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Why Sweden Has So Few Road Deaths

110 points by sethbannon 12y ago

Retric 12y ago
The US saw a huge advertising effort trying to convince people that pedestrian fatalities were not an issue with either cars or drivers. Realistically, while it costs more and be less convenient for drivers a better separation between cars and people is going to save plenty of lives. However, only 14% of traffic fatalities ~(4,743/year) are pedestrains in the US. ed:(+ 726 bike/year) So there is a limit to how far that can take you. http://www.pedbikeinfo.org/data/factsheet_crash.cfm http://www.pedbikeinfo.org/data/factsheet_crash.cfm
01Michael10 12y ago
Roads like the ones in Sweden will never be common place in the US. We value speed, convenience, and cheap over a "couple" of dead people.
- bmj 12y ago
  I think this is part of it, but there are also issues of infrastructure as well. Many aging eastern cities, with their challenging (read: hilly) topography, make it prohibitively expensive to radically redesign roads.[0] Additionally, I think it would be "federalize" such efforts, as it would be easier gradually redesign roads in a city, or even a part of a city, rather than attempt to broadly dictate policy for the entire country. [0] That said, it is possible to make the streets safer, even when geography and economics are obstacles. My own town has been doing this, though often it is piecemeal.
  - Spooky23 12y ago
    Great point. It's made more complex by artifacts of state law and home rule for political subdivisions. For example, in New York, state and US highways (ie. State Route 5, US Route 20) are maintained by the State DOT -- unless you're in a "city". Areas that are organized as towns (think Hempstead, NY on Long Island with 300k+ people) get state services, areas organized as cities (Albany, NY with 90k people) typically do a lousy job at it. The Federal government has been able to update things like street signals, etc. But fundamental things like road conceptual design, breaking out bike lanes, etc are going to be very difficult issues to handle without local control. There are more people in NYC than Sweden, so the size and scope of the problem in the US is several orders of magnitude more complex.
  - nawitus 12y ago
    Hilly topography doesn't really make it prohibitively expensive to make 2+1 roads, or at least they're relatively common in Finland. (Although 2+1 roads are rarely separated by fence here). Even hilly roads tend to have straight sections that can serve as the 2+1 area.
- codeflo 12y ago
  To state my European prejudices, you also seem to value being allowed to drive without proper training, and driving around in bulky vehicles that are basically designed to use the other car as their crumple zone. Those two things are possibly related.
  - hueving 12y ago
    Well it sounds like they are pretty baseless prejudices. You must pass a skills test, even if not as rigorous as some countries. Additionally, the idea that the other car is the crumple zone was valid maybe 50 years ago. Safety tests are conducted by smashing cars into walls that don't crumple. Everyone I know who has been in a crash hasn't been due to improper training, it been because of ignoring rules that they knew very well (speeding, texting and driving, etc). I don't know anyone that has crashed because they didn't know how a stop sign worked.
    - jbrooksuk 12y ago
      > Everyone I know who has been in a crash hasn't been due to improper training, it been because of ignoring rules that they knew very well (speeding, texting and driving, etc) How can anybody not know that texting and driving is a bad idea? That's just stupid.
      - bkmartin 12y ago
        But people do stupid things every day. Smoking is stupid, binge drinking is stupid, not wearing your seat belt is stupid... all have consequences. The point still remains, it is a choice people make to not follow the rules that causes most of the problems. Now, how do we get people to follow the rules better?
      - bkmartin 12y ago
        But people do stupid things every day. Smoking is stupid, binge drinking is stupid, not wearing your seat belt is stupid... all have consequences. The point still remains, it is a choice people make to not follow the rules that causes most of the problems. Now, how do we get people to follow the rules better?
- Tuna-Fish 12y ago
  Some of the designs are advantageous even for speed and convenience. Modern roundabouts reduce intersection fatalities by 90% and increase throughput in most traffic conditions. They were much maligned as complicated and hard to understand when they started being built in the USA, but the rate of their construction is going up and eventually they will probably be as common in the USA as they are in Europe.
- matwood 12y ago
  Parts of Highway 17 in South Carolina were recently upgraded to exactly this type of road. I've noticed many other highways (not Interstates) using this exact design. Admittedly, they do not always have a steel barrier. Traffic circles are another thing going in all around where I currently live. Unfortunately many people still do not know how to use them, but they are learning.
- darklajid 12y ago
  This is the third time I'm commenting on the same issue in this thread. Speed? What's the limit? What are you actually driving, if you're ignoring the limit? Because Sweden allows 110-120km/h and other places in Europe might even allow more (France w/ 130km/h, and .. I'm from Germany). You are NOT going fast in the US. You might drive a lot. You might commute more than anyone else. I don't know about these things. But fast? I don't buy it.
  - lttlrck 12y ago
    Around Boston for my 15 mile commute on the Interstate the fast lane is nominally at 110-120km/h. No it's not as fast as the autobahn but it's on a par with Europe and far from slow. (I'm British, lived in Germany for 10 years, US for 5 years)
    - emp_zealoth 12y ago
      I'm sorry, 110-120 in the fast lane isn't "on par with Europe". If you look at Germany, 270 is more like it... If you look at Austria/Italy, the fast lane rarely ever goes as low as the speed limit and going as fast as 145 kph usually meant we had to go out of the lane to let others through. Whoever is driving 110kph on an European highway is more or less a deadly road hazard. At such low speed it is nearly impossible to overtake lorries without having somebody nearly ram you from the back and it is guaranteed to cause a massive pileup of angry cars behind. Source - I've been traveling Europe both on motorbike and by car
arethuza 12y ago
Even when you look at deaths per billion vehicle-km the US still seems to be quite bad at 7.6, with the UK at 4.3 and Sweden at 3.7: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-related_death_rate http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-re...
- emodendroket 12y ago
  "Safer than Japan" sounds like a good pitch.
kristofferR 12y ago
In addition to the road quality I would say the driver's ed is also a big factor. Getting a license in Sweden is much tougher than most other places, especially the US.
- Svip 12y ago
  I should point out, that EU has standardised driving licence education. So despite Denmark having almost no tunnels (no mountains to speak of), we still have to learn about tunnel driving. And that's good. These tests also include driving at a facility. However, the EU requirements are minimum requirements, countries are allowed to make the requirements tougher, such as Finland (which I think requires at least 3 days at a facility).
  - sampo 12y ago
    What does 'driving at a facility' mean?
    - Svip 12y ago
      A driving facility, where you experience driving through water, surfaces with low friction, as well as attempting avoiding obstacles, rescuing skidding (both front and back end) out and so forth.
      - kiiski 12y ago
        So I suppose in Finland these would be driving on ice x2, and the night driving simulator (at least in my case). Are you sure that tunnels are a part of the standard? I didn't need to do that ~5 years ago. Is the education split into three seperate parts in all EU countries (first gives a temporary license, and there must be a few months before the others (to get real world driving experience), but all must be done withing 2 years)? When I got my license, the education cost about 2500 euros (I think it's higher now). Is that about the same as elsewhere in the EU?
        12y ago
happyscrappy 12y ago
