TC1

It would be difficult for you, or anyone, to better exemplify the precise problem that I am referring to, which is the all-too-common "Live and let die" attitude. Your comments here reflect the vast majority of the road safety problem in the United States.

The living -- who are not in prison -- do not actually have to live with this killer. Having already killed two -- and only via dumb luck not having killed 20 -- and put a dozen more in the hospital with serious injuries, and then lied about the circumstances of those killings, this perpetrator should not walk freely again in this lifetime.

That would be what "I'd rather" see happen. You would seemingly prefer that they receive a quick little slap on the wrist, and then resume their life as-if nothing had happened. And, at risk of repeating myself ad nauseum, that attitude is precisely why many tens of thousands of people die on US roads annually.

There is a significant difference in sentence lengths. This particular killer should have been charged with -- at least -- 2 counts of negligent homicide, and 13 counts of aggravated assault. The former is a class 4 felony, and the latter is a class 2 or 3 ( yes, in bizarro-world Arizona, aggravated assault is a more serious crime than homicide ). That's a total of about 50 years in prison -- minimum -- before even considering escalators like any potential previous convictions for this killer. It might go as high as 165 years depending on various factors.

So does being run over by a pickup truck. Those unfortunate cyclists did not get to choose their fate. This killer did.

You know what else prevents a person from working in their preferred field? Being fatally run over by a pickup truck.

Roughly how many people should one person get to kill and maim, in your opinion?

This individual seems perfectly capable of "doing bad things" already, so patting them on the head and saying "Try to do better next time" is hugely unlikely to work -- especially since their response to having killed several people was to lie and attempt to shirk their responsibility.

That's exactly the sort of person that we build prisons to house, and that's exactly where this killer ought to spend the remainder of his days.

TC1

No, it really doesn't. Political science and criminal justice are two separate fields of inquiry. If this is "political" and off-limits here, then a whole raft of other topics are as well, chiefly the construction of infrastructure.

The facts of the case are that the prosecutors have decided to woefully undercharge the perpetrator, in contravention of Arizona law, and as we've already learned, the disinclination of law enforcement to do their jobs and enforce our laws leads directly to tens of thousands of annual road deaths in the United States. We know what the problem is, and it is that road users do not respect the laws. And we know how to fix that, and we know whose job that is. Continuing to wonder if there is "anything that might be learned" is akin to wondering if the Earth might be flat.

Chistophe516

Rest In Peace

FBinNY 

We clearly have very different worldviews. I focus on what may be learned from accidents, in order to prevent them.

You're more interested in the criminal aspects and punishing the perpetrators.

IMO, if you feel prosecotors and judges aren't doing their jobs, that's something for voters, and the very definition of political. Nothing wrong with bringing it up, but continually harping on it here, rather than the local press is pointless.

JW Fas

John Hammond from Jurassic Park said it best: "I don't blame people for their mistakes, but I do ask that they pay for them."

base2 

Fair enough you say it isn't ok. Ok. But dang, man. Words have definitions. What he did is a felony. Felon is the appropriate term. We also have Gross Misdemeanors for common unacceptable major actions that pose a risk to life and liberty of others, and regular plain ol' misdemeanors for minor unacceptable actions that concern property. His actions exceed both of the lesser classes of crime.

Justice doesn't require vengeance for life. Justice requires the wrong to be righted. In this case, after he has made the victims household whole and complete for the sum total of each person's lifetime value, then he can continue on as a free man with out restriction.

Out of a lack of other quantifiable criteria let's focus strictly on monetary concerns. Assuming that each person murdered has a first world lifetime earning potential of ~$2.7 million dollars or so. He's on the hook for 5.2 million. Let's be kind and prorate that to 30 years remaining based on the hypothetical 78 year average lifespan and a reasonable guess to the age of the victims of around age 58 at time of the crime....(*crunching numbers*)... That comes to $1,038,461 and 54¢ each. So, in all fairness, when this irresponsible person fully fills in his $2,077,000 hole he dug for himself, then he can go about a with out the stigma of being a felonious felon. Until then, living with the stigma associated with his heinous act is a bargain.

Corporations do it all the time. So, thinking along these lines is hardly without precedent.

