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Japan has percentage-based liability, and generally speaking there is a large onus on the driver of cars to do the safe thing when close to smaller groups. For

by rtpg 4y ago

Japan has percentage-based liability, and generally speaking there is a large onus on the driver of cars to do the safe thing when close to smaller groups. For example, you have to slow down to under 10km/h in theory if there are small children on the sidewalk next to you. Up until recently, a bike collision with a driver was considered 100% the driver's fault even if the bike was riding against traffic (That was changed so that the liability is 100% if the bike is riding on the right side of the road). The point of all this is that there is such a thing as mixed liability, and the idea that it's either one or the other person's fault is just completely unworkable. And because there's this percentage-based system, you can ratchet up the liability based on who is more likely to cause major damage, without having binary results for really tough things.

throwawaylinux 4y ago
I know there is such a thing as mixed liability, that's pretty common in civil court systems isn't it? I don't see what point you're trying to make with it. You didn't really answer the questions I was asking OP for either. Japan puts a large onus on drivers but appears to have backed off from some of it? That is actually interesting though, why did they change?
- rtpg 4y ago
  Well my point is that there's a lot of mixed liability things baked in, so there are many many many many things that can make a driver liable, because there's not this fear of "what about in this extenuating circumstance X???" The change is mostly around making rules more strict for cyclists, as cyclists... well, they also pose a danger to pedestrians! There is a pretty famous case of a cyclist hitting an old lady and killing her. Some people moving here get annoyed because a lot of times the liability split ends up being 90% driver/10% victim, because there are technicalities, but generally speaking even for pretty "egregious" behavior from pedestrians the driver is ultimately expected to be doing their best. Things like "but there was a blind corner, how could I know somebody was going to ride from that corner" hold no water because drivers are supposed to slow down in those cases, for example. I don't know the state of liability in the US but I imagine it's a bit less victim-friendly.

by rtpg 4y ago

throwawaylinux 4y ago

I know there is such a thing as mixed liability, that's pretty common in civil court systems isn't it? I don't see what point you're trying to make with it. You didn't really answer the questions I was asking OP for either. Japan puts a large onus on drivers but appears to have backed off from some of it? That is actually interesting though, why did they change?

rtpg 4y ago
Well my point is that there's a lot of mixed liability things baked in, so there are many many many many things that can make a driver liable, because there's not this fear of "what about in this extenuating circumstance X???" The change is mostly around making rules more strict for cyclists, as cyclists... well, they also pose a danger to pedestrians! There is a pretty famous case of a cyclist hitting an old lady and killing her. Some people moving here get annoyed because a lot of times the liability split ends up being 90% driver/10% victim, because there are technicalities, but generally speaking even for pretty "egregious" behavior from pedestrians the driver is ultimately expected to be doing their best. Things like "but there was a blind corner, how could I know somebody was going to ride from that corner" hold no water because drivers are supposed to slow down in those cases, for example. I don't know the state of liability in the US but I imagine it's a bit less victim-friendly.