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> You can also say that about 1-in-5 deaths occur at what are supposed to be the safest places for pedestrians to cross roadways. I'd expect it to be far more r

> You can also say that about 1-in-5 deaths occur at what are supposed to be the safest places for pedestrians to cross roadways. I'd expect it to be far more remote if in fact intersections were designed for people instead of cars. Considering way more people use crosswalks than walk across the middle of the street, only 1-in-5 pedestrian deaths occurring in a crosswalk seems like a very strong signal. Ignoring such an obvious consideration screams 'motivated reasoning'. Following the traditional road safety advice keeps kids very safe: Use the crosswalk, look both ways, be home before dark and don't get drunk. Even accounting for all the failures to follow that advice, there are still only a few hundred child pedestrian deaths a year in a country with hundreds of millions of people. Calling it an "absolute bloodbath" is just sensationalism. I think you're just trying to scare people because you have an axe to grind against car culture for other reasons.

jMyles 4y ago
> Considering way more people use crosswalks than walk across the middle of the street It is impossible to find good data on this, so I don't understand why you're using a tone of certainty in this assertion. Anecdotally, I find this difficult to believe; it seems to me that the opposite is true (at least here in St. Pete, Florida). > Following the traditional road safety advice keeps kids very safe: Use the crosswalk, look both ways, be home before dark and don't get drunk. "Traditional"? In what tradition? My tradition is not to put cars first and make kids avoid death by dancing around them. Streets are for people. The idea that people need to be limited to crosswalks, exercise paranoia, and avoid them after dark suggests strongly that the points I'm making are very sound. > there are still only a few hundred child pedestrian deaths a year in a country with hundreds of millions of people. I don't think a few hundred deaths - among a cohort extremely unlikely to die of any cause - is anything to sneeze at. And again, you are ignoring other causes of death-by-car by focusing on this one ICD code. Why? > you have an axe to grind against car culture for other reasons. You got me. I'm a wealthy lobbyist for big bike. I'm sorry I didn't disclose this earlier.
- robonerd 4y ago
  > You got me. I'm a wealthy lobbyist for big bike. I'm sorry I didn't disclose this earlier. Bike lobby huh? Usually the anti-car position is motivated by environmentalism, or the social/economic inequalities inherent to car culture that have been baked into our public infrastructure. Those would all be much better reasons than the number of children killed by cars, but bike lobby... I guess that works too. While it's not impossible that you're telling the truth, I just don't believe that children killed by cars is really the root of your beef against cars. Rather, I think you're cynically using a "think of the children" argument to advance some other agenda (likely some combination of environmental, social and economic.) By the data, 'think of the children' is the lamest of all the plausible motives to oppose cars.
  - jMyles 4y ago
    In case my sarcasm fell short of the obviousness for which I had aimed: I do not work for a bike lobby, nor do I have any direct interest in the outcomes of these policies except extending the life of my kiddo and his friends. I have no specific axe to grind. It's just absolutely obvious to me, from extensive travel through 49 of the United States, that children face dramatic and unprovoked hostility from the infrastructure through many of their cities. The streets feel like they are literally made for cars instead of people. If you don't get that impression, then I really wonder what makes our perspectives so different.

jMyles 4y ago

> Considering way more people use crosswalks than walk across the middle of the street It is impossible to find good data on this, so I don't understand why you're using a tone of certainty in this assertion. Anecdotally, I find this difficult to believe; it seems to me that the opposite is true (at least here in St. Pete, Florida). > Following the traditional road safety advice keeps kids very safe: Use the crosswalk, look both ways, be home before dark and don't get drunk. "Traditional"? In what tradition? My tradition is not to put cars first and make kids avoid death by dancing around them. Streets are for people. The idea that people need to be limited to crosswalks, exercise paranoia, and avoid them after dark suggests strongly that the points I'm making are very sound. > there are still only a few hundred child pedestrian deaths a year in a country with hundreds of millions of people. I don't think a few hundred deaths - among a cohort extremely unlikely to die of any cause - is anything to sneeze at. And again, you are ignoring other causes of death-by-car by focusing on this one ICD code. Why? > you have an axe to grind against car culture for other reasons. You got me. I'm a wealthy lobbyist for big bike. I'm sorry I didn't disclose this earlier.

robonerd 4y ago
> You got me. I'm a wealthy lobbyist for big bike. I'm sorry I didn't disclose this earlier. Bike lobby huh? Usually the anti-car position is motivated by environmentalism, or the social/economic inequalities inherent to car culture that have been baked into our public infrastructure. Those would all be much better reasons than the number of children killed by cars, but bike lobby... I guess that works too. While it's not impossible that you're telling the truth, I just don't believe that children killed by cars is really the root of your beef against cars. Rather, I think you're cynically using a "think of the children" argument to advance some other agenda (likely some combination of environmental, social and economic.) By the data, 'think of the children' is the lamest of all the plausible motives to oppose cars.
- jMyles 4y ago
  In case my sarcasm fell short of the obviousness for which I had aimed: I do not work for a bike lobby, nor do I have any direct interest in the outcomes of these policies except extending the life of my kiddo and his friends. I have no specific axe to grind. It's just absolutely obvious to me, from extensive travel through 49 of the United States, that children face dramatic and unprovoked hostility from the infrastructure through many of their cities. The streets feel like they are literally made for cars instead of people. If you don't get that impression, then I really wonder what makes our perspectives so different.