...Or society can pay it on his behalf. All he's got to do is stay put on the right side of a barbed wire fence. Seems fair.

TC1

This is not a matter of opinion. Go to any university, and you will find that a Political Science major is different from a Criminal Justice major.

We already know how to prevent them. Road users have to be incentivized to behave properly.

Because that's necessary to preventing such killings -- which will never stop completely, but are presently encouraged by the 'Live and let die' attitude that I have previously mentioned.

Also, in every one of these cases in which I have commented, prosecutors have undercharged the perpetrators anywhere from slightly to enormously. That constitutes a trend. We're not talking about just one anecdote.

No, it is not pointless to discuss the critical problem with road safety, on a forum titled "Advocacy & Safety". More to the point, if cyclists do not demand that prosecutors enforce the law with respect to dead cyclists, no one else is going to do so -- and cyclists are voters.

Iride01 

Regardless of whether the person goes to prison as a misdemeanor or a felon, they are still going to prison. They are unlikely to be in prison for the length of time some of you wish them to be. So they'll be out and we will have to deal with that.

Putting a person in jail isn't going to promote cycling safety. If you remember when the mad mothers got started, it was only about the time when they started making bar tenders, bar owners and companies that had office parties responsible for serving alcohol to that drunk driver that they made great in-roads to alcohol and driving.

For certain we need some real driver education. Here in the USA, we don't get much. And that could be just in the PSA commercials on TV. I'm a little tired of hearing don't drive drunk and click it or ticket. Shouldn't we also have some other things talked about to educate the public in general?

This forum tends to get sidetracked in issues that aren't safety. This is a legal matter, not safety. Whether they go to prison as a felon or for a misdemeanor, it is not going to make cycling safer. The prosecutor for any of many reasons has chosen not to pursue more severe classification of the crime. One reason might be that they just don't feel they can get a conviction on anything stronger. I don't know, I haven't read anything about it other than the initial reports of the accident. And note that the term accident means that there are consequences involved that might include legal things that might be criminal.

base2 

Iride01 Good point about MADD making inroads with holding bars and bar-tenders accountable for the actions of the patrons they excessively serve.

Bringing this back to safety, why not hold road engineers responsible for how people use the product they design? It seems to me a NTSB level investivation and list of recommended best practices to avoid systemic fatal flaws in design or processes is appropriate. How many aviation, rail, or maritime fatality accidents are there? Very few. Right now, any investigation is left up to well meaning law enforcement (who are not engineers) to find fault with the affected parties, not root cause analysis. Until we get this level of scrutiny and hold road engineers responsible for the use/misuse of their designs we're merely chasing our tails. The road design failed to protect vulnerable road users and the road design failed to signify the risk excessive speed and inattention posed to others to the driver so that he could operate his vehicle in an appropriate manner with due care and caution of the consequences.

Adding on to the above, our system of urban planning guarantees that whatever it is that you need is a long way away from where you are. This necessarily means that community gathering spaces where you can meet and socialize with people of different socioeconomic strata requires driving. We wonder why there is a drinking and driving problem? The two go hand-in-hand by design.

Proper infrastructure design and urban planning would have eliminated the opportunity for this driver to become a murderous felon.

The accountability loop is broken. Is that a bug or a feature of the system? We have a long ways to go.

RCMoeur 

In my first career, I spent a notable amount of my professional time in legal meetings or depositions arising from claims or lawsuits against the agency I worked for alleging defective design, maintenance, or other activity. If an agency doesn't follow accepted guidelines in building or maintaining a roadway, in states such as Arizona it's difficult for an agency not to be found liable. If a professional engineer was grossly negligent, they could see their registration suspended or revoked. That being said, the crash location to my knowledge meets all guidelines in effect at the time of construction, and current guidance as well.

You bring in "urban planning". For reference, this crash occurred in a rural and agricultural / desert area.

