharing your data sources and defending your thoughts with actual facts. Keep up the good work with these videos!
I remember when I was in college a student biking was killed by a drunk driver. As someone that biked around almost everywhere in college (and still do today), I couldn't help but think that that could have been me. Thankfully it hasn't--yet.
One semester in my school we had 3 deaths from drunk drivers. They put speed bumps now.
"...the illusion of self-determination." wise words
Thank you for making this!
This is almost a direct parallel of how people evaluate the risk of nuclear power vs fossil fuels.
Nuclear power is very safe normally, but when things go wrong (very rare) they will go really bad. Fossil fuels aren't that safe normally (air pollution) but accidents are extremely rare. So people will pick out a few nuclear incidents completely ignoring how they are safe when operating correctly with well-trained staff and the people will keep regurgitating that incident as if it happens every day.
@@williamhuang8309 Actually the "really bad" case only happened once (Chernobyl) and that was due to many flaws in design and procedure that were obvious to most nuclear engineers even before the accident. People's perception of the other two nuclear containment breaches tend to be far beyond the actual damage done.
Also fossil fuel accidents aren't rare. It's actually fairly common that people get hurt or killed while working at oil wells or coal mines.
@@VitalVampyr Yup. Too many people get killed at oil refineries and drilling rigs due to negligent safety (just watch some CSB videos)
Dropping a like because its enlightening. Eye opening.
Would love a video that talks about crashes and traffic fatality differentials between stroads, normal city streets, city streets with traffic calming infrastructure, grade-separated highways, parking lots, and any other classes of driveable facilities you deem relevant. Love the channel, keep up the great work!
Thanks for this one. I’m definitely on high alert every time I drive or walk anywhere near a road, ever since my cousin was killed on his motorcycle years ago. It’s amazing what can happen at any moment.
For every dramatic transit or aircraft event there are dozens if not hundreds of everyday car-related deaths and I wish more people knew that so thank you for doing your part in breaking down the myths around transit and safety! Keep on keepin' on! Peace and love from Canada!
Thanks! You are absolutely brilliant. Please keep up the outstanding work.
Thanks, will do!
Excellent presentation! Very important subject!
Video on roadway functional classification, please! I'd really like to see the correlations within this video and roadway functional classification. Btw: binging on CityNerd vids right meow.
Brilliant video: The final bit on pedestrian "fault" codes (e.g. distracted while eating/drinking, daydreaming, etc.) was disheartening, mildly amusing and completely infuriating they even exists. Thanks for the content.
This was a great video. It’s always good to be reminded of the data in order to reevaluate emotional perceptions of danger.
That was a legit post. Awesome work. 👏.
Fantastic video, one of your best. Humans are abysmal at evaluating risk and properly responding. Driving is one of the most dangerous things we do, particularly in the age ranges for people who are otherwise young and healthy.
I lived in the US for six years, and have visited over 30 times over the past 65 years. Indeed, US road (and rail, canal, and airport) infrastructure is terrible, but I saw and continue to regard two other issues as even more impactful on the country's aweful road accident record. These are the ease with which drivers' licenses are given, and the absence of regular roadworthy testing of automobiles. I suggest over half of US drivers under 25 would fail a driving test anywhere in Europe. Certainly, a large proportion of the private vehicles over three years old which I have seen on US roads, would fail any EU, UK, or Canadian vehicle test.
While testing drivers' skills more than once in their lives and making a license harder to acquire in the first place would undoubtedly reduce the number of licensed bad drivers, it's unlikely ever to happen, because the ability to drive is practically sacrosanct in car-centric cultures.
@@arferbargel Well, in most western European countries, the test is far, far harder than in the US. I know as I took a test at 17 in Europe and tested again in VA when I was in my 40s. Also, after 75, drivers in Europe have to have a fresh eyesight test and after 80 a doctor's certificate of health. The bigger issue is the testing of vehicles for road worthiness after being three years old, and annually thereafter. In most Canadian provinces, if selling a used car, it must first be inspected by a govt inspection centre, and any necessary repairs carried out to the satisfaction of the inspector. All of these countries have high car dependency. It is just that the US seems so anti regulation that it would prefer to see higher rates of road deaths and injuries than get rust buckets off the road.