From the comments: "Sweden has 264 road deaths for 9.5 million people. Britain has 1730 for 62 million people. The deaths rates, at 28 per million people, are virtually identical in both countries and way below every other European country. Britain though, has impossibly crowded narrow roads laid down hundreds of years ago, full of bends and hazards large urban conurbations with lots of people, including pedestrians, using the roads at the same time, and almost no new roads designed for safety or anything else. Yet Britain has no more per capita road deaths than Sweden. Perhaps the Swedes have technical solutions in road planning, design and all sorts of legal restrictions on drivers to aid road safety. Perhaps the British are just more considerate and more aware, that, as their roads are much more hazardous, they have to take a lot more care when driving." Very surprising that Britain has done that well.
- Retric 12y ago
  Britain discurages driving, sweden makes roads safer. There both going to reduce fatalities, but britain ed:(approach) can't really make much progress without removing cars from the road where Sweden can make things safer and still use cars.
  - arethuza 12y ago
    "britain can't really make much progress" Yes it can - the roads here (as in most countries) are constantly being upgraded to improve capacity and safety. e.g. The dualling of the A9 (the main route to the North of Scotland) will hopefully make a huge difference to this notoriously dangerous road: http://www.transportscotland.gov.uk/project/a9-dualling-perth-inverness http://www.transportscotland.gov.uk/project/a9-dualling-pert... [NB At the moment the A9 switches from single lanes in either direction to dual carriageway and back again numerous times - people get mixed up as to whether they are on a single or dual carriageway with unfortunate results]. I'm sure there are examples throughout the UK of this kind of thing happening.
    - Retric 12y ago
      Granted, I did not mean to say Britain is not using the full set of tool to reduce road fatalities (Road Design, Signage, Licensing, Enforcement, etc.). Just that discouraging driving especially around London significantly reduces their fatalities, but it’s not really scalable.
ErikHuisman 12y ago
Whenever I'm in Sweden i just drive one road. The E4. I bet the asphalt per capita is probably pretty low compared to any other country. But still the quality of the roads don't compare to Denmark or the Netherlands for example which feel even more thought out and structured.
- rab_oof 12y ago
  As an aside, the bicycle roads in the Netherlands are extremely well-organized. The U.S. and other countries should borrow this format for inter- and intracity cycling. Most U.S. bicycle paths are like road signs in rural Germany: few and far between or hidden behind an overgrown hedge.
pc86 12y ago
Can someone with knowledge or experience on the subject explain how the "2+1"[0] road is better than a standard 3-lane highway? [0] FTA "Building 1,500 kilometres (900 miles) of "2+1" roads—where each lane of traffic takes turns to use a middle lane for overtaking—is reckoned to have saved around 145 lives over the first decade of Vision Zero"
- rdl 12y ago
  I think it is an improvement vs existing 2 lane roads. It wouldn't have cost anything to convert a 3 lane roads to 2+1.
- Svip 12y ago
  I don't know what a 'standard 3-lane highway' is. But a 2+1 highway means one lane in each direction, as well as a middle lane that changes direction at certain points. The advantage of these is that rather than forcing drivers to overtake into opposing traffic, they can wait until their direction gets the overtaking lane. These sort of roads are very common in Denmark. And I've seen a few of them in Germany as well. (This is not to be confused with 2+1 highways where the middle lane change direction depending on the time of day, these have been phased out. There are usually clear markings on 2+1 highways when the direction change.)
  - DanBC 12y ago
    A three lane highway is similar to a UK motorway. A road has six lanes, three (plus an emergency "hard shoulder") for each direction seperated by a central crash barrier.
    - pc86 12y ago
      Yes that is what I meant, thank you for clarifying. My US-centric viewpoint came through more than I expected!
- johnbatch 12y ago
  The Wikipeda article is quite good. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2%2B1_road#Sweden https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2%2B1_road#Sweden all the 2+1 roads in Sweden have barriers.
ZachS 12y ago
I'm not convinced the added safety is worth it. If you had the choice between getting to your destination in 20 minutes, with a 11.4 in 100,000 chance of dying, or arriving in 25 minutes with a 3 in 100,000 chance, which would you choose?
- ronjouch 12y ago
  Would you say that again while considering your spouse is a travelling salesman? It's not about one-time trips, it's about the aggregated death toll over years or decades.
  - ZachS 12y ago
    Yes, absolutely. My comment was actually incorrect, since it's 11.4 in 100,000 per year. I think I'd want my spouse to spend 1/5th less time driving for the increase in risk.
    - quesera 12y ago
      5 minutes is that valuable to you?
- teh 12y ago
  The article mentions safety for other road participants. One issue is that going fast often doesn't kill the driver due to modern car safety, but some unsuspecting other road user. In other words the drivers aren't carrying the risk so they are not the right people to ask whether this is a good trade-off.
- revelation 12y ago
  You do realize that a large chunk of road deaths are pedestrians, people that explicitly did not choose to use a car and insted walk to their destination, and that are overwhelmingly killed by people that did choose a car? I sure hope you do not drive if that is your attitude to safety.
- glesica 12y ago
  25 minutes. Actually, no, I would just take the bus and arrive in 30 minutes, but having had spent the time doing something enjoyable rather than driving. :)
thomasahle 12y ago
"Building 1,500 kilometres (900 miles) of "2+1" roads—where each lane of traffic takes turns to use a middle lane for overtaking—is reckoned to have saved around 145 lives over the first decade of Vision Zero." I'm no expert in roads, but can anyone explain how that shared middle lane is not the recipe for disaster?
- wwosik 12y ago
  It's not shared I believe. It's like 1km where northbound traffic has two lanes, and then 1 km where it has just one lane and southbound has 2 lanes. Not Sweden, but you can see an example here: https://www.google.pl/maps/place/Zyrard%C3%B3w/@52.0700711,20.3753902,3a,75y,103.21h,90.64t/data=!3m4!1e1!3m2!1swjjVN9BvNLxEcEbuh6Iegg!2e0!4m2!3m1!1s0x471944c794a8145b:0x81ced2f5df4d3278?hl=pl https://www.google.pl/maps/place/Zyrard%C3%B3w/@52.0700711,2...
  - thomasahle 12y ago
    Ah that makes sense. I have seen those roads before. However I've also heard that in crowded situations it's actually faster for everyone to have just two separated lanes (no overtaking). Because the constant lane merging slows everybody down.
    - dalke 12y ago
      Quoting from the "2+1 road" Wikipedia entry: "It turned out that not only did safety improve, but it was also easier to overtake than before as the 2-lane sections provide safe overtaking opportunities." "After some good experiences with test roads the system has been used often in places where the amount of traffic does not justify construction of a dual carriageway expressway but remote rural areas should be connected to major towns with a high speed road."
      - thrownaway2424 12y ago
        My experience with this type of road in america is that slow people go slow when they have one lane and then they speed up when their direction has two lanes, making it harder to overtake them in the designated section. This is infuriating, of course. In America drivers aware not trained in throttle control, speed control, or lane discipline so their behavior in these situations is usually a combination of the worst possibilities.
netcan 12y ago
George Orwell: .. Accidents happen because on narrow, inadequate roads, full of blind corners and surrounded by dwelling houses, vehicles and pedestrians are moving in all directions at all speeds from three miles an hour to sixty or seventy. If you really want to keep death off the roads, you would have to replan the whole road system in such a way as to make collisions impossible. Think out what this means (it would involve, for example, pulling down and rebuilding the whole of London), and you can see that it is guite beyond the power of any nation at this moment. Short of that you can only take palliative measures, which ultimately boil down to making people more careful. But the only palliative measure that would make a real difference is a drastic reduction in speed. Cut down the speed limit to twelve miles an hour in all built-up areas, and you would cut out the vast majority of accidents. But this, everyone will assure you, is ‘impossible’. Why is it impossible? Well, it would be unbearably irksome. It would mean that every road journey took twice or three times as long as it takes at present. .. http://orwell.ru/library/articles/As_I_Please/english/eaip_04 http://orwell.ru/library/articles/As_I_Please/english/eaip_0...