Let's say that the local jurisdictions decide to install separated cycletracks or sidepaths along the entire WVCC training loop route to reduce the risk of crashes of this type in between intersections and driveways. A standard cycletrack or sidepath is typically 5-8 feet in width per direction. The WVCC ride is reportedly a very fast-paced one, at about 20 mph. To accommodate this speed, the facility would likely need to be a full travel lane wide per direction (10-14 ft). Otherwise, the riders would likely choose different facilities or roadways so they can maintain the pace at which they intend to legally ride and train. And whether it is 5 ft or 14 ft wide, these facilities aren't cheap, and installing them only on the WVCC loop for example would still cost tens of millions of dollars. Where would this funding come from? And the unfortunate fact is that even if they were installed, they probably would not be well-maintained, especially in the rural desert and agricultural areas. If past experience is a guide, they could be unusable in a matter of months due to sand, gravel, debris, weeds, thorns, glass, or other accumulating items. Installing separated facilities creates an expectation of a serious commitment to maintenance, which with current budgets and staffing would probably not happen, especially in rural areas.

TC1

And this is a large part of the problem. Had this killer chosen to use a gun, or even a knife, to kill 2 and seriously wound 11 others, he would be removed from society for, at least, the vast majority of his natural life.

In other words, we do not "have to deal with that". We choose to -- for no good reason at all.

By way of comparison, since it is a current event, this young man received a 14-year sentence for firing a gun into an occupied house. He fired one shot, and hit no one. 14 years in prison. Now this is a different jurisdiction, but that is an example of how we could choose to treat people who kill with motor vehicles.

Yes, it does. At an absolute minimum, it means this particular killer will not be mowing down any pelotons for a while. It also publicizes the message that there are serious consequences for killing and injuring cyclists -- and that notion is foreign to many drivers, which is a large part of the problem.

Actually, what change has occurred happened when it became significantly-illegal and socially unacceptable in most circles to drive drunk. MADD was founded in late 1980, and started to be noticed a few years later. At that point, a steep decline in the percentage of alcohol-involved highway deaths was already underway -- due to increased enforcement and cultural changes -- and continued until 1997 when it leveled-off at approximately its current level.

This is absolutely a safety issue. A massive part of our road safety problem is that there exist few, if any, consequences for dangerous vehicle operation.

This statement demonstrates a profound lack of knowledge on the topic. We roughly halved the incidence of drunk-driving fatalities in fifteen years precisely by increasing the legal ( and social ) consequences of that behavior. We can do the same with other types of dangerous driving, if we so choose.


Again, "Live and let die". This is not an acceptable response to killing two, and nearly killing 18 more.

That is outrageous nonsense. The two individuals are quite certainly dead, and we know precisely why. The other eleven were certainly almost killed, and we know precisely how that occurred. The vehicle has been studied, and nothing was wrong with it. We even know that the killer ran them down from behind. We know this killer dragged some cyclists for several hundred yards. Which means he didn't even touch the brakes until long-after he plowed through an entire peloton of 20 riders. ( cf: https://www.azcentral.com/story/news...9/72866623007/ )

This is as-much of a slam-dunk as possible -- but that requires a prosecutor who is willing to do their job, and those are exceedingly-difficult to find.

Consider not pontificating on the subject then.

TC1

This comment is almost entirely wrong. It might be quicker to observe the statements that are not wholly incorrect and nonsensical, but I will try the reverse anyway.

The timeline of the reduction in drunk-driving does not support the claim that MADD was in any way responsible, as I noted a couple comments earlier. The NHTSA also identified the cause, and it wasn't MADD ( or SADD, or any other group ).

Road engineers are not held responsible for dangerous driving because the latter cannot be prevented by road design. And even if it could, it would be financially idiotic to do so, compared with the far lower cost of simply using infrastructure properly.

As noted already, this is not an urban planning issue, since the site is not urban. And your impression of urban planning leads the reader to wonder if you have ever been to an urban area. Suffice it to say, you are completely wrong about the respective locations of people and destinations.

Finally, it is absolutely ridiculous to claim that infrastructure design can prevent a person at the wheel of a pickup truck -- or just about any other motor vehicle -- from killing with it. You would need walls -- everywhere. Surrounding every home and business, every outdoor space -- literally everywhere. You would need to remove all intersections. Such a proposal is obviously not possible, nor would anyone want to see it happen if it were.

base2 

The entire point of root cause analysis is to change the accepted guidelines.

