5 ms·

More Americans have died in car crashes since 2000 than in both World Wars

38 points by jseliger 7y ago

jseliger 7y ago
Somehow we continue to consider this normal, and not to do anything substantive about it: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/07/29/was-the-automotive-era-a-terrible-mistake https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/07/29/was-the-automo...
- bobthepanda 7y ago
  The Interstate system was basically a fluke; we spent so much money on it and were willing to, and we will probably never spend so much money again. And unfortunately we blew it on the Interstates.
tomohawk 7y ago
A large proportion of these were due to alcohol. http://www.nbcnews.com/id/6089353/ns/health-addictions/t/alcohol-linked-us-deaths-year/ http://www.nbcnews.com/id/6089353/ns/health-addictions/t/alc... Alcohol is probably the leading cause of preventable death.
- bobthepanda 7y ago
  It probably doesn’t help that for the vast majority of America the only feasible way to get home from the bar is to drive. Even in the biggest cities, overnight transit dries up.
- CapricornNoble 7y ago
  I don't understand why the US doesn't have the equivalent of "daiko service". In Japan they have taxi/Uber services where basically 2 drivers in a small car come pick you AND YOUR CAR up. You ride in your car as a passenger while one guy drives your car, and other guy follows in the taxi. They drop you off at your home with your vehicle. Keeps DUIs manageable (but still not unheard of). Japan also has an essentially zero-tolerance policy for alcohol consumption by drivers. The legal limit is 0.03 BAC, which is the lowest level current devices can detect.
  - bobthepanda 7y ago
    I don’t know that Americans have thar much trust in strangers. Sounds like a great way to get your car stolen.
air7 7y ago
This is an annoyingly contrived headline and article. First of all, the "World Wars" were centered around a European /Asian conflict. In both cases America entered the wars several years after they had started, and fought away from home. I'm obviously not disrespecting the "535,000 American military personnel who died in World War I and World War II" but rather pointing out that, arguably, it's a contrived yard stick to measure against as it sounds like more of a monumental figure than it perhaps should. More importantly, since the year 2000 Americans have driven ~60 trillion miles!!! To put that in perspective, the size of our solar system is ~7.5 billion miles, or 8000 times smaller that 60 trillion. Alpha Centauri is "only" 25 trillion miles away. 60 trillion miles is ~10 light years... Given that, I'm not sure 624,000 deaths, which is about 1 death per 100 million miles, is necessarily a lot. --- [0] https://www.bts.gov/content/us-vehicle-miles https://www.bts.gov/content/us-vehicle-miles
- melling 7y ago
  When it could be two orders of magnitude less, it’s a lot.
- romwell 7y ago
  >More importantly, since the year 2000 Americans have driven ~60 trillion miles!!! ..so what? That's still over half a million people dead. Here, let me put it in a slightly different light: Critical lack of infrastructure (including public transportation) and horrific zoning that causes ever-increasing amounts of urban sprawl has forced Americans drive an astounding 60 trillion miles since year 2000, killing over half a million of them. From what I know, most of these miles were not driven by choice: people don't choose to work 100 miles away from where they live; and most of these miles are commute miles. Our infrastructure (or lack thereof) is killing us by making us drive more than anywhere else on Earth[1]. (The verbatim title of that article is: "Americans drive more than anyone else in the world, and are dying for it" - and that is what the problem is). [1]https://www.thecarcrashdetective.com/americans-drive-more-dying/ https://www.thecarcrashdetective.com/americans-drive-more-dy...
  - austhrow743 7y ago
melling 7y ago
Some sort of ADAS - Advanced Driver Assist can’t get here fast enough: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_driver-assistance_systems https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_driver-assistance_s... Obviously full-self driving is better but that’s going to be much harder.
iamgopal 7y ago
In India same number comes to about 3 million.
effnorwood 7y ago
False.

38 points by jseliger 7y ago

Somehow we continue to consider this normal, and not to do anything substantive about it: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/07/29/was-the-automotive-era-a-terrible-mistake https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/07/29/was-the-automo...

bobthepanda 7y ago
The Interstate system was basically a fluke; we spent so much money on it and were willing to, and we will probably never spend so much money again. And unfortunately we blew it on the Interstates.

tomohawk 7y ago

A large proportion of these were due to alcohol. http://www.nbcnews.com/id/6089353/ns/health-addictions/t/alcohol-linked-us-deaths-year/ http://www.nbcnews.com/id/6089353/ns/health-addictions/t/alc... Alcohol is probably the leading cause of preventable death.

bobthepanda 7y ago
It probably doesn’t help that for the vast majority of America the only feasible way to get home from the bar is to drive. Even in the biggest cities, overnight transit dries up.
CapricornNoble 7y ago
I don't understand why the US doesn't have the equivalent of "daiko service". In Japan they have taxi/Uber services where basically 2 drivers in a small car come pick you AND YOUR CAR up. You ride in your car as a passenger while one guy drives your car, and other guy follows in the taxi. They drop you off at your home with your vehicle. Keeps DUIs manageable (but still not unheard of). Japan also has an essentially zero-tolerance policy for alcohol consumption by drivers. The legal limit is 0.03 BAC, which is the lowest level current devices can detect.
- bobthepanda 7y ago
  I don’t know that Americans have thar much trust in strangers. Sounds like a great way to get your car stolen.

air7 7y ago

This is an annoyingly contrived headline and article. First of all, the "World Wars" were centered around a European /Asian conflict. In both cases America entered the wars several years after they had started, and fought away from home. I'm obviously not disrespecting the "535,000 American military personnel who died in World War I and World War II" but rather pointing out that, arguably, it's a contrived yard stick to measure against as it sounds like more of a monumental figure than it perhaps should. More importantly, since the year 2000 Americans have driven ~60 trillion miles!!! To put that in perspective, the size of our solar system is ~7.5 billion miles, or 8000 times smaller that 60 trillion. Alpha Centauri is "only" 25 trillion miles away. 60 trillion miles is ~10 light years... Given that, I'm not sure 624,000 deaths, which is about 1 death per 100 million miles, is necessarily a lot. --- [0] https://www.bts.gov/content/us-vehicle-miles https://www.bts.gov/content/us-vehicle-miles

melling 7y ago
When it could be two orders of magnitude less, it’s a lot.
romwell 7y ago
>More importantly, since the year 2000 Americans have driven ~60 trillion miles!!! ..so what? That's still over half a million people dead. Here, let me put it in a slightly different light: Critical lack of infrastructure (including public transportation) and horrific zoning that causes ever-increasing amounts of urban sprawl has forced Americans drive an astounding 60 trillion miles since year 2000, killing over half a million of them. From what I know, most of these miles were not driven by choice: people don't choose to work 100 miles away from where they live; and most of these miles are commute miles. Our infrastructure (or lack thereof) is killing us by making us drive more than anywhere else on Earth[1]. (The verbatim title of that article is: "Americans drive more than anyone else in the world, and are dying for it" - and that is what the problem is). [1]https://www.thecarcrashdetective.com/americans-drive-more-dying/ https://www.thecarcrashdetective.com/americans-drive-more-dy...
- austhrow743 7y ago

melling 7y ago

Some sort of ADAS - Advanced Driver Assist can’t get here fast enough: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_driver-assistance_systems https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_driver-assistance_s... Obviously full-self driving is better but that’s going to be much harder.

iamgopal 7y ago

In India same number comes to about 3 million.

effnorwood 7y ago

False.