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The gap between these mistakes causing harm and not causing harm is basically just luck. The less careful we are even when the mistake doesn't cause harm, the

The gap between these mistakes causing harm and not causing harm is basically just luck. The less careful we are even when the mistake doesn't cause harm, the more frequently we'll make the mistake. Some feedback that made people be more careful, and pay more attention, would be good. And at a larger level: if we can't be bothered to be that careful (or simply can't at all), and want to be allowed to not be that careful, then maybe we should make more societal changes to stop depending on humans driving 3000+lb machines. All this is great data for less driving but because it's mostly invisible, it can't be used to rebut the "but I want my own car and I want to drive it myself" folks.

laumars 7y ago
Obviously I agree that bad drivers deserve little sympathy. But not all human errors are down to bad drivers nor a lack of care. > The less careful we are even when the mistake doesn't cause harm, the more frequently we'll make the mistake. Some feedback that made people be more careful, and pay more attention, would be good. That only works if mistake are concious. My point is mistakes can be unintended like rowdy kids causing a distraction at the wrong time. > The gap between these mistakes causing harm and not causing harm is basically just luck. I agree. But also the gap between a good driver driving well and a good driver making an honest mistake because of a badly timed distraction is also just bad luck. It's happened to me before -- I've ran a red light at temporary traffic lights after my 2nd child was born (so I was tired thus required sharper focus) and my 1st child was so excited about having a baby sister that he kept making a scene. For a fraction of a second I lost focus and that fraction of a second happened to be when I was approaching road works. I was lucky that it was a Sunday evening and driving along a quiet village road so there wasn't any other vehicles. But I still had ran a red light despite my best efforts of driving safely. > And at a larger level: if we can't be bothered to be that careful... It's not about people not making the effort to drive safely; it's about human error. If it were that easy to drive then we'd already have infallible autonomous cars but we don't because driving isn't actually all that easy. This is also why I'm fully in favour of all these new smart safety features that autonomy has introduced; they help reduce the impact of the worst instances of human error. Just to recap: I have little sympathy for bad or negligent drivers. I just want to remind people that it's easy to demonise others but sometimes actions are genuine flukes of bad luck.
- Wowfunhappy 7y ago
  Okay, so you make an error, you get a fine for it. It's not as though I'm arguing anyone who runs a red light should go to jail. Heck, maybe our fines are too high, or should take income into account—I think all of those things would be healthy conversations. But cars are deadly vehicles, and mistakes—regardless of the circumstance—should have consequences before someone gets killed. As frequently as possible.
  - throwaway1912 7y ago
    I’d be all for that if we could sort out gun control first.
  - mikepurvis 7y ago
    Just commenting to reinforce the degree of my agreement here. Basically the attitude from law enforcement and the legal system comes down to: - Oh, no one was hurt? Just a close call? Everyone go home and try to be more careful out there next time. - Oh, you killed someone? I mean, it's a fluke— could have happened to anyone. Honestly, you've suffered enough emotional trauma already, here's a slap on the wrist to make the victim's family feel a bit better. This is not hypothetical; it happens all the time. Here's an example from my city: Cyclist struck and killed, Feb 2017: https://kitchener.ctvnews.ca/cyclist-dies-after-being-hit-from-behind-by-car-1.3267698 https://kitchener.ctvnews.ca/cyclist-dies-after-being-hit-fr... All charges dropped, March 2018: https://www.therecord.com/news-story/8354441-charges-dropped-in-crash-that-killed-waterloo-cyclist/ https://www.therecord.com/news-story/8354441-charges-dropped... The library charges you a fee for returning a book late— it's a small penalty and a reminder to be more attentive in the future. Fines on the road should be treated the same way, as an additional cost you pay for the privilege of using the road, in proportion to the number of "mistakes" and "brain farts" you have. And who knows, maybe that additional cost might motivate a few more people to choose transit or a cab instead of driving while fatigued, or pull over and wait for the kids to stop fighting in the back seat.
  - kortilla 7y ago
    As long as you are okay with fining cyclists for riding on sidewalks, failing to come to a complete stop at stop signs, failing to signal turn direction, failing to yield, etc as well. Same with pedestrians for jaywalking. You can’t be intolerant of vehicle mistakes and allow for others if you actually care about safety.
rconti 7y ago
Actually, the vast majority of traffic collisions require 2 parties to not be paying attention, but only one of whom has to actually make a mistake; I wouldn't consider the 2nd person failing to avoid the accident as a matter of luck.
- mikepurvis 7y ago
  This is part of why the "share the road" and "all have a role to play" narratives are so offensive to people who cycle and walk. The people choosing these active transportation options are already overwhelmingly the ones picking up the slack and preventing driver inattention and carelessness from becoming serious crashes. We don't get a choice in this— we do it because the alternative is being killed in the street, and then when people actually are hit, we get to hear smarmy commentary about how it wouldn't have happened if they'd just looked both ways, or been wearing brighter clothing, or chosen a different time of day to go out for a walk: https://usa.streetsblog.org/2019/03/12/we-need-to-change-the-way-we-talk-about-pedestrian-deaths/ https://usa.streetsblog.org/2019/03/12/we-need-to-change-the... But it's hard to even build a case out of this that will be accepted by people who don't have that first hand experience of being the vulnerable road user. Most places in North America, small driver errors are only barely punished if at all, and there's pretty much universally zero effort to track close calls involving people walking and cycling.
  - soperj 7y ago
    I honestly don't know how you're so level headed about all of this. Thanks for being the better person.
  - laumars 7y ago
    > We don't get a choice in this— we do it because the alternative is being killed in the street Is this commonplace in the US? In the UK most streets are safe to walk down (even some country roads which don't have pavements/sidewalks). In the UK there isn't such thing as jaywalking (etc) so it is the drivers responsibility to give way to pedestrians even when those pedestrians aren't following the highway code themselves.
kortilla 7y ago
> The gap between these mistakes causing harm and not causing harm is basically just luck. No. There are certain things in your example like rolling stops and lane changes in intersections that are completely safe when there are no other vehicles or pedestrians near the intersection. The existence of the yield sign and its use prove the former.
- mikepurvis 7y ago
  Executing a safe lane change requires doing a shoulder check, matching speed with another lane, etc— the reason it's prohibited in and near intersections is because those are exactly where you need to be paying the most attention to crosswalks, opposing traffic, conflict points, etc. It may well be that it's fine if you're very, very confident there "are no other vehicles or pedestrians" nearby. But what is that literally every driver says who strikes a person walking? That they "came out of nowhere". It turns out enough drivers are bad at judging these things that it makes sense to just blanket ban them.
  - kortilla 7y ago
    I’m not sure you’ve ever driven in rural areas or even the outer suburbs of US cities. Things are so spread out that you can easily have visibility of the entire 100 yard radius around a given intersection from more than 1000ft away.