Entire countries place a separated and protected path along side arterials from one city to another and don't run up the deficits and debts that we do. The answer is to allocate space differently and infringe upon the driver's sense of impunity towards consequences. Our roads are huge, wide, flat, with sweeping curves and no obstacles or consequences. Is it any wonder that "10 over" and often blatant disregard for any limits is the cultural norm. There is a disconnect between the actual risk to self and others and the perceived risk by vehicle drivers. Everything traffic engineers do encourages this disconnect.

A police officer in my town murdered a lady with his cop car by driving ~75mph in a 25mph zone. The penalty was a traffic ticket. Even the cops are complicit in these wrong design priorities. Could you even expect any sort of root cause analysis by these guys? I think not. Their very job is to continue establishment priorities and order.

The default in the US is to prioritize the speed and convenience of automobiles. If an engineer wants to deviate from established metrics to encourage or otherwise accommodate other users he has to justify how and why. Established metrics don't even take cyclists or pedestrians into account in any meaningful way with any priority whatsoever unless their accomodation is forced by political directive. The default is increased car demand ad infinitum. So that is what gets designed and built. The concept of induced demand working both ways to favor non-automobile modes is a foreign concept not even acknowledged to exist to American traffic design. That's how we get to where we are. 5 foot wide sidewalks with cars zooming by at 55 mph, 6 feet away and the manuals call that kind of pedestrian hostile design "safe." Unacceptable.

Elsewhere, the default is the safety and convenience of all other road users. An engineer has to justify why a potentially dangerous automobile must be taken in to account and using design manual "best practices" written through root cause analysis to mitigate the risk that vehicle presents to other road users. Often times that means narrow lanes and a variety of visual clues and obvious consequences to slow vehicle speed. Very different mindsets and priorities. As a result traffic related deaths or injuries elsewhere in the world are a fraction of what they are here in the US.

I've ridden my bicycle through "streets" in foreign countries that are no wider than a standard US 2-4 meter wide MUP and offer no means of a motor vehicle to even access it. Car travel there just wasn't necessary, so no car lane was built. Pretty simple and pretty cheap.

Duragrouch

I'm new to this thread, read the beginning, and recent events. I am not aware of the road conditions at the accident site. This is just general comments, for constructive purpose.

Wide paved smooth shoulder that bikes can ride on? Great.

Wide paved smooth shoulder with line of rumble strips between bikers and cars? Even better.

Narrow shoulder with only rumble strips, that's a problem. Rumble strips bang the heck out of bikes, you cannot ride on them more than a very short distance. So in this case, bikers are always on the right edge of the smooth pavement. Drivers may perceive that the bikers should be on the shoulder, but that is impossible. Drivers should be better educated about this. And road design should change in this respect, no rumble strips on narrow shoulders, unless a very narrow strip of them, or Botts' dots instead.

Roadway with no shoulder, seems just as bad, but at least drivers know that there is no other path for bikers, especially in rural areas, but even in urban areas, biking on the sidewalk is too hazardous, with pedestrains, people quickly coming out of shops, etc, which is why in many such areas, biking on the sidewalk is prohibited. My point being, drivers need to be educated on showing due caution when passing bicyclists. I don't recall bicycle-specific questions in my driver's license renewal tests. There should be.

As with dangerous behavior by police, increased use of video cameras by bikers may help. Decades ago I was biking on the edge of roadway, a car passed, someone in it threw a bottle at me. I was able to get the car model and three digits of the license plate, called state police, they were easily able to look up the car, and they paid the vehicle owner a visit. I don't think any charges, as I was never called to testify, but I'm sure a stern warning. Small video cameras (generic version of GoPro) are cheap now, and I should get one for my bike, and a second mount for my car on the rare occasion I drive. If people know there is a high likelihood that they are being videoed, they may behave differently.

TC1

These do not work to save cyclist lives, as every municipality that has attempted such, has found. What they universally turn to, after their attempts at building safety fail, is increased enforcement and reduction in motor vehicle usage.

Yes, and the first four attributes make them exceedingly safe. The latter, however, trumps those features. We can fix the latter, if we desire to, and it's very cheap -- since we've already built the prisons, and are much less-interested in filling them with marijuana users these days.