- emodendroket 12y ago
  I get the point, but that's not entirely true; improvements in car design have also reduced fatalities in ways other than forcing people to slow down.
  - netcan 12y ago
    At the time he was writing, cars dominating traffic was relatively new. He was talking about the next year, not the next hundred years. The greater purpose of the article is (IMO) to point out bullshitting, "our unwillingness to face facts and our consequent readiness to make gestures which are known in advance to be useless." People talk about reducing road deaths. One life when it is a specific person is supposedly worth any cost but in practice we agree to a system that strikes a balance between death and convenience. All sorts of things are possible at a cost, but we often BS because we don't want the cost and we also don't want to know that we weren't willing to pay it.
    - 12y ago
dschiptsov 12y ago
* Sparse, mostly rural population (with an unique culture). * "2+1" roads, which discourages meaningless overtaking or competing. (But I don't buy it as the single cause). * Roundabouts instead of crossroads with traffic lights. (My bet this is one of the most important factors). * Special reserved lane for doing left turns to secondary roads. * Lots of street lamps (Sweden is famous for illumination and urban development). * High percentage of expensive, very good quality cars (lots of Volvos) which kept well-maintained. * 40 km/h speed limit in most small towns. Together it works. Basically a complex phenomena is a weighted sum of multiple different causes - cultural (tradition), economical, social (current "normals"), technological, etc. with "random variables". Such simple model could explain it to some extent. I am in Sweden now, and I drive a classic Volvo.
- pkaye 12y ago
  Regarding roundabouts I personally find them confusing since they are not common where I live but I wonder if the main benefit of a roundabout it that the curve forces people to slow down instead of gunning through a yellow/red light.
  - dschiptsov 12y ago
    It also has a dead-simple rule - one should give way to everyone who is already on it.
    - rikkus 12y ago
      In France, "almost all roundabouts give priority to the vehicles on the roundabout". That's quite terrifying when you get to one where they don't!
    - vacri 12y ago
      You're also guaranteed that all traffic to watch for is coming from one side only - you don't have to watch for cross-traffic in both directions, nor people coming from the opposite direction who are turning.
    - 12y ago
bluedino 12y ago
Whenever I see a non-highway fatality here in the US, it falls under a few categories: * head-on because someone crossed the center line on a 2-way, 40-55mph road, and they are usually going well over the speed limit * one of the cars was running the light at a 4-way intersection * someone pulled out into traffic into a 40-55mph road and was hit
- rogerbinns 12y ago
  You haven't included people who aren't in cars being fatalities. For example there have been two deaths of cyclists in the last week here due to hit and run. The cycle lanes where they exist are a joke.
  - Chronic30 12y ago
    Sounds like a city problem.
    - spdustin 12y ago
      It's a problem in my far-off Chicago suburb, too. Distracted driving is a major problem - I wonder if it's the same in other countries?
psp 12y ago
Hah few you say, what about Cliff Burton!
finid 12y ago
In which city in the US of A do you see bike lanes like that in the article? In my neck of the woods, riding a bike is a disaster waiting to happen.
- mpapi 12y ago
  They're not exactly common in the Boston area, but they're here, and new ones are getting added (mainly in Cambridge, as far as I can tell). At least one even has separate traffic lights that turn green for bikes a few seconds early. FWIW I tend to stick to the roads anyway, though, because the segregated bike lanes often have pedestrians and runners in them regardless, and the paths often get cracked from tree roots and whatnot. Most drivers don't seem to care if I'm not on the dedicated path, so long as I'm hauling and not riding crazy.
- akgerber 12y ago
  New York added an incomplete network of 'protected bike lanes', as they're called, a few years ago that we are working to expand. Chicago has likewise started building them, and after that they've been filtering down to places like Pittsburgh and Austin.
pash 12y ago
The article ignores the single biggest reason Americans are likelier than Swedes to die on the roads, which is simply that Americans drive more. The death rate is nearly four times higher per capita in the United States, but only twice as high per mile driven [0]. (In fact, in America, the last few decades' worth of safety improvements to cars have been almost entirely offset by an increase in miles driven; despite their much safer cars, Americans are only slightly less likely to die driving today than they were in 1990 [1].) The bigger mystery is why Americans are now far likelier to die in their cars than Europeans even after you control for the time they spend in them. That didn't use to be the case. Until the mid-1990s, Sweden (like almost every other country [2]) had a higher rate of traffic fatalities per mile driven than did the United States. Those rates have declined markedly all around the world, but much less in the United States than elsewhere. My guess is that the divergence comes down to diverging patterns of living. Over the last few decades, American cities have sprawled all over the landscape, so Americans not only drive more, but their road infrastructure is built to facilitate daily travel at high speeds over long distances. A great many Americans drive 30+ highway miles each day between their suburban homes and city offices, but that sort of commute is rare elsewhere. 0. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-related_death_rate http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-re... 1. http://www.planetizen.com/node/68200 http://www.planetizen.com/node/68200 2. See, e.g., statistics showing that fatalities per vehicle mile were lower in the United State than in many European countries in 1991, https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/ohim/hs93/Sec7.pdf https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/ohim/hs93/Sec7.pdf [PDF; see page 4]
- hobbes78 12y ago
  Europeans and americans may have diverging patterns of living, but sleeping in suburban areas and working in city centres isn't one of those patterns, as it's becoming the norm everywhere...
  - flexie 12y ago
    Few or no European suburbs are as vast as your American suburbs (think Houston, Atlanta or the Bay area). In my home country (Denmark) young families now tend to stay in city centers rather than moving to suburbs so the trend is reverse. Also, European cities generally have much better public transportation such as really decent busses, trolley busses, light rails, subways, trains, and trams. Finally, I suspect a mile driven by 30-60 year olds are generally safer than a mile driven by teenagers. Europe has older population and few teenage drivers.
mytochar 12y ago
I found this part particularly interesting, for strange reasons: "now less than 0.25% of drivers tested are over the alcohol limit" Why are they testing those other 399 people (0.25% = 1 in 400)? Driving while drowsy? drunk driving checkpoints? Someone's a little swervy and gets noticed?
- MetallicCloud 12y ago
  I don't know the answer there, but in Australia I regularly get breath tested for drink driving at 'drunk driving checkpoints'. The basically just stop and test as much traffic as they can. Othertimes they will just randomly pull me over and test me.
- bberrry 12y ago
  The police sometimes do random sobriety checkpoints.
  - spdustin 12y ago
    At least in Illinois, they're euphemistically called "road-side safety inspections". I had a limo driver once get caught not wearing his seatbelt by a spotter at the beginning of a backup leading into one. The car was radioed in and, even though he put on his seat belt while in line (in his mind, well before any officer could see he wasn't wearing one), he received a citation when we finally made it to the actual inspection point. I never even noticed he wasn't wearing one. On the rare occasion I have a driver who doesn't use it, I tell them that story.
- ptaipale 12y ago
  In Sweden, like much of Europe, the police can (and routinely does) stop everybody for a breathalyzer test. I understand that in the US the police can't do that; they need some reason (like swervy driving) to apply a breathalyzer test.
