Cars have been made safer and drunk driving laws are more enforced then ever. But sure, “nothing will be done” whatever makes you feel self-satisfied in your weirdo anti-car cult.
“Hanging out in communities you sharply disagree with to run defense for pedestrian murder” sounds WAY more culty than “cars should not be the only possible method of getting around,” friendo. 🤷
Interestingly, the US is going in the opposite direction to everyone else with road fatalities. Since the mid 2010’s their numbers have stopped declining and increased slightly.
Not the person you commented on but, don’t know if I agree with that, I am on the side of cars are needed but they should be supplemented with better alternatives as will to dissuade their usage unless actually required for the trip(for many of the reasons this community has stated).
it’s why I joined the community because I do like the posts demonstrating why this is required, and the posts that give information about potential alternatives. That being said I’ve been on edge whether to stay as of late because I’m no longer seeing posts like that, and when I read the comments there’s so much toxicity and always someone flaming another. Sometimes it’s called for, others I do agree feel very cult like in behavior of “oh they are indicating cars might have usage? burn the witch!”
Note I’m not saying this specific instance qualifies as that, just saying what I’ve noticed in the past posts I’ve looked at.
note note: realized I skipped your emissions target part… fully agree changing the defacto tech for current day cars are a hard requirement if we want to meet goals as the current ones just aren’t cutting it
I’ve joined this instance for a reason, because I agree with it’s message. But what you’ve posted here is misleading. Cars have gotten safer over the years. Seatbelts, airbags, drive by wire, etc have all helped do that. The link you’ve posted refers to the US, which does matter in this case. Cos, globally, there has been a 5% drop in road user deaths since 2010 (and some countries have had some huge drops, over 50% isn’t super rare), partly cos of these increased safety measures. So, yeah, cars have objectively gotten safer. The US’ problem stems more from other issues like culture, infrastructure, individual attitudes etc.
Reversal of the safety trends occurred in the US just when SUV became the dominant car type in new car sales. Europe and other countries are slowly approaching this pivotal point. There is a risk that these results will be replicated in other countries after that is approached. Therefore we can’t dismiss this US only (for now) phenomenon.
I mean, sure, we can’t outright dismiss it. Espexially as there was a slight rise in the death rate of vulnerable road users (ie, those not in a vehicle) globally. But let’s look at those countries I mentioned who have significantly dropped their death rates. Even if they somehow manage to get the same 40% increase in pedestrian deaths, their total is still gonna go down. And I doubt it’ll rise anywhere near close to that 40%, if it even does rise, as they do things like have better public transport, higher petrol taxes that discourage driving so much, higher taxes on “yank tanks”, better designed roads for all users, lowering speed limits, initiatives like what Japan does where they ban on street parking at night in busy areas so pedestrians and cyclists can be more easily seen, things like that. You know, actually being proactive about the issue. I wouldn’t be using the US as a global barometer for anything besides obesity rates. Cos here’s another example, and I know it’s not just America who has this problem, but global gun related deaths dropped ever so slightly between 1990-2016 despite the US’ rising (admittedly, not by much cos it start to show a drop for a while). Because a bunch of countries have done the work to reduce their death tolls, which counters the insanity of those few countries who haven’t. Cos other countries give two shits about their citizens.
Unless you think the US population has magically increased more than 50% since 2008, it’s most certainly been both.
Cars are safer, yes. The issue is the amount of people driving larger vehicles such as SUVs and pickups for absolutely zero reason. The vast majority of people driving those vehicles have no actual practical use for them. Look into the history of auto manufacturers pushing anything considered a light truck in order to dodge EPA regulations. It’s absolutely an issue and it absolutely needs to be addressed through legislation, including but not limited to getting rid of the light truck exemption, sales tax based off curb weight, and property tax based off curb weight.
“safer” still isn’t as safe as any system that can get driving-age people around without expecting 90% of them to spend most of their travel time…
behind the steering wheel of a 2 ton machine at an average speed of 45mph/70kph
driving on roads that we literally paved over cities to have and now bleed funding from the surviving towns to maintain
bound by the authoritarian system that is necessary to ensure any amount of safety in doing the aforementioned.