laumars 7y ago

Obviously I agree that bad drivers deserve little sympathy. But not all human errors are down to bad drivers nor a lack of care. > The less careful we are even when the mistake doesn't cause harm, the more frequently we'll make the mistake. Some feedback that made people be more careful, and pay more attention, would be good. That only works if mistake are concious. My point is mistakes can be unintended like rowdy kids causing a distraction at the wrong time. > The gap between these mistakes causing harm and not causing harm is basically just luck. I agree. But also the gap between a good driver driving well and a good driver making an honest mistake because of a badly timed distraction is also just bad luck. It's happened to me before -- I've ran a red light at temporary traffic lights after my 2nd child was born (so I was tired thus required sharper focus) and my 1st child was so excited about having a baby sister that he kept making a scene. For a fraction of a second I lost focus and that fraction of a second happened to be when I was approaching road works. I was lucky that it was a Sunday evening and driving along a quiet village road so there wasn't any other vehicles. But I still had ran a red light despite my best efforts of driving safely. > And at a larger level: if we can't be bothered to be that careful... It's not about people not making the effort to drive safely; it's about human error. If it were that easy to drive then we'd already have infallible autonomous cars but we don't because driving isn't actually all that easy. This is also why I'm fully in favour of all these new smart safety features that autonomy has introduced; they help reduce the impact of the worst instances of human error. Just to recap: I have little sympathy for bad or negligent drivers. I just want to remind people that it's easy to demonise others but sometimes actions are genuine flukes of bad luck.