  - serge2k 12y ago
    random stops or roadblocks? Canada (BC at least) does roadblocks.
protomyth 12y ago
I've seen 2+1 in Minnesota (cannot remember which road, but it is a highway off I90 and headed to the cities). In SD and ND, I've seen the added lane for slow traffic to move to so the normal traffic can pass. Same effect, but probably an acknowledgement of the number of slow vehicles found on rural highways (e.g. combines, tractors, heavily loaded grain trucks).
xasos 12y ago
>Planning has played the biggest part in reducing accidents. Roads in Sweden are built with safety prioritised over speed or convenience. Low urban speed-limits, pedestrian zones and barriers that separate cars from bikes and oncoming traffic have helped. This is big. Cities in Sweden have the ability to cater much faster to bikers because biking is a much more prevalent way of trasport than in the United States. In fact, that is one of the larger causes for deaths in cities like San Francisco. [1] [1] http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Streets-of-S-F-a-road-hazard-as-pedestrian-5205143.php http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Streets-of-S-F-a-road-...
tomohawk 12y ago
I'm acquainted with a civil engineer who worked in the FHWA for several decades. He spent a big chunk of that time trying to convince government agencies to build roads with pavement that had a better coefficient of friction. See for example http://safety.fhwa.dot.gov/roadway_dept/pavement/pavement_friction/ http://safety.fhwa.dot.gov/roadway_dept/pavement/pavement_fr... He estimated that they could reduce deaths considerably with more appropriate pavement. In many cases, states refused to even allow pavement friction tests to occur, as they didn't want to be on the hook for paying for improvements if the tests showed poor friction. Also, requiring better friction would disallow certain road materials, which would adversely affect certain very large politically connected contractors. In Europe, they take this much more seriously. The Germans have started using a concrete pavement that is both better for friction and is quiet. It's interesting that if a government builds a substandard road that leads to people losing their lives, it doesn't seem to be a big deal, but if a car manufacturer produces a car that leads to a much smaller number of people dying, then it is.
- jacquesm 12y ago
  In NL we use this: http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zeer_Open_Asfalt http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zeer_Open_Asfalt It's super good if you have lots of rain (the rain sinks right away under the road surface) but it is prone to frost damage. Super quiet and great in the rain though, the difference is incredible when you switch from ZOAB to regular asphalt or the other way around.
  - ominous_prime 12y ago
    I remember tests of a similar asphalt near me in the NE US. In the spring we had black banks of it all along the road, where it was scraped off by snowplows over the winter. What's left was packed with sand.
- seanp2k2 12y ago
  Interesting; I've always wondered about how different road surfaces affect grip, and how that affects accidents. It'd be interesting to see a study on traffic accidents on similarly-trafficked roads with similar speed limits where the surface is different. It's also interesting but sad that many people don't even care enough to learn + practice super basic car maintenance as it pertains to safety equipment. I wonder how many accidents would prevented if everyone fixed their tyre inflation (there is a label on the driver's-side door frame, usually by where your butt or foot passes when stepping into the vehicle) and ensured they had well-performing brakes (a small mirror usually lets you see how much brake pad you have left, assuming you have 4-wheel disc, though the fronts are more important anyway). Smog-testing is a thing, maybe we should have brake distance testing as well?
ptaipale 12y ago
Regarding "Vision Zero": I find it unrealistic, for the simple reason that you can't stop people from dying. I think Sweden must share the same way of counting as my country (Finland) where the traffic death statistics include suicides and "natural" deaths. We have around 250 road deaths per year in a country of 5 million, and about 50 of these are suicides. This means that practically every week there's someone who kills him/herself by an intentional act in traffic. For instance, a couple of months back a mother killed herself and her three children by driving 100 km/h head-on at a bus where his husband was travelling. This was just an act of defiance, desperation and hate. When suicides count for about one fifth of traffic deaths, it is not insignificant and leaves the number of traffic deaths well above zero. Also, natural deaths - people dying of a heart attack or a stroke while driving - account for a significant part of the statistics (somewhere around 10-15 %). They're counted as traffic deaths even in cases where no one else is hurt and even the vehicle is unscathed.
- akgerber 12y ago
  It's a statement of engineering priorities, not an literal goal. This is in contrast to the United States, where only very recently has anything other than maximum automotive throughput been prioritized.
  - spdustin 12y ago
    I wouldn't say that throughput is the priority. The typical speed limits on interstates were optimal for fuel efficiency. Convenience highways are revenue generating through the use of automatic toll collection, but in my experience, only have higher speed limits when they have more limited access (read: fewer exits/on-ramps).
kazinator 12y ago
National mentality has to do with it. For instance, you see a night-and-day difference in driver behavior when you cross the border from, say, Switzerland to Italy. Why poor countries have lots of deadly car accidents probably has something to do with corruption, in part. People won't respect order, such as traffic codes, when their government isn't respectable. If I imagine I'm a citizen of a poor country, why would I stop at a red light if my president gave a contract to some foreign company in exchange for bribes. If he can do as he pleases, so can I. There is also driver licensing. Here in the provinces of Canada, for instance, if you have a measurable pulse and/or your breath can fog a cold mirror, you can get a driver's license. I can't imagine that the same is true in Sweden. A learner's permit can be obtained by passing a written test. After that, a very brief and easy road test results in a driver's license. No formal schooling is required; a friend or relative can teach you, for instance. Furthermore, driver's license renewals do not require any testing. I got my driver's license in 1987. Since, then, I have renewed it every five years simply by paying the fee, signing a paper, and having my picture taken. I've never been required to take any additional training or testing. Imagine if it was like that for, say, commercial airline pilots.
_almosnow 12y ago
>Building 1,500 kilometres (900 miles) of "2+1" roads—where each lane of traffic takes turns to use a middle lane for overtaking—is reckoned to have saved around 145 lives over the first decade of Vision Zero. Basically translates to: "this substantial increase on costs (3 lanes instead of 2, +50%) is going to save the lives of 15 people per year". It is really praiseworthy for a country to just go for it and put people first. A human life is truly invaluable but very few countries actually account for them as such; on most other countries "15 dead" would simply just not be worth the investment.
- alkonaut 12y ago
  Conversion to 2+1 isn't very expensive as the starting point is a 1.5+1.5 road without dividing fences, where overtaking takes place at least partly in the incoming lane. There is normally no need to widen the road to convert to 2+1. The lanes in the 2+1 is just narrower and it has less shoulder.
alkonaut 12y ago
Don't forget mandatory practical training in driving in wet/icy conditions as well as mandatory winter tires in such conditions. This probably causes some deaths in countries where such conditions occur less frequently. On the other hand, several months of snow/ice is likely adding to Swedens death toll. Training looks like this: https://youtube.com/watch?v=6AJ1J5wVpMY https://youtube.com/watch?v=6AJ1J5wVpMY
Apofis 12y ago
I certainly know why Dominican Republic has such high death rates on the road. The people that drive there are freakin' insane. They have no regard for road rules, traffic signs, pedestrians... Driving in Santo Domingo is like driving in the demolition derby. It was absolutely terrifying.