Thank you for offering me further motivation to get Greek citizenship so I can move to the EU. Not that it matters, but the annual number of gun-related deaths in the United States is similar to the annual number of traffic related deaths. I suppose some comfort can be taken from the fact that about half of all gun-related deaths are suicides. Like traffic deaths, suicides by gunshot don't get much media attention.
I thought about drawing attention to that when I was going over the CDC data...but this video was plenty long and plenty dark
When I was learning how to drive as a teenager, I was so terrified of being in an accident that I'd have panic attacks in the driver's seat. I remember asking my driver's ed instructor how to overcome this fear, and she looked at me in complete confusion and told me she'd never had a student who was scared of driving before. I think that says a lot about our collective psychology.
How do we (America) get our politicians to make ACTUAL safety improvements for pedestrians and non-moter vehicles?
- Zoning changes to limit car dependence
- multi modal infrastructure
- lane narrowing
- safer intersections
Make a constitutional amendment forcing your politicians to have the exact same duties and privileges as the rest of the population and those problems will go away over night. Probably you will need to wait a little bit until they fix healthcare system and gun violence issues first, but it will be worth it.
I have the feeling that even the drivers and secret service will gladly give up their jobs if it means fixing the ** country.
We should make efforts to keep pedestrians and motor vehicles separate from eachother as well, except on the narrowest of streets.
Great video. I drive almost every day. Getting into my car to go to work or the store is the most dangerous thing I do by far. Honestly I'm convinced my life will end in a car crash. It is scary. There are some idiots out there. I also live on a service road where there are no sidewalks, no streetlights, no shoulder, and people will fly down that road. Also on this road (aside from me who is too scared to walk my dog on it) is multiple nursing homes and nurses/CNAs are walking up and down this road to get to work from a nearby bus stop. I'm surprised nobody has died there since I've been here. I contacted my assemblyperson and they don't seem to care much.
Also want to say your video on SUVs and pickups getting larger and larger has really stuck with me. An acquaintance who I know has no use for a pickup and doesn't haul anything just got one. Can't say I don't judge him for it. Now whenever I'm in a parking lot walking by these lifted massive pickups (tons in my area) I can't help but notice how the grill comes up to my neck, and I'm 6 feet tall. It's scary to see. Scary to be a pedestrian, and even scary to be in my little hatchback
When you drive a car, that is the most dangerous thing you'll do that day.
I haven't driven in 25 years and take the bus or train everywhere in the city (granted that in Chicago, that's easy).
When I hear people complain about violence on the subways, it frustrates me because, while there is, it's nothing near the violence on the roads. I feel much safer on the bus than I do in a car.
It's really disturbing that the data you presented is biased in how it assigns blame to drivers verses pedestrians (and I assume bicyclists also). It's as if any outside factor negates a drivers' lack of competence, carelessness, purposeful distraction (such as texting), etc and how the law only punitively doles out punishment for that, mainly in the form of a fine only. It is a symptom of how politically volatile the issue of demoting cars as kings of the road is. Everyone in a car thinks they have primacy over the way the right of way is used. Woe be the one who lowers a speed limit on a stroad. Woe be the one who takes away any street parking for better transit. Woe be the one who suggests taking a lane of freeway for other usage rather than adding a lane.
I have been impressed how in, I believe Norway, fines are based on a % of income versus a flat rate. A speeding infraction may be 0.02% of an annual wage. A wealthy person speeding may pay $3,000 in a fine versus a poor person paying $100 for the same infraction.
Speaking of Mexico, you haven't seen a speed bump until you've driven in Mexico. When approaching a town, most have a series of speed bumps to slow you down and they are signed. If you hit one of those speed bumps at speed, and by that I mean anything over a crawl, they will destroy your car. You have to slow down and ease your car over that killer hump. Good idea though.
