6 ms·

I think the biggest factor is high fronts on trucks and SUVs that seem to be designed to crush pedestrians, together with increasingly poor visibility. We have

I think the biggest factor is high fronts on trucks and SUVs that seem to be designed to crush pedestrians, together with increasingly poor visibility. We have the same problem in the EU. Pickups are not as popular here, but even small cars are getting SUV styling with pedestrian-killing hoods. I had high hopes that Tesla would make sleek and pedestrian-safer cars popular again: the Model X has a pretty low front for an SUV. Unfortunately Tesla threw all that out the window and designed the most effective pedestrian-crushing-device I've ever seen -- I hope the Cybertruck is delayed for a few more years....

twblalock 4y ago
> We have the same problem in the EU. Then how does that explain why increased road deaths are exceptional to the USA?
- throwaway294566 4y ago
  Because, while the same problem exists, it doesn't exist to the same extent. The average size of the vehicles is smaller, even bigger European SUVs are far smaller than what americans call trucks. And there are less of the really big and deadly ones, almost none with a neck-breaking-bar, etc.
- leoedin 4y ago
  I was totally shocked by the shape of truck grills last time I visited Canada. The standard F150-esque chassis used for all sorts of commercial vehicles is fronted by a huge slab of steel. And those things are everywhere - it's not just the obvious "manly truck lovers", but all sorts of commercial vehicles where it's totally unnecessary. In Toronto the parks service are all driving around in those trucks. As the parent of a 2 year old, they are SCARY - the blind spot in front must be massive. In Europe we mostly use van derived chassis for commercial vehicles. Ford Transits or Fiat Ducato (Dodge Ram Promaster in NA). They seem to be able to serve the same purpose without having terrifying blind spots.
  - sam_lowry_ 4y ago
    I've been in front collisions with European cars a couple of times, they are designed to fold in and down, first protecting the pedestrian and then the legs of the driver/passenger. It's amazing how they fold at the slightest hit.
    - rightbyte 4y ago
      > I've been in front collisions with European cars a couple of times I hope you doing some sort of crash rally?
- acdha 4y ago
  The U.S. heavily subsidizes those vehicles and the wide roads & parking they require so we have tons of them. Europeans also buy them for the same reasons but you have to be especially committed to intimidating your neighbors to pay that much more for fuel, parking, etc. and deal with narrower streets.
  - Karrot_Kream 4y ago
    The US doesn't subsidize those vehicles. In 2008, the Obama government passed the CAFE emissions standards which carved out an exception for vehicles used for commercial purposes. Most pickups and large vehicles fall under this exception and can be profitable due to lower emissions standards. The rest is true but a bit complicated. The US Federal government subsidizes arterials which gives local governments an incentive to build more arterials so they can receive more federal funding.
    - adgjlsfhk1 4y ago
      parent's point was that the infrastructure we build acts as subsidy. A pickup truck is a lot more desirable if your country increases pays a bunch of money to increase road widths. European roads are typically 8 or 9 feet per lane while US roads are often 10-12 ft per lane.
      - Karrot_Kream 4y ago
        Right, I was adding more detail as to why US roads are wider, they're arterials. That and signal spacing and lane width is based solely around throughput in most of the US. Too much online literature throws around "subsidizes" blindly without going deeper.
        frosted-flakes 4y ago
        These vehicles are not directly subsidized in the form of a cash rebate or tax refund, but they are heavily subsidized by the general public through regulations for minimum parking mandates, free highways everywhere, excess road capacity, wide lanes, perverse incentives to build further apart, and a whole host of other measures that prop up car dependency in the US.
Swizec 4y ago
Fun result from an old Fifth Gear episode back when SUVs were called “four by fours”. https://youtu.be/4aCumC7sJIg https://youtu.be/4aCumC7sJIg The taller nose of an SUV better distributes forces across more of a pedestrian’s body, which reduces injury. And you get pushed ahead of the car instead of being scooped up to hit the windshield with your head. This is again better for the pedestrian as long as the car stops in time not to run over the person lying on the ground. You’ll notice that non-SUV noses have been getting taller and flatter for the past ~15 years. This is a direct result of Euro NCAP rules for pedestrian safety. edit: if you’re downvoting, I really suggest you watch the linked video. It’s great food for thought.
- smcl 4y ago
  Has British-English moved on from calling them "4x4"?
  - atchoo 4y ago
    We'd still call a genuine off road vehicle a four by four. Americans have gone a bit nuts with the SUV label - we don't call things like a Model Y an SUV, it's just a hatchback. Some other models Americans call SUVs are Estates or People Carriers. We probably wouldn't call things like a Porsche Cayenne a 4x4 because it's never going off road. That will happily be called an SUV with all the selfish egotism implied. Other names for it would be more deliberately insulting e.g. Chelsea Tractor etc.
  - soneil 4y ago
    It's not so much that we've stopped calling them 4x4 - it's more than the 4WD market has diverged. A 4x4 is designed to get muddy. An SUV is designed to traverse speed bumps & children's bodies with dignity. To my mind 4x4 still very much calls to mind vehicles that are 4WD for a functional reason.
- Panzer04 4y ago