That's not an infrastructure problem, that's a law enforcement issue ( in two different ways ).

Not for no reason, it should be noted. Mobility is a large part of the reason why the US has ~5% of the world's population and 25% of its GDP.

This is incorrect. The US is actually about 20% under the global average of traffic mortality per-capita.

https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SH.STA.TRAF.P5

When compared on a per-distance-traveled basis, far fewer countries even have data to compare. Those that do, have lower fatality rates than the US, but the difference is not accurately described as "a fraction" ( every number is "a fraction" of every other number ).

https://www.itf-oecd.org/sites/defau...ort-2018_2.pdf

The US was at 7.3 deaths per billion km in 2018. Belgium was the same. New Zealand was at 7.2. All other countries except Czechia and Korea were between Norway ( 3.0 ) and Slovenia ( 7.0 ). See page 21 of the aforementioned source.

The difference is not as drastic as you attempted to claim.

JW Fas

It's easier to hold bartenders and people who sell alcohol accountable because when an intoxicated person causes property damage and/or personal injury as a result of their intoxication, it's more straightforward to trace the proximate cause to the person's intoxicated state. In the case of road engineering it's far more nebulous. If someone crashes due to excessive speed, why were they speeding? Is it because the road design lowered their inhibitions or because of their choice? Not as easy to narrow down.

While most dates recognize social host liability or have dram shop laws, the burden of proof against the bartender or person who sold alcohol is still pretty high (rightfully so). The first time I got hit on my bike was by a drunk driver pulling out of the restaurant where he'd drank, and even with helmet cam evidence and the driver's admission that he was drunk it was still a drawn out process to pursue a successful dram shop claim against the business.

base2 

TC1 Did you even read the report you linked. 11.6 traffic deaths per 100,000 residents is more than everybody than the remaining 8 countries. Congratulations. The US traffic fatality numbers are better than Cambodia, Argentina, Mexico, Uruguay, Jamaica, Columbia, Malaysia, & South Africa. Yay! Better than the developing world. That's a real accomplishment right there.

Meanwhile, the first world, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, and the UK have between 2 and 2.8 deaths per 100,000 residents. In fractional terms, that's between ¼ to ⅙ that of the US. You know why? Because people there drive less. They have practical options that are not automobiles and the automobiles they do have are driven at slower speeds.

The reason why global traffic deaths per mile decreased through 2017 for vehicle occupants is the size and weight of the vehicles themselves. They protect the occupants to all others detriment. At it's best, in 2017 the US is 7.3 per billion miles travelled. Third from the bottom, ahead of The Czech Republic and Korea.

Vehicle sizeand safety features that supposedly helped through 2017 protects the occupants to all others detriment to the tune of 7.4% increased fatality to vehicle occupants and contributed to an increase of 39.2% for pedestrians 2010-2016. Last place. These are the numbers in your link.

The speeds travelled in 2020 undoes all the built in safety features for all and the numbers are even worse. Post Covid the numbers are strikingly worse. https://www.nhtsa.gov/press-releases...uring-pandemic

Again, this false sense of security in risk assessment encourages a disconnect between perceived and actual risk. We see this with pedestrian, cyclist and driver fatality rates across the board.

You can cherry pick all the data you want, but let's be honest about this. An increase from 1.11 fatalities per 100 million vehicle miles travelled in 2019 to 1.37 deaths per 100 million vehicle miles travelled in 2020 is a 23½% increase of fatalities in your preferred metric and a metric ton more than 1 death per 86.3 VMT in 2017.

Obscuring you premise behind Global numbers where driving has indeed gotten safer over time is out of the scope of discussing US traffic fatalities.

TC1

Yes, I read it. You may want to try: https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SH.STA.TRAF.P5 If you need help counting, let us know.


Now investigate the relative population densities. The UK is at 270 per km^2, for example, which is about nine times the US' 33 per km^2. So, shockingly, they drive less. Switzerland is at 200 per km^2. Norway and Sweden are both lower than the US, but for the same reason, that their populations are clustered in a few southern cities.


If this claim were correct, we'd see that trend in the US. We do not.