110 points by sethbannon 12y ago

The US saw a huge advertising effort trying to convince people that pedestrian fatalities were not an issue with either cars or drivers. Realistically, while it costs more and be less convenient for drivers a better separation between cars and people is going to save plenty of lives. However, only 14% of traffic fatalities ~(4,743/year) are pedestrains in the US. ed:(+ 726 bike/year) So there is a limit to how far that can take you. http://www.pedbikeinfo.org/data/factsheet_crash.cfm http://www.pedbikeinfo.org/data/factsheet_crash.cfm

01Michael10 12y ago

Roads like the ones in Sweden will never be common place in the US. We value speed, convenience, and cheap over a "couple" of dead people.

bmj 12y ago
I think this is part of it, but there are also issues of infrastructure as well. Many aging eastern cities, with their challenging (read: hilly) topography, make it prohibitively expensive to radically redesign roads.[0] Additionally, I think it would be "federalize" such efforts, as it would be easier gradually redesign roads in a city, or even a part of a city, rather than attempt to broadly dictate policy for the entire country. [0] That said, it is possible to make the streets safer, even when geography and economics are obstacles. My own town has been doing this, though often it is piecemeal.
- Spooky23 12y ago
  Great point. It's made more complex by artifacts of state law and home rule for political subdivisions. For example, in New York, state and US highways (ie. State Route 5, US Route 20) are maintained by the State DOT -- unless you're in a "city". Areas that are organized as towns (think Hempstead, NY on Long Island with 300k+ people) get state services, areas organized as cities (Albany, NY with 90k people) typically do a lousy job at it. The Federal government has been able to update things like street signals, etc. But fundamental things like road conceptual design, breaking out bike lanes, etc are going to be very difficult issues to handle without local control. There are more people in NYC than Sweden, so the size and scope of the problem in the US is several orders of magnitude more complex.
- nawitus 12y ago
  Hilly topography doesn't really make it prohibitively expensive to make 2+1 roads, or at least they're relatively common in Finland. (Although 2+1 roads are rarely separated by fence here). Even hilly roads tend to have straight sections that can serve as the 2+1 area.
codeflo 12y ago
To state my European prejudices, you also seem to value being allowed to drive without proper training, and driving around in bulky vehicles that are basically designed to use the other car as their crumple zone. Those two things are possibly related.
- hueving 12y ago
  Well it sounds like they are pretty baseless prejudices. You must pass a skills test, even if not as rigorous as some countries. Additionally, the idea that the other car is the crumple zone was valid maybe 50 years ago. Safety tests are conducted by smashing cars into walls that don't crumple. Everyone I know who has been in a crash hasn't been due to improper training, it been because of ignoring rules that they knew very well (speeding, texting and driving, etc). I don't know anyone that has crashed because they didn't know how a stop sign worked.
  - jbrooksuk 12y ago
    > Everyone I know who has been in a crash hasn't been due to improper training, it been because of ignoring rules that they knew very well (speeding, texting and driving, etc) How can anybody not know that texting and driving is a bad idea? That's just stupid.
    - bkmartin 12y ago
      But people do stupid things every day. Smoking is stupid, binge drinking is stupid, not wearing your seat belt is stupid... all have consequences. The point still remains, it is a choice people make to not follow the rules that causes most of the problems. Now, how do we get people to follow the rules better?
    - bkmartin 12y ago
      But people do stupid things every day. Smoking is stupid, binge drinking is stupid, not wearing your seat belt is stupid... all have consequences. The point still remains, it is a choice people make to not follow the rules that causes most of the problems. Now, how do we get people to follow the rules better?
Tuna-Fish 12y ago
Some of the designs are advantageous even for speed and convenience. Modern roundabouts reduce intersection fatalities by 90% and increase throughput in most traffic conditions. They were much maligned as complicated and hard to understand when they started being built in the USA, but the rate of their construction is going up and eventually they will probably be as common in the USA as they are in Europe.
matwood 12y ago
Parts of Highway 17 in South Carolina were recently upgraded to exactly this type of road. I've noticed many other highways (not Interstates) using this exact design. Admittedly, they do not always have a steel barrier. Traffic circles are another thing going in all around where I currently live. Unfortunately many people still do not know how to use them, but they are learning.
darklajid 12y ago
This is the third time I'm commenting on the same issue in this thread. Speed? What's the limit? What are you actually driving, if you're ignoring the limit? Because Sweden allows 110-120km/h and other places in Europe might even allow more (France w/ 130km/h, and .. I'm from Germany). You are NOT going fast in the US. You might drive a lot. You might commute more than anyone else. I don't know about these things. But fast? I don't buy it.
- lttlrck 12y ago
  Around Boston for my 15 mile commute on the Interstate the fast lane is nominally at 110-120km/h. No it's not as fast as the autobahn but it's on a par with Europe and far from slow. (I'm British, lived in Germany for 10 years, US for 5 years)
  - emp_zealoth 12y ago
    I'm sorry, 110-120 in the fast lane isn't "on par with Europe". If you look at Germany, 270 is more like it... If you look at Austria/Italy, the fast lane rarely ever goes as low as the speed limit and going as fast as 145 kph usually meant we had to go out of the lane to let others through. Whoever is driving 110kph on an European highway is more or less a deadly road hazard. At such low speed it is nearly impossible to overtake lorries without having somebody nearly ram you from the back and it is guaranteed to cause a massive pileup of angry cars behind. Source - I've been traveling Europe both on motorbike and by car

arethuza 12y ago

Even when you look at deaths per billion vehicle-km the US still seems to be quite bad at 7.6, with the UK at 4.3 and Sweden at 3.7: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-related_death_rate http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-re...

emodendroket 12y ago
"Safer than Japan" sounds like a good pitch.

kristofferR 12y ago

In addition to the road quality I would say the driver's ed is also a big factor. Getting a license in Sweden is much tougher than most other places, especially the US.

Svip 12y ago
I should point out, that EU has standardised driving licence education. So despite Denmark having almost no tunnels (no mountains to speak of), we still have to learn about tunnel driving. And that's good. These tests also include driving at a facility. However, the EU requirements are minimum requirements, countries are allowed to make the requirements tougher, such as Finland (which I think requires at least 3 days at a facility).
- sampo 12y ago
  What does 'driving at a facility' mean?
  - Svip 12y ago
    A driving facility, where you experience driving through water, surfaces with low friction, as well as attempting avoiding obstacles, rescuing skidding (both front and back end) out and so forth.
    - kiiski 12y ago
      So I suppose in Finland these would be driving on ice x2, and the night driving simulator (at least in my case). Are you sure that tunnels are a part of the standard? I didn't need to do that ~5 years ago. Is the education split into three seperate parts in all EU countries (first gives a temporary license, and there must be a few months before the others (to get real world driving experience), but all must be done withing 2 years)? When I got my license, the education cost about 2500 euros (I think it's higher now). Is that about the same as elsewhere in the EU?
      - 12y ago

happyscrappy 12y ago

From the comments: "Sweden has 264 road deaths for 9.5 million people. Britain has 1730 for 62 million people. The deaths rates, at 28 per million people, are virtually identical in both countries and way below every other European country. Britain though, has impossibly crowded narrow roads laid down hundreds of years ago, full of bends and hazards large urban conurbations with lots of people, including pedestrians, using the roads at the same time, and almost no new roads designed for safety or anything else. Yet Britain has no more per capita road deaths than Sweden. Perhaps the Swedes have technical solutions in road planning, design and all sorts of legal restrictions on drivers to aid road safety. Perhaps the British are just more considerate and more aware, that, as their roads are much more hazardous, they have to take a lot more care when driving." Very surprising that Britain has done that well.