In fact, the industry had to push a lot of propaganda and laws by anti-democratic means to make the public accept the death toll of cars. They achieved this by a) shifting all blame for excess deaths away from those producing and selling the cars as they actively destroyed all other means of transport, and b) making roads as “safe” and convenient as they are by making them hostile to all road users other than cars. All of that just so you can feel so confident in the number of people being killed and maimed by cars as to be here in a community literally called fuckcars talking like any number of road deaths is a normal and good thing, actually.
You can read about the propaganda and other methods used by the auto industry here (section 1.5) if you actually care to learn at all. Highly recommend reading the rest while you’re at it too. Genuinely good and compelling read. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7325856/#s0030title
People got around before cars, they still get around without cars in many places. Fewer cars on the road means less traffic and fewer road deaths. Car-centric infrastructure is expensive to maintain, encourages blight, kills small business, and discourages community engagement. In contrast, people and businesses and communities alike all thrive when infrastructure prioritizes pedestrian transport. There simply needs to be more alternatives to driving; especially in high density areas where people go out to eat, drink, and be merry; so nobody has to put themselves and others in danger just to get from a to b.
Edit: fixed some grammar errors and changed formatting for clarity
Cars have been made safer and drunk driving laws are more enforced then ever. But sure, “nothing will be done” whatever makes you feel self-satisfied in your weirdo anti-car cult.
Traffic fatalities are literally on their way back up, not down.
They’re down sharply per capita. Anything else?
deleted by creator
Where did you get that statistic from? Over last decade its been incredibly steady per driver.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/191660/fatality-rate-per-100000-licensed-drivers-in-the-us-since-1988/
This motherfucker has a DUI guaranteed.
“Hanging out in communities you sharply disagree with to run defense for pedestrian murder” sounds WAY more culty than “cars should not be the only possible method of getting around,” friendo. 🤷
Interestingly, the US is going in the opposite direction to everyone else with road fatalities. Since the mid 2010’s their numbers have stopped declining and increased slightly.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motor_vehicle_fatality_rate_in_U.S._by_year
I don’t even think anyone here is anti-car. All I’ve ever heard said is that it needs to stop being the default (and only) option.
This is pretty reasonable when you consider it’s the only way we can meet emissions targets to continue living on this planet.
Not the person you commented on but, don’t know if I agree with that, I am on the side of cars are needed but they should be supplemented with better alternatives as will to dissuade their usage unless actually required for the trip(for many of the reasons this community has stated).
it’s why I joined the community because I do like the posts demonstrating why this is required, and the posts that give information about potential alternatives. That being said I’ve been on edge whether to stay as of late because I’m no longer seeing posts like that, and when I read the comments there’s so much toxicity and always someone flaming another. Sometimes it’s called for, others I do agree feel very cult like in behavior of “oh they are indicating cars might have usage? burn the witch!”
Note I’m not saying this specific instance qualifies as that, just saying what I’ve noticed in the past posts I’ve looked at.
note note: realized I skipped your emissions target part… fully agree changing the defacto tech for current day cars are a hard requirement if we want to meet goals as the current ones just aren’t cutting it
Reminder that claiming individual action can have any meaningful impact compared to corporate action is journalistic malpractice/misinformation.
Having trouble posting the image directly, so here is a link.
I’m proposing a system wide change though
Brave of you to post this in a community litteraly named “Fuck Cars”
Cars are safer? What are you talking about?
https://www.npr.org/2023/06/26/1184034017/us-pedestrian-deaths-high-traffic-car
I’ve joined this instance for a reason, because I agree with it’s message. But what you’ve posted here is misleading. Cars have gotten safer over the years. Seatbelts, airbags, drive by wire, etc have all helped do that. The link you’ve posted refers to the US, which does matter in this case. Cos, globally, there has been a 5% drop in road user deaths since 2010 (and some countries have had some huge drops, over 50% isn’t super rare), partly cos of these increased safety measures. So, yeah, cars have objectively gotten safer. The US’ problem stems more from other issues like culture, infrastructure, individual attitudes etc.