  Is that true? My understanding is lower hoods roll pedestrians over, whereas tall, solid hoods basically bring them to full speed immediately, doing a bunch of damage in the process.
onetimeusename 4y ago
Maybe in a secondary sense the type of automobile is part of it but also I don't know why you are saying there is "increasingly poor visibility". There have been trucks and SUVs for decades now as well. My belief is that very bad habits were created by the empty roads in 2020 that made people start speeding. A plausible case can be constructed around this theory based on evidence. A lot of people are anecdotally familiar with this as well. Traffic data indicates the higher death toll was related to higher average speeds in conjunction with more of those on the roads driving under the influence of drugs and alcohol and a slight decline in seatbelt use.[1] Speeding increased after the pandemic lockdown.[2] There also appears to be an increase in road rage incidents.[3] So far in 2022 NHTSA says that there is an increase in road deaths for early 2022.[4] One theory that could explain the sustained increase is lower levels of traffic enforcement. [1]: https://apnews.com/article/covid-19-speeding-highway-deaths-30a26b82eeab5880abab5f2b30952725 https://apnews.com/article/covid-19-speeding-highway-deaths-... [2]: https://www.iihs.org/news/detail/pandemic-lockdowns-made-rush-hour-speeding-risky-driving-the-new-normal https://www.iihs.org/news/detail/pandemic-lockdowns-made-rus... [3]: https://www.healthline.com/health-news/road-rage-has-risen-during-the-pandemic-how-to-stay-safe https://www.healthline.com/health-news/road-rage-has-risen-d... [4]: https://www.nhtsa.gov/press-releases/early-estimates-first-quarter-2022 https://www.nhtsa.gov/press-releases/early-estimates-first-q...
fasthands9 4y ago
I don't know how much can be attributed to this but always seemed weird to me that the safety tests (which both are mandated legally and also used in marketing) are solely about how safe the passengers of the car will be in the event of a crash. It seems like a classic collective action problem. If an automaker has a new car design which will make its passengers 5% safer in a crash but passengers in the other car 10% more likely to die then they have incentive to do the design change anyways. I wouldnt know the exact numbers but would think with a lot of the changes (such as cars getting 1000s of lbs heavier) the impacts are real - especially when you factor in pedestrians.
- rafeto 4y ago
  I don't know about other markets, but Euro NCAP (https://www.euroncap.com/ https://www.euroncap.com/) includes pedestrian and cyclist safety in their assessments and Land Rover claimed that they had to stop the production of the original Defender because it did not comply with the mandated minimum safety standards for pedestrians and occupants. I spent a lot of time in a 2012 Defender without any airbags and seats which were essentially just screwed to a wooden/sheet metal frame - but the high and upright seating position made me feel safer than do in an (objectively safer) sedan or hatchback.
- gnopgnip 4y ago
  There are a lot of automotive standards that address pedestrian safety, other crash testing besides the ones for passengers. This is why pop up headlights and hood ornaments are rarely used now for example.
S_A_P 4y ago
While I agree that styling elements that are outright pedestrian harmful(a row of spear heads across the grill, etc) should be banned, I also HATE the way that these same regulations are making all cars look the same. Maybe folks who don't like cars don't care. I DO care what a car looks like. As someone who also would not like to meet his demise by an errant vehicle, I think I would rather see a bunch of safety tech designed to not hit pedestrians in the first place would be ideal. Auto stop seems to be getting pretty good and while you could never eliminate vehicle to pedestrian crashes(suicide by car is likely impossible to protect against in many scenarios) But I hope we can stop making all the cars look like a shin destroying tear drop. :)
- newaccount74 4y ago
  The same argument could be used against airbags and seatbelts, or against crumple zones. Crashes are unavoidable, and any feature that can reduce the lethality of crashes should be considered.
lm28469 4y ago
Add absolute piss poor control/regulations on what's on the road. I've seen more crashes in a week around LA than in my entire life. Half the cars had bald tires, at the first sign of rain you saw a crash every 10-15min At least 25% of the vehicles on the roads there wouldn't be considered legally road worthy in western Europe
- Zak 4y ago
  California appears to have an annual safety inspection, which many US states do not. According to the NHTSA, 6.8% of crashes involved a vehicle with a significant safety fault, which was not necessarily a causal factor in the crash. 4.9% of crash vehicles had a tire or wheel defect. This suggests to me that there probably isn't a desperate need for stricter vehicle inspections in the US. https://crashstats.nhtsa.dot.gov/Api/Public/ViewPublication/811059 https://crashstats.nhtsa.dot.gov/Api/Public/ViewPublication/... (PDF)
  - trgn 4y ago
    > there probably isn't a desperate need for stricter vehicle inspections in the US. American drivers take awful care of their cars. bald tyres, ripped off bumpers, worn brakes, ... It's shocking coming back from (western) europe from vacation this summer, how trash the cars are on the road here. Once you see it, you can't unsee it.
    - Zak 4y ago
      I've seen it. I may have even participated in it. The difference you've observed definitely exists, but there's a big difference between: * That car looks crappy * That car looks unsafe * The kind of maintenance shortcomings present on that car are correlated with a large increase in crash rate
      - deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
  - toast0 4y ago