There is also the issue of road rage getting out of control. How many car fender benders, or even someone cutting you off, turn into violence because we're a nation of man-boys who think screaming, threatening, or pointing a gun at the other driver is the way to resolve the issue?
Count me in for the video on roadway classification. A somber video, but an important topic
Yes! Definitely do an explainer on functional classification of roadways!
I really appreciate your coverage of this topic. Most Americans are truely clueless about how dangerous their roads are compared to other developed nations.
Would love a video on Roadway functional classification!
Great video. Can you please do one on office parks? Like why they exist, history of them, etc. They seem like a natural outgrowth of regular low density suburban sprawl like the suburban cul-de-sac housing model applied to the office.
This video is very insightful, thank you for sharing. As much as going fast was always something normal for me and others I knew growing up, I think your point around the double standards between (1) driver errors vs cyclist/pedestrian errors and (2) driver speed inhibitors vs ebike/scooter speed inhibitors really show how much we have normalized the downsides of cars, but clearly make very different assessments whenever we're thinking about modes of transportation less familiar to us (i.e. when we have fresh eyes)
Also, I would love a video about road classifications. Knowing how to classify the streets that surround me, and their implications, would probably make me think much more consciously about the design of my area
Just a thought -- I wonder if insurance could play a stronger role in driver safety. I have seen the commercials related to various devices from insurance companies to "reward safe driving", but what would a world look like where such devices were required vs an option (either through legislation or massive rate differences)?
Thank you for these sobering thoughts. It has also made me think twice about driving less, which is a shame because I (as well as so many others) love driving. I'm in Hong Kong and, anecdotally, there appears to be more traffic accidents and fatalities judging from the number of dash cam video compilations we now get on TH-cam. I need to look at the proper data from our Transport Department, which you have inspired me to do. Subscribed and thank you. 👍😄
i would love the roadway classification video
When I worked in NY, we tried to install (voluntarily) advanced vehicle trackers with accelerometers and direct access to the vehicle "black box" data. The idea is that we'd be able to identify "near miss" collisions (and clusters of these near misses) and then prioritize those spots for treatment. Alas, we were done in by the insurance agencies.
Great video. We really should be outraged over car deaths in the country
I am a gun owner. It's amazing how few people are killed in gun accidents, not counting gun homicides and suicides. However most legitimate gun owners know how dangerous guns are and practice gun safety. Yet we are more focused on gun owners than rogue drivers.
Excellent video.
Really. Great. Video!! This topic hits close to home with me lately, and my driving habits. I actually disagree that the RISK of a driver being involved in a crash is completely out of one's control. I won't share more here, but I have a personal anecdote on how you can improve your odds operating on public roads.
This really point out the main issue with motor vehicles. As pointed out, car culture is a big reason of car related deaths and accidents, but also driving awareness. Down here, even as we have a similar statistic in road violence deaths, we have a way higher percentage of public transportation users of the total population, so why is there that the statistics are so high related to Europe? In Europe, public transportation is based on rail based systems and better street design, over here in North America, transportation is based in rubber wheeled vehicles. That means that lack of better street design and insufficient driver culture and acknowledging of road safety are the main drivers of the lack of driving safety both in the US and Mexico. Difference is that in the US it relates more to particular car crashes and down here relates more with recklessness of public transportation drivers... We have to be aware about how much road accidents are reported in the media around us and relate it to the statistics shown.
Thanks for exposing the reality as it is. Hope we can develop better driver awareness and better public space design because of the visibility of videos as this.
I won't give you punctual details about public transportation accidents, just this link: th-cam.com/users/results?search_query=mexico+bus+accident
Fall asleep coming home from the bar on a train and you might miss your stop of get your wallet picked but fall asleep driving home from the bar and it's often a somewhat life changing event for all those involved. Now that I'm older and wiser and know these things l stay stay home and write comments if I'm drinking or high, so l mostly just stay home and write comments.