Reversal of the safety trends occurred in the US just when SUV became the dominant car type in new car sales. Europe and other countries are slowly approaching this pivotal point. There is a risk that these results will be replicated in other countries after that is approached. Therefore we can’t dismiss this US only (for now) phenomenon.
I mean, sure, we can’t outright dismiss it. Espexially as there was a slight rise in the death rate of vulnerable road users (ie, those not in a vehicle) globally. But let’s look at those countries I mentioned who have significantly dropped their death rates. Even if they somehow manage to get the same 40% increase in pedestrian deaths, their total is still gonna go down. And I doubt it’ll rise anywhere near close to that 40%, if it even does rise, as they do things like have better public transport, higher petrol taxes that discourage driving so much, higher taxes on “yank tanks”, better designed roads for all users, lowering speed limits, initiatives like what Japan does where they ban on street parking at night in busy areas so pedestrians and cyclists can be more easily seen, things like that. You know, actually being proactive about the issue. I wouldn’t be using the US as a global barometer for anything besides obesity rates. Cos here’s another example, and I know it’s not just America who has this problem, but global gun related deaths dropped ever so slightly between 1990-2016 despite the US’ rising (admittedly, not by much cos it start to show a drop for a while). Because a bunch of countries have done the work to reduce their death tolls, which counters the insanity of those few countries who haven’t. Cos other countries give two shits about their citizens.
Yeah that’s why pedestrian death rates have been increasing since 2008.
Edit: to be clear, it’s because cars are needlessly getting bigger and actively more dangerous to pedestrians.
Pedestrian death rates have been dropping. Pedestrian deaths have been increasing. If you’re going argue a point at least understand it first.
Unless you think the US population has magically increased more than 50% since 2008, it’s most certainly been both.
Cars are safer, yes. The issue is the amount of people driving larger vehicles such as SUVs and pickups for absolutely zero reason. The vast majority of people driving those vehicles have no actual practical use for them. Look into the history of auto manufacturers pushing anything considered a light truck in order to dodge EPA regulations. It’s absolutely an issue and it absolutely needs to be addressed through legislation, including but not limited to getting rid of the light truck exemption, sales tax based off curb weight, and property tax based off curb weight.
deleted by creator
“safer” still isn’t as safe as any system that can get driving-age people around without expecting 90% of them to spend most of their travel time…
In fact, the industry had to push a lot of propaganda and laws by anti-democratic means to make the public accept the death toll of cars. They achieved this by a) shifting all blame for excess deaths away from those producing and selling the cars as they actively destroyed all other means of transport, and b) making roads as “safe” and convenient as they are by making them hostile to all road users other than cars. All of that just so you can feel so confident in the number of people being killed and maimed by cars as to be here in a community literally called fuckcars talking like any number of road deaths is a normal and good thing, actually.
You can read about the propaganda and other methods used by the auto industry here (section 1.5) if you actually care to learn at all. Highly recommend reading the rest while you’re at it too. Genuinely good and compelling read. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7325856/#s0030title
People got around before cars, they still get around without cars in many places. Fewer cars on the road means less traffic and fewer road deaths. Car-centric infrastructure is expensive to maintain, encourages blight, kills small business, and discourages community engagement. In contrast, people and businesses and communities alike all thrive when infrastructure prioritizes pedestrian transport. There simply needs to be more alternatives to driving; especially in high density areas where people go out to eat, drink, and be merry; so nobody has to put themselves and others in danger just to get from a to b.
Edit: fixed some grammar errors and changed formatting for clarity
No one is going to bubble wrap all the sharp corners on the planet for you.
Bold of you to reply without reading past the first sentence.
Welp 🤷🏽 you can lead a horse to fresh water but you can’t make them drink.
Have a day.
I gave your comment as much time as it deserved. Be less presumptuous.
lol. So you just have really poor reading comprehension then? Sorry, my mistake. Next time I’ll approach assuming less intelligence 👍