twblalock 4y ago

> We have the same problem in the EU. Then how does that explain why increased road deaths are exceptional to the USA?

throwaway294566 4y ago
Because, while the same problem exists, it doesn't exist to the same extent. The average size of the vehicles is smaller, even bigger European SUVs are far smaller than what americans call trucks. And there are less of the really big and deadly ones, almost none with a neck-breaking-bar, etc.
leoedin 4y ago
I was totally shocked by the shape of truck grills last time I visited Canada. The standard F150-esque chassis used for all sorts of commercial vehicles is fronted by a huge slab of steel. And those things are everywhere - it's not just the obvious "manly truck lovers", but all sorts of commercial vehicles where it's totally unnecessary. In Toronto the parks service are all driving around in those trucks. As the parent of a 2 year old, they are SCARY - the blind spot in front must be massive. In Europe we mostly use van derived chassis for commercial vehicles. Ford Transits or Fiat Ducato (Dodge Ram Promaster in NA). They seem to be able to serve the same purpose without having terrifying blind spots.
- sam_lowry_ 4y ago
  I've been in front collisions with European cars a couple of times, they are designed to fold in and down, first protecting the pedestrian and then the legs of the driver/passenger. It's amazing how they fold at the slightest hit.
  - rightbyte 4y ago
    > I've been in front collisions with European cars a couple of times I hope you doing some sort of crash rally?
acdha 4y ago
The U.S. heavily subsidizes those vehicles and the wide roads & parking they require so we have tons of them. Europeans also buy them for the same reasons but you have to be especially committed to intimidating your neighbors to pay that much more for fuel, parking, etc. and deal with narrower streets.
- Karrot_Kream 4y ago
  The US doesn't subsidize those vehicles. In 2008, the Obama government passed the CAFE emissions standards which carved out an exception for vehicles used for commercial purposes. Most pickups and large vehicles fall under this exception and can be profitable due to lower emissions standards. The rest is true but a bit complicated. The US Federal government subsidizes arterials which gives local governments an incentive to build more arterials so they can receive more federal funding.
  - adgjlsfhk1 4y ago
    parent's point was that the infrastructure we build acts as subsidy. A pickup truck is a lot more desirable if your country increases pays a bunch of money to increase road widths. European roads are typically 8 or 9 feet per lane while US roads are often 10-12 ft per lane.
    - Karrot_Kream 4y ago
      Right, I was adding more detail as to why US roads are wider, they're arterials. That and signal spacing and lane width is based solely around throughput in most of the US. Too much online literature throws around "subsidizes" blindly without going deeper.
      - frosted-flakes 4y ago
        These vehicles are not directly subsidized in the form of a cash rebate or tax refund, but they are heavily subsidized by the general public through regulations for minimum parking mandates, free highways everywhere, excess road capacity, wide lanes, perverse incentives to build further apart, and a whole host of other measures that prop up car dependency in the US.