You neglected to explain why, for example, Belgium's rate matches the US'.

Make up your mind -- either it is a false sense of security, or not. You cannot have it both ways.

I used all of the data that is available, and the fact remains that your statements were incorrect. If you cannot be bothered to do your research, that's not my fault.

You claim other people are "cherry picking data" and you try to use a pandemic year in your claim? That's one black kettle.

TC1

I don't disagree with some of your comment, but the second sentence here is ridiculous -- and you aren't the only one spouting such. A speeding vehicle operator is always speeding because of their own choice. There is no other possibility, except mechanical failure of the vehicle, but that's outside this scope.

That said, it is both impossible and undesirable to build roads that cannot be sped upon. The US Interstate Highway system is one of the marvels of the world's infrastructure, moving more people in more convenience, safety, and speed than anything else. On most of its miles, a motor vehicle operator can easily top out whatever speed their vehicle is capable of, and that's one of the reasons why it is so safe and so efficient. Wide, straight, smooth roads are brilliant for transport, and they've been built since the Romans, at least. We could, for example, rebuild the Interstate system with zig-zags every couple hundred meters, or speed bumps everywhere, or what-have-you, but that'd be disastrously stupid. The ideal situation is roads that can be sped upon, and users of those roads who are trained sufficiently to understand that just because one can do something, does not mean that they should.

The answer is very simple, and not even particularly expensive. We need to train road users better, and incentivize them to travel in cooperative, considerate fashion. The US already has about 4 million miles of roads, and they go effectively everywhere that has been developed, and almost all of them are perfectly fine for any vehicle that is legal upon them -- and even pedestrians. The one and only problem is that many of the operators of those vehicles have no training at all, and even less consideration for other human beings. We can fix that problem, if we want to, and while not easy, it's easier than any alternative except resigning ourselves to the status quo.

base2 

Again, global.
I already agreed as much with the Urbanism point. The US low population density is a significant contributing factor and barrier to any fix to the traffic fatality problem.

Vehicle speed and stubborn road design combined with an absence of enforcement accounts for the disparity

It is both. The combination is the one-two punch.

Ok. Here is a copy-paste from you link: I picked the 2020-2021 because it represents a shift in trend. I'm not being disingenuous. The 2022 pedestrian numbers ( the latest year we have complete data) are even worse, still. https://www.ghsa.org/resources/Pedestrians23

2023 numbers aren't out yet but preliminary reports suggest a modest couple of percent improvement.


To answer your needling about Belgium: Belgium, if you've ever been there, has boilerplate standard US infrastructure design and traffic problems. Belgium sucks.

To the rest of the list: Population density and options that are not car is a feature, not a bug. See above points made about proper urban planning removing the opportunity for the murderous felon to do his crime.

TC1

Yes, it is a copy-paste -- from one of the links I posted. Now read the other one, as I suggested.

If you are not being intentionally disingenuous, then you just aren't equipped for this discussion. No one, in any field, uses pandemic-era data to support claims of a trend. As you may have heard, the pandemic was unprecedented, and introduced a few new variables that we've no way to study.

What claim are you trying to support here? We were talking about infrastructure design. Are you alleging that US infrastructure design has become more dangerous for pedestrians in the past few years? That's a very difficult position to defend, since there are very few, if any, municipalities building less-friendly designs compared to five, ten, or however many years ago.

Well there's an adult response. Wait, no it isn't -- it's wrong like everything else you've written. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/featu...r-driving-less

Again, if you cannot be bothered to do your research, just stop. It's rude to make me do your homework.

Now consider how much easier it is to travel to your destination in a country with nine times the US' population density, where everything is necessarily much nearer to your location. Now consider the relative cost of building public transportation in countries with nearly an order of magnitude difference in user density.

That comment still makes zero sense.

And, for the record, does France have "proper urban planning"? Does Berlin have "proper urban planning"? Does London? Does Stockholm? Does London, again? Does London yet again? Does Barcelona?

base2 

What is your point. That Global scope makes it look like the numbers have improved in America? That's a stupid interpretation to support a nonsense claim.

