this post was submitted on 18 Sep 2023
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Fuck Cars

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[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago (3 children)
  1. Why will every driver go over 20mph/30kph? Are they incapable of maintaining that speed? All school and community zones in my country are 30kph; are we wasting our time with those?

  2. I'm a vision zero proponent, so I don't care about the number of collisions; I care about the number of fatal collisions first, serious injuries second, minor injuries third. So even if 20 mph maintains, or even increases collisions; so long as it reduces casualties, it's positive. Bumpers are replaceable; people are not. The AAA document you link even says a 10% reduction in mean speed reduces fatal crashes by ~34% in the executive summary.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Regarding the first point, drivers naturally trend towards the speed they "feel" is right. Also many modern cars practically idle faster than 20 once you get rolling.

Change the actual road to slow people down and reduce accidents.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I agree, but you are making excuses for bad driving. It's still their fault that they drive too fast.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Not excusing shit, I'm describing human behavior. Humans literally drift to the speed they think is right, by feel.

Don't assume intent.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

But similarly, human behavior can be trained. We aren't NPCs. These bad drivers could be taught to drive at a safe speed regardless of the width of the street, through stricter education and enforcement. Pedestrians/cyclists/homes/businesses around the street -> drive slow, that should be an instinct.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

I said "change the actual road"

Enforcement doesn't work for what I'm describing, without conscious effort, humans drift to the speed they think they need. Always. So whenever you try to policy it, you are asking folks to go against their nature.

Change the shape / characteristics of the road to change the speed people drive it.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

As I said, I completely agree that changing the shape of the road is an important component of this solution.

Yes, I am asking the operators of deadly heavy machinery to put in a small amount of conscious effort to keep people safe. Why is that an impossible request?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

No one in my state complies with the speed limits because they're ridiculously low for the design of the road. You have a road built to handle 90mph but you tell people to go 30mph? Yeah that ain't happening

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago
  1. I did not make this claim, and so I do not choose to defend it.