Swizec 4y ago

Fun result from an old Fifth Gear episode back when SUVs were called “four by fours”. https://youtu.be/4aCumC7sJIg https://youtu.be/4aCumC7sJIg The taller nose of an SUV better distributes forces across more of a pedestrian’s body, which reduces injury. And you get pushed ahead of the car instead of being scooped up to hit the windshield with your head. This is again better for the pedestrian as long as the car stops in time not to run over the person lying on the ground. You’ll notice that non-SUV noses have been getting taller and flatter for the past ~15 years. This is a direct result of Euro NCAP rules for pedestrian safety. edit: if you’re downvoting, I really suggest you watch the linked video. It’s great food for thought.

smcl 4y ago
Has British-English moved on from calling them "4x4"?
- atchoo 4y ago
  We'd still call a genuine off road vehicle a four by four. Americans have gone a bit nuts with the SUV label - we don't call things like a Model Y an SUV, it's just a hatchback. Some other models Americans call SUVs are Estates or People Carriers. We probably wouldn't call things like a Porsche Cayenne a 4x4 because it's never going off road. That will happily be called an SUV with all the selfish egotism implied. Other names for it would be more deliberately insulting e.g. Chelsea Tractor etc.
- soneil 4y ago
  It's not so much that we've stopped calling them 4x4 - it's more than the 4WD market has diverged. A 4x4 is designed to get muddy. An SUV is designed to traverse speed bumps & children's bodies with dignity. To my mind 4x4 still very much calls to mind vehicles that are 4WD for a functional reason.
Panzer04 4y ago
Is that true? My understanding is lower hoods roll pedestrians over, whereas tall, solid hoods basically bring them to full speed immediately, doing a bunch of damage in the process.

onetimeusename 4y ago

Maybe in a secondary sense the type of automobile is part of it but also I don't know why you are saying there is "increasingly poor visibility". There have been trucks and SUVs for decades now as well. My belief is that very bad habits were created by the empty roads in 2020 that made people start speeding. A plausible case can be constructed around this theory based on evidence. A lot of people are anecdotally familiar with this as well. Traffic data indicates the higher death toll was related to higher average speeds in conjunction with more of those on the roads driving under the influence of drugs and alcohol and a slight decline in seatbelt use.[1] Speeding increased after the pandemic lockdown.[2] There also appears to be an increase in road rage incidents.[3] So far in 2022 NHTSA says that there is an increase in road deaths for early 2022.[4] One theory that could explain the sustained increase is lower levels of traffic enforcement. [1]: https://apnews.com/article/covid-19-speeding-highway-deaths-30a26b82eeab5880abab5f2b30952725 https://apnews.com/article/covid-19-speeding-highway-deaths-... [2]: https://www.iihs.org/news/detail/pandemic-lockdowns-made-rush-hour-speeding-risky-driving-the-new-normal https://www.iihs.org/news/detail/pandemic-lockdowns-made-rus... [3]: https://www.healthline.com/health-news/road-rage-has-risen-during-the-pandemic-how-to-stay-safe https://www.healthline.com/health-news/road-rage-has-risen-d... [4]: https://www.nhtsa.gov/press-releases/early-estimates-first-quarter-2022 https://www.nhtsa.gov/press-releases/early-estimates-first-q...