Well pandemic era is the most recent data we have and it suggests an alarming trend. But you just go ahead and keep believing it wasn't somehow a continuation of a trend already in progress. Because.."reasons" or whatever.

I'm suggesting that US driver behaviour combined by a lack of consequences and a false sense of security lent by inadequate infrastructure messaging cues and perceived vehicle occupant safety has led to greater frequency and severity of consequences. My assertion fits the US data set.


Well excuse me. The last time I was there, in
Bruxelle, België was 2019. Should I go there to research an internet post to confirm my own experience? It'd be interesting to see what trend the 4 years since they have been making changes suggests. The Bloomberg article you, yourself link to lends itself to support my position, my vision of the necessary changes towards a pedestrian and cyclist fatality free future.

This is the crux of the problem. Generations of failed design means generations of people who (you included, apparently) that have no concept of what good design is or what it looks like.

It makes sense. You are blind to how infrastructure and environmental cues inform your behaviour.

Well, the traffic and pedestrian fatality statistics suggest they are doing something right in the traffic and pedestrian fatality arena. How are terror attacks by extremist religious fanatics related? Please explain.

JW Fas

The point I was making was that you can't immediately call the road engineer negligent because someone crashed from speeding. However, it's easier to cite negligence on the part of a bartender when they know (or should have reasonably known) the patron was intoxicated.

tomato coupe

The prosecutors have a much better understanding than you do of when negligent homicide is applicable.

TC1

You have been misguidedly fixated on improvement, which has never been the point of discussion. The point is that your claim that "As a result traffic related deaths or injuries elsewhere in the world are a fraction of what they are here in the US." is just wrong.

No, it does not -- for precisely the reason that I already explained, and which virtually everyone who uses statistics is already aware of. Please stop with this particular nonsense, as it is an embarrassing waste of time.

Again, make up your mind -- in just that brief pair of sentences, you claimed that there is both a lack of consequences and a greater frequency and severity of consequences. Sit down and have a think about what your argument actually is, before writing, next time.

No, but to start with, you might want to understand that the plural of 'anecdote', is not data.

No, it does not. It specifically describes many of the ways in which Brussels is no longer similar to the US, in this area. And despite those changes, the country's road fatality rate is identical to the US.

"At first gradually and then stunningly fast, Brussels’ transportation network has been reconfigured, shifting trips away from cars and toward bikes, transit and walking. The share of bike commuters has tripled in just four years, and transit ridership has already bounced back to pre-Covid levels. In 2017 cars accounted 64% of the miles traveled within the city; by 2021 the figure had fallen under 50%. Meanwhile, a huge pedestrian zone has emerged in the city center."

"If car-choked Brussels can transform itself in less than a generation..."

And that's just Brussels, for the record. Someone who visits as often as you claim to might be aware that Belgium is composed of more than just Brussels.

The "good designs" to which you refer have no beneficial effect on safety, and this has been proven too many times to count by now. In every case, after wasting time, money, and lives attempting to build safety, municipalities have seen the failure, and changed tack. And the tack they always switch to, which does work, is increased law enforcement and decreased motor vehicle usage.

And, since you'll likely miss the point, if you can accomplish those two goals, there's nothing at all wrong with the US' infrastructure -- it will remain the world's gold standard. The US has 4 million miles of roads that are almost all perfectly suitable for any type of transport that is legal upon them -- the one and only problem is with the users of the infrastructure, and their misuse of it. And that cannot be designed-away, as is being seen in the Netherlands right just now.

No, it does not, because you are claiming that infrastructure can be built to completely prevent a driver from killing non-drivers. And, as I explained to you with a bunch of examples, that is impossible.

Furthermore, the incident in-question was not even urban, so you are displaying an embarrassingly-low level of familiarity with the discussion.

As I already explained, only one person is responsible for a motor vehicle being operated in a dangerous manner -- and that's the operator thereof.

For not the first time, attempt to keep your argument straight in your head, before setting your fingers loose on the keyboard. Having to repeatedly explain your own points to you is becoming tiresome. You very recently claimed:

So, I was forced to illustrate to you that all of the cities which you claim have done that "proper urban planning" have completely failed to prevent murderous felons from killing people with vehicles.

Do you understand now, or do I need to use even smaller words?