Retric 12y ago
Britain discurages driving, sweden makes roads safer. There both going to reduce fatalities, but britain ed:(approach) can't really make much progress without removing cars from the road where Sweden can make things safer and still use cars.
- arethuza 12y ago
  "britain can't really make much progress" Yes it can - the roads here (as in most countries) are constantly being upgraded to improve capacity and safety. e.g. The dualling of the A9 (the main route to the North of Scotland) will hopefully make a huge difference to this notoriously dangerous road: http://www.transportscotland.gov.uk/project/a9-dualling-perth-inverness http://www.transportscotland.gov.uk/project/a9-dualling-pert... [NB At the moment the A9 switches from single lanes in either direction to dual carriageway and back again numerous times - people get mixed up as to whether they are on a single or dual carriageway with unfortunate results]. I'm sure there are examples throughout the UK of this kind of thing happening.
  - Retric 12y ago
    Granted, I did not mean to say Britain is not using the full set of tool to reduce road fatalities (Road Design, Signage, Licensing, Enforcement, etc.). Just that discouraging driving especially around London significantly reduces their fatalities, but it’s not really scalable.

ErikHuisman 12y ago

Whenever I'm in Sweden i just drive one road. The E4. I bet the asphalt per capita is probably pretty low compared to any other country. But still the quality of the roads don't compare to Denmark or the Netherlands for example which feel even more thought out and structured.

rab_oof 12y ago
As an aside, the bicycle roads in the Netherlands are extremely well-organized. The U.S. and other countries should borrow this format for inter- and intracity cycling. Most U.S. bicycle paths are like road signs in rural Germany: few and far between or hidden behind an overgrown hedge.

pc86 12y ago

Can someone with knowledge or experience on the subject explain how the "2+1"[0] road is better than a standard 3-lane highway? [0] FTA "Building 1,500 kilometres (900 miles) of "2+1" roads—where each lane of traffic takes turns to use a middle lane for overtaking—is reckoned to have saved around 145 lives over the first decade of Vision Zero"

rdl 12y ago
I think it is an improvement vs existing 2 lane roads. It wouldn't have cost anything to convert a 3 lane roads to 2+1.
Svip 12y ago
I don't know what a 'standard 3-lane highway' is. But a 2+1 highway means one lane in each direction, as well as a middle lane that changes direction at certain points. The advantage of these is that rather than forcing drivers to overtake into opposing traffic, they can wait until their direction gets the overtaking lane. These sort of roads are very common in Denmark. And I've seen a few of them in Germany as well. (This is not to be confused with 2+1 highways where the middle lane change direction depending on the time of day, these have been phased out. There are usually clear markings on 2+1 highways when the direction change.)
- DanBC 12y ago
  A three lane highway is similar to a UK motorway. A road has six lanes, three (plus an emergency "hard shoulder") for each direction seperated by a central crash barrier.
  - pc86 12y ago
    Yes that is what I meant, thank you for clarifying. My US-centric viewpoint came through more than I expected!
johnbatch 12y ago
The Wikipeda article is quite good. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2%2B1_road#Sweden https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2%2B1_road#Sweden all the 2+1 roads in Sweden have barriers.

ZachS 12y ago

I'm not convinced the added safety is worth it. If you had the choice between getting to your destination in 20 minutes, with a 11.4 in 100,000 chance of dying, or arriving in 25 minutes with a 3 in 100,000 chance, which would you choose?

ronjouch 12y ago
Would you say that again while considering your spouse is a travelling salesman? It's not about one-time trips, it's about the aggregated death toll over years or decades.
- ZachS 12y ago
  Yes, absolutely. My comment was actually incorrect, since it's 11.4 in 100,000 per year. I think I'd want my spouse to spend 1/5th less time driving for the increase in risk.
  - quesera 12y ago
    5 minutes is that valuable to you?
teh 12y ago
The article mentions safety for other road participants. One issue is that going fast often doesn't kill the driver due to modern car safety, but some unsuspecting other road user. In other words the drivers aren't carrying the risk so they are not the right people to ask whether this is a good trade-off.
revelation 12y ago
You do realize that a large chunk of road deaths are pedestrians, people that explicitly did not choose to use a car and insted walk to their destination, and that are overwhelmingly killed by people that did choose a car? I sure hope you do not drive if that is your attitude to safety.
glesica 12y ago
25 minutes. Actually, no, I would just take the bus and arrive in 30 minutes, but having had spent the time doing something enjoyable rather than driving. :)

thomasahle 12y ago

"Building 1,500 kilometres (900 miles) of "2+1" roads—where each lane of traffic takes turns to use a middle lane for overtaking—is reckoned to have saved around 145 lives over the first decade of Vision Zero." I'm no expert in roads, but can anyone explain how that shared middle lane is not the recipe for disaster?

wwosik 12y ago
It's not shared I believe. It's like 1km where northbound traffic has two lanes, and then 1 km where it has just one lane and southbound has 2 lanes. Not Sweden, but you can see an example here: https://www.google.pl/maps/place/Zyrard%C3%B3w/@52.0700711,20.3753902,3a,75y,103.21h,90.64t/data=!3m4!1e1!3m2!1swjjVN9BvNLxEcEbuh6Iegg!2e0!4m2!3m1!1s0x471944c794a8145b:0x81ced2f5df4d3278?hl=pl https://www.google.pl/maps/place/Zyrard%C3%B3w/@52.0700711,2...
- thomasahle 12y ago
  Ah that makes sense. I have seen those roads before. However I've also heard that in crowded situations it's actually faster for everyone to have just two separated lanes (no overtaking). Because the constant lane merging slows everybody down.
  - dalke 12y ago
    Quoting from the "2+1 road" Wikipedia entry: "It turned out that not only did safety improve, but it was also easier to overtake than before as the 2-lane sections provide safe overtaking opportunities." "After some good experiences with test roads the system has been used often in places where the amount of traffic does not justify construction of a dual carriageway expressway but remote rural areas should be connected to major towns with a high speed road."
    - thrownaway2424 12y ago
      My experience with this type of road in america is that slow people go slow when they have one lane and then they speed up when their direction has two lanes, making it harder to overtake them in the designated section. This is infuriating, of course. In America drivers aware not trained in throttle control, speed control, or lane discipline so their behavior in these situations is usually a combination of the worst possibilities.