fasthands9 4y ago

I don't know how much can be attributed to this but always seemed weird to me that the safety tests (which both are mandated legally and also used in marketing) are solely about how safe the passengers of the car will be in the event of a crash. It seems like a classic collective action problem. If an automaker has a new car design which will make its passengers 5% safer in a crash but passengers in the other car 10% more likely to die then they have incentive to do the design change anyways. I wouldnt know the exact numbers but would think with a lot of the changes (such as cars getting 1000s of lbs heavier) the impacts are real - especially when you factor in pedestrians.

rafeto 4y ago
I don't know about other markets, but Euro NCAP (https://www.euroncap.com/ https://www.euroncap.com/) includes pedestrian and cyclist safety in their assessments and Land Rover claimed that they had to stop the production of the original Defender because it did not comply with the mandated minimum safety standards for pedestrians and occupants. I spent a lot of time in a 2012 Defender without any airbags and seats which were essentially just screwed to a wooden/sheet metal frame - but the high and upright seating position made me feel safer than do in an (objectively safer) sedan or hatchback.
gnopgnip 4y ago
There are a lot of automotive standards that address pedestrian safety, other crash testing besides the ones for passengers. This is why pop up headlights and hood ornaments are rarely used now for example.

S_A_P 4y ago

While I agree that styling elements that are outright pedestrian harmful(a row of spear heads across the grill, etc) should be banned, I also HATE the way that these same regulations are making all cars look the same. Maybe folks who don't like cars don't care. I DO care what a car looks like. As someone who also would not like to meet his demise by an errant vehicle, I think I would rather see a bunch of safety tech designed to not hit pedestrians in the first place would be ideal. Auto stop seems to be getting pretty good and while you could never eliminate vehicle to pedestrian crashes(suicide by car is likely impossible to protect against in many scenarios) But I hope we can stop making all the cars look like a shin destroying tear drop. :)

newaccount74 4y ago
The same argument could be used against airbags and seatbelts, or against crumple zones. Crashes are unavoidable, and any feature that can reduce the lethality of crashes should be considered.

lm28469 4y ago

Add absolute piss poor control/regulations on what's on the road. I've seen more crashes in a week around LA than in my entire life. Half the cars had bald tires, at the first sign of rain you saw a crash every 10-15min At least 25% of the vehicles on the roads there wouldn't be considered legally road worthy in western Europe

Zak 4y ago
California appears to have an annual safety inspection, which many US states do not. According to the NHTSA, 6.8% of crashes involved a vehicle with a significant safety fault, which was not necessarily a causal factor in the crash. 4.9% of crash vehicles had a tire or wheel defect. This suggests to me that there probably isn't a desperate need for stricter vehicle inspections in the US. https://crashstats.nhtsa.dot.gov/Api/Public/ViewPublication/811059 https://crashstats.nhtsa.dot.gov/Api/Public/ViewPublication/... (PDF)
- trgn 4y ago
  > there probably isn't a desperate need for stricter vehicle inspections in the US. American drivers take awful care of their cars. bald tyres, ripped off bumpers, worn brakes, ... It's shocking coming back from (western) europe from vacation this summer, how trash the cars are on the road here. Once you see it, you can't unsee it.
  - Zak 4y ago
    I've seen it. I may have even participated in it. The difference you've observed definitely exists, but there's a big difference between: * That car looks crappy * That car looks unsafe * The kind of maintenance shortcomings present on that car are correlated with a large increase in crash rate
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
- toast0 4y ago