Archives for November 2015

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has released its 2014 Summary of Motor Vehicle Crashes at http://1.usa.gov/291QBWd. The portion of non-occupant (pedestrian, bicyclists, and other cyclists) fatalities increased from 13 percent to 18 percent between 2005 and 2014.

According to the report, on average, a pedestrian is killed in a motor vehicle crash every 108 minutes, and one is injured about every 8 minutes. Using 2010 data, the most recent available, the tangible economic cost for pedestrians’ crashes is $11.5 billion and for bicyclists’ crashes is $4.4 billion. The comprehensive costs, including quality of life factors, are $65 billion for pedestrians’ crashes and $21.7 billion for bicyclists’ crashes.

Traffic fatalities are on the rise up again, with an increase of 8.1 percent in the first half of 2015, according to the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration (http://1.usa.gov/1lWDhEr). NHTSA officials attribute the problem to driver (or passenger) error — drunk driving, speeding, failure to wear seatbelts — but did promise “new initiatives to protect vulnerable road users such as pedestrians and cyclists.” The hazards NHTSA flags are real, but Robert Steuteville at Better Cities & Towns says the agency is also overlooking another major culprit: dangerous street design, propagated by an engineering profession that’s still pushing a “bigger is better” agenda… http://bit.ly/1Q037E2