netcan 12y ago

George Orwell: .. Accidents happen because on narrow, inadequate roads, full of blind corners and surrounded by dwelling houses, vehicles and pedestrians are moving in all directions at all speeds from three miles an hour to sixty or seventy. If you really want to keep death off the roads, you would have to replan the whole road system in such a way as to make collisions impossible. Think out what this means (it would involve, for example, pulling down and rebuilding the whole of London), and you can see that it is guite beyond the power of any nation at this moment. Short of that you can only take palliative measures, which ultimately boil down to making people more careful. But the only palliative measure that would make a real difference is a drastic reduction in speed. Cut down the speed limit to twelve miles an hour in all built-up areas, and you would cut out the vast majority of accidents. But this, everyone will assure you, is ‘impossible’. Why is it impossible? Well, it would be unbearably irksome. It would mean that every road journey took twice or three times as long as it takes at present. .. http://orwell.ru/library/articles/As_I_Please/english/eaip_04 http://orwell.ru/library/articles/As_I_Please/english/eaip_0...

emodendroket 12y ago
I get the point, but that's not entirely true; improvements in car design have also reduced fatalities in ways other than forcing people to slow down.
- netcan 12y ago
  At the time he was writing, cars dominating traffic was relatively new. He was talking about the next year, not the next hundred years. The greater purpose of the article is (IMO) to point out bullshitting, "our unwillingness to face facts and our consequent readiness to make gestures which are known in advance to be useless." People talk about reducing road deaths. One life when it is a specific person is supposedly worth any cost but in practice we agree to a system that strikes a balance between death and convenience. All sorts of things are possible at a cost, but we often BS because we don't want the cost and we also don't want to know that we weren't willing to pay it.
  - 12y ago

dschiptsov 12y ago

* Sparse, mostly rural population (with an unique culture). * "2+1" roads, which discourages meaningless overtaking or competing. (But I don't buy it as the single cause). * Roundabouts instead of crossroads with traffic lights. (My bet this is one of the most important factors). * Special reserved lane for doing left turns to secondary roads. * Lots of street lamps (Sweden is famous for illumination and urban development). * High percentage of expensive, very good quality cars (lots of Volvos) which kept well-maintained. * 40 km/h speed limit in most small towns. Together it works. Basically a complex phenomena is a weighted sum of multiple different causes - cultural (tradition), economical, social (current "normals"), technological, etc. with "random variables". Such simple model could explain it to some extent. I am in Sweden now, and I drive a classic Volvo.

pkaye 12y ago
Regarding roundabouts I personally find them confusing since they are not common where I live but I wonder if the main benefit of a roundabout it that the curve forces people to slow down instead of gunning through a yellow/red light.
- dschiptsov 12y ago
  It also has a dead-simple rule - one should give way to everyone who is already on it.
  - rikkus 12y ago
    In France, "almost all roundabouts give priority to the vehicles on the roundabout". That's quite terrifying when you get to one where they don't!
  - vacri 12y ago
    You're also guaranteed that all traffic to watch for is coming from one side only - you don't have to watch for cross-traffic in both directions, nor people coming from the opposite direction who are turning.
  - 12y ago

bluedino 12y ago

Whenever I see a non-highway fatality here in the US, it falls under a few categories: * head-on because someone crossed the center line on a 2-way, 40-55mph road, and they are usually going well over the speed limit * one of the cars was running the light at a 4-way intersection * someone pulled out into traffic into a 40-55mph road and was hit

rogerbinns 12y ago
You haven't included people who aren't in cars being fatalities. For example there have been two deaths of cyclists in the last week here due to hit and run. The cycle lanes where they exist are a joke.
- Chronic30 12y ago
  Sounds like a city problem.
  - spdustin 12y ago
    It's a problem in my far-off Chicago suburb, too. Distracted driving is a major problem - I wonder if it's the same in other countries?

psp 12y ago

Hah few you say, what about Cliff Burton!

finid 12y ago

In which city in the US of A do you see bike lanes like that in the article? In my neck of the woods, riding a bike is a disaster waiting to happen.

mpapi 12y ago
They're not exactly common in the Boston area, but they're here, and new ones are getting added (mainly in Cambridge, as far as I can tell). At least one even has separate traffic lights that turn green for bikes a few seconds early. FWIW I tend to stick to the roads anyway, though, because the segregated bike lanes often have pedestrians and runners in them regardless, and the paths often get cracked from tree roots and whatnot. Most drivers don't seem to care if I'm not on the dedicated path, so long as I'm hauling and not riding crazy.
akgerber 12y ago
New York added an incomplete network of 'protected bike lanes', as they're called, a few years ago that we are working to expand. Chicago has likewise started building them, and after that they've been filtering down to places like Pittsburgh and Austin.

pash 12y ago

The article ignores the single biggest reason Americans are likelier than Swedes to die on the roads, which is simply that Americans drive more. The death rate is nearly four times higher per capita in the United States, but only twice as high per mile driven [0]. (In fact, in America, the last few decades' worth of safety improvements to cars have been almost entirely offset by an increase in miles driven; despite their much safer cars, Americans are only slightly less likely to die driving today than they were in 1990 [1].) The bigger mystery is why Americans are now far likelier to die in their cars than Europeans even after you control for the time they spend in them. That didn't use to be the case. Until the mid-1990s, Sweden (like almost every other country [2]) had a higher rate of traffic fatalities per mile driven than did the United States. Those rates have declined markedly all around the world, but much less in the United States than elsewhere. My guess is that the divergence comes down to diverging patterns of living. Over the last few decades, American cities have sprawled all over the landscape, so Americans not only drive more, but their road infrastructure is built to facilitate daily travel at high speeds over long distances. A great many Americans drive 30+ highway miles each day between their suburban homes and city offices, but that sort of commute is rare elsewhere. 0. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-related_death_rate http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-re... 1. http://www.planetizen.com/node/68200 http://www.planetizen.com/node/68200 2. See, e.g., statistics showing that fatalities per vehicle mile were lower in the United State than in many European countries in 1991, https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/ohim/hs93/Sec7.pdf https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/ohim/hs93/Sec7.pdf [PDF; see page 4]

hobbes78 12y ago
Europeans and americans may have diverging patterns of living, but sleeping in suburban areas and working in city centres isn't one of those patterns, as it's becoming the norm everywhere...
- flexie 12y ago
  Few or no European suburbs are as vast as your American suburbs (think Houston, Atlanta or the Bay area). In my home country (Denmark) young families now tend to stay in city centers rather than moving to suburbs so the trend is reverse. Also, European cities generally have much better public transportation such as really decent busses, trolley busses, light rails, subways, trains, and trams. Finally, I suspect a mile driven by 30-60 year olds are generally safer than a mile driven by teenagers. Europe has older population and few teenage drivers.

mytochar 12y ago

I found this part particularly interesting, for strange reasons: "now less than 0.25% of drivers tested are over the alcohol limit" Why are they testing those other 399 people (0.25% = 1 in 400)? Driving while drowsy? drunk driving checkpoints? Someone's a little swervy and gets noticed?