Wowfunhappy 7y ago
Okay, so you make an error, you get a fine for it. It's not as though I'm arguing anyone who runs a red light should go to jail. Heck, maybe our fines are too high, or should take income into account—I think all of those things would be healthy conversations. But cars are deadly vehicles, and mistakes—regardless of the circumstance—should have consequences before someone gets killed. As frequently as possible.
- throwaway1912 7y ago
  I’d be all for that if we could sort out gun control first.
- mikepurvis 7y ago
  Just commenting to reinforce the degree of my agreement here. Basically the attitude from law enforcement and the legal system comes down to: - Oh, no one was hurt? Just a close call? Everyone go home and try to be more careful out there next time. - Oh, you killed someone? I mean, it's a fluke— could have happened to anyone. Honestly, you've suffered enough emotional trauma already, here's a slap on the wrist to make the victim's family feel a bit better. This is not hypothetical; it happens all the time. Here's an example from my city: Cyclist struck and killed, Feb 2017: https://kitchener.ctvnews.ca/cyclist-dies-after-being-hit-from-behind-by-car-1.3267698 https://kitchener.ctvnews.ca/cyclist-dies-after-being-hit-fr... All charges dropped, March 2018: https://www.therecord.com/news-story/8354441-charges-dropped-in-crash-that-killed-waterloo-cyclist/ https://www.therecord.com/news-story/8354441-charges-dropped... The library charges you a fee for returning a book late— it's a small penalty and a reminder to be more attentive in the future. Fines on the road should be treated the same way, as an additional cost you pay for the privilege of using the road, in proportion to the number of "mistakes" and "brain farts" you have. And who knows, maybe that additional cost might motivate a few more people to choose transit or a cab instead of driving while fatigued, or pull over and wait for the kids to stop fighting in the back seat.
- kortilla 7y ago
  As long as you are okay with fining cyclists for riding on sidewalks, failing to come to a complete stop at stop signs, failing to signal turn direction, failing to yield, etc as well. Same with pedestrians for jaywalking. You can’t be intolerant of vehicle mistakes and allow for others if you actually care about safety.

rconti 7y ago

Actually, the vast majority of traffic collisions require 2 parties to not be paying attention, but only one of whom has to actually make a mistake; I wouldn't consider the 2nd person failing to avoid the accident as a matter of luck.

mikepurvis 7y ago
This is part of why the "share the road" and "all have a role to play" narratives are so offensive to people who cycle and walk. The people choosing these active transportation options are already overwhelmingly the ones picking up the slack and preventing driver inattention and carelessness from becoming serious crashes. We don't get a choice in this— we do it because the alternative is being killed in the street, and then when people actually are hit, we get to hear smarmy commentary about how it wouldn't have happened if they'd just looked both ways, or been wearing brighter clothing, or chosen a different time of day to go out for a walk: https://usa.streetsblog.org/2019/03/12/we-need-to-change-the-way-we-talk-about-pedestrian-deaths/ https://usa.streetsblog.org/2019/03/12/we-need-to-change-the... But it's hard to even build a case out of this that will be accepted by people who don't have that first hand experience of being the vulnerable road user. Most places in North America, small driver errors are only barely punished if at all, and there's pretty much universally zero effort to track close calls involving people walking and cycling.
- soperj 7y ago
  I honestly don't know how you're so level headed about all of this. Thanks for being the better person.
- laumars 7y ago
  > We don't get a choice in this— we do it because the alternative is being killed in the street Is this commonplace in the US? In the UK most streets are safe to walk down (even some country roads which don't have pavements/sidewalks). In the UK there isn't such thing as jaywalking (etc) so it is the drivers responsibility to give way to pedestrians even when those pedestrians aren't following the highway code themselves.

kortilla 7y ago

> The gap between these mistakes causing harm and not causing harm is basically just luck. No. There are certain things in your example like rolling stops and lane changes in intersections that are completely safe when there are no other vehicles or pedestrians near the intersection. The existence of the yield sign and its use prove the former.

mikepurvis 7y ago
Executing a safe lane change requires doing a shoulder check, matching speed with another lane, etc— the reason it's prohibited in and near intersections is because those are exactly where you need to be paying the most attention to crosswalks, opposing traffic, conflict points, etc. It may well be that it's fine if you're very, very confident there "are no other vehicles or pedestrians" nearby. But what is that literally every driver says who strikes a person walking? That they "came out of nowhere". It turns out enough drivers are bad at judging these things that it makes sense to just blanket ban them.
- kortilla 7y ago
  I’m not sure you’ve ever driven in rural areas or even the outer suburbs of US cities. Things are so spread out that you can easily have visibility of the entire 100 yard radius around a given intersection from more than 1000ft away.