MetallicCloud 12y ago
I don't know the answer there, but in Australia I regularly get breath tested for drink driving at 'drunk driving checkpoints'. The basically just stop and test as much traffic as they can. Othertimes they will just randomly pull me over and test me.
bberrry 12y ago
The police sometimes do random sobriety checkpoints.
- spdustin 12y ago
  At least in Illinois, they're euphemistically called "road-side safety inspections". I had a limo driver once get caught not wearing his seatbelt by a spotter at the beginning of a backup leading into one. The car was radioed in and, even though he put on his seat belt while in line (in his mind, well before any officer could see he wasn't wearing one), he received a citation when we finally made it to the actual inspection point. I never even noticed he wasn't wearing one. On the rare occasion I have a driver who doesn't use it, I tell them that story.
ptaipale 12y ago
In Sweden, like much of Europe, the police can (and routinely does) stop everybody for a breathalyzer test. I understand that in the US the police can't do that; they need some reason (like swervy driving) to apply a breathalyzer test.
- serge2k 12y ago
  random stops or roadblocks? Canada (BC at least) does roadblocks.

protomyth 12y ago

I've seen 2+1 in Minnesota (cannot remember which road, but it is a highway off I90 and headed to the cities). In SD and ND, I've seen the added lane for slow traffic to move to so the normal traffic can pass. Same effect, but probably an acknowledgement of the number of slow vehicles found on rural highways (e.g. combines, tractors, heavily loaded grain trucks).

xasos 12y ago

>Planning has played the biggest part in reducing accidents. Roads in Sweden are built with safety prioritised over speed or convenience. Low urban speed-limits, pedestrian zones and barriers that separate cars from bikes and oncoming traffic have helped. This is big. Cities in Sweden have the ability to cater much faster to bikers because biking is a much more prevalent way of trasport than in the United States. In fact, that is one of the larger causes for deaths in cities like San Francisco. [1] [1] http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Streets-of-S-F-a-road-hazard-as-pedestrian-5205143.php http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Streets-of-S-F-a-road-...

tomohawk 12y ago

I'm acquainted with a civil engineer who worked in the FHWA for several decades. He spent a big chunk of that time trying to convince government agencies to build roads with pavement that had a better coefficient of friction. See for example http://safety.fhwa.dot.gov/roadway_dept/pavement/pavement_friction/ http://safety.fhwa.dot.gov/roadway_dept/pavement/pavement_fr... He estimated that they could reduce deaths considerably with more appropriate pavement. In many cases, states refused to even allow pavement friction tests to occur, as they didn't want to be on the hook for paying for improvements if the tests showed poor friction. Also, requiring better friction would disallow certain road materials, which would adversely affect certain very large politically connected contractors. In Europe, they take this much more seriously. The Germans have started using a concrete pavement that is both better for friction and is quiet. It's interesting that if a government builds a substandard road that leads to people losing their lives, it doesn't seem to be a big deal, but if a car manufacturer produces a car that leads to a much smaller number of people dying, then it is.

jacquesm 12y ago
In NL we use this: http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zeer_Open_Asfalt http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zeer_Open_Asfalt It's super good if you have lots of rain (the rain sinks right away under the road surface) but it is prone to frost damage. Super quiet and great in the rain though, the difference is incredible when you switch from ZOAB to regular asphalt or the other way around.
- ominous_prime 12y ago
  I remember tests of a similar asphalt near me in the NE US. In the spring we had black banks of it all along the road, where it was scraped off by snowplows over the winter. What's left was packed with sand.
seanp2k2 12y ago
Interesting; I've always wondered about how different road surfaces affect grip, and how that affects accidents. It'd be interesting to see a study on traffic accidents on similarly-trafficked roads with similar speed limits where the surface is different. It's also interesting but sad that many people don't even care enough to learn + practice super basic car maintenance as it pertains to safety equipment. I wonder how many accidents would prevented if everyone fixed their tyre inflation (there is a label on the driver's-side door frame, usually by where your butt or foot passes when stepping into the vehicle) and ensured they had well-performing brakes (a small mirror usually lets you see how much brake pad you have left, assuming you have 4-wheel disc, though the fronts are more important anyway). Smog-testing is a thing, maybe we should have brake distance testing as well?

ptaipale 12y ago

Regarding "Vision Zero": I find it unrealistic, for the simple reason that you can't stop people from dying. I think Sweden must share the same way of counting as my country (Finland) where the traffic death statistics include suicides and "natural" deaths. We have around 250 road deaths per year in a country of 5 million, and about 50 of these are suicides. This means that practically every week there's someone who kills him/herself by an intentional act in traffic. For instance, a couple of months back a mother killed herself and her three children by driving 100 km/h head-on at a bus where his husband was travelling. This was just an act of defiance, desperation and hate. When suicides count for about one fifth of traffic deaths, it is not insignificant and leaves the number of traffic deaths well above zero. Also, natural deaths - people dying of a heart attack or a stroke while driving - account for a significant part of the statistics (somewhere around 10-15 %). They're counted as traffic deaths even in cases where no one else is hurt and even the vehicle is unscathed.

akgerber 12y ago
It's a statement of engineering priorities, not an literal goal. This is in contrast to the United States, where only very recently has anything other than maximum automotive throughput been prioritized.
- spdustin 12y ago
  I wouldn't say that throughput is the priority. The typical speed limits on interstates were optimal for fuel efficiency. Convenience highways are revenue generating through the use of automatic toll collection, but in my experience, only have higher speed limits when they have more limited access (read: fewer exits/on-ramps).

kazinator 12y ago

National mentality has to do with it. For instance, you see a night-and-day difference in driver behavior when you cross the border from, say, Switzerland to Italy. Why poor countries have lots of deadly car accidents probably has something to do with corruption, in part. People won't respect order, such as traffic codes, when their government isn't respectable. If I imagine I'm a citizen of a poor country, why would I stop at a red light if my president gave a contract to some foreign company in exchange for bribes. If he can do as he pleases, so can I. There is also driver licensing. Here in the provinces of Canada, for instance, if you have a measurable pulse and/or your breath can fog a cold mirror, you can get a driver's license. I can't imagine that the same is true in Sweden. A learner's permit can be obtained by passing a written test. After that, a very brief and easy road test results in a driver's license. No formal schooling is required; a friend or relative can teach you, for instance. Furthermore, driver's license renewals do not require any testing. I got my driver's license in 1987. Since, then, I have renewed it every five years simply by paying the fee, signing a paper, and having my picture taken. I've never been required to take any additional training or testing. Imagine if it was like that for, say, commercial airline pilots.

_almosnow 12y ago

>Building 1,500 kilometres (900 miles) of "2+1" roads—where each lane of traffic takes turns to use a middle lane for overtaking—is reckoned to have saved around 145 lives over the first decade of Vision Zero. Basically translates to: "this substantial increase on costs (3 lanes instead of 2, +50%) is going to save the lives of 15 people per year". It is really praiseworthy for a country to just go for it and put people first. A human life is truly invaluable but very few countries actually account for them as such; on most other countries "15 dead" would simply just not be worth the investment.

alkonaut 12y ago
Conversion to 2+1 isn't very expensive as the starting point is a 1.5+1.5 road without dividing fences, where overtaking takes place at least partly in the incoming lane. There is normally no need to widen the road to convert to 2+1. The lanes in the 2+1 is just narrower and it has less shoulder.

alkonaut 12y ago

Don't forget mandatory practical training in driving in wet/icy conditions as well as mandatory winter tires in such conditions. This probably causes some deaths in countries where such conditions occur less frequently. On the other hand, several months of snow/ice is likely adding to Swedens death toll. Training looks like this: https://youtube.com/watch?v=6AJ1J5wVpMY https://youtube.com/watch?v=6AJ1J5wVpMY

Apofis 12y ago

I certainly know why Dominican Republic has such high death rates on the road. The people that drive there are freakin' insane. They have no regard for road rules, traffic signs, pedestrians... Driving in Santo Domingo is like driving in the demolition derby. It was absolutely terrifying.