Safe Speed Forums

It is my hypothosis that the slowest "Quartile" of drivers hit more pedestrians than the fastest! (as a subset, I also suspect that the same applies to collisions between main road traffic and traffic emerging from minor roads)

This is based on personal expriance/observation

Are ther any figures that would support/refute this hypothosis in the wider world

D

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"The road to a police state is paved with public safety legislation"

If you are someone who seeks the "truth" by examining the evidence, then you are an unusual person!

Can I ask, are you an engineer or scientist?

The immediate problem is how you classify and then measure the slowest "Quartile" of drivers, how could this be known?

All I can suggest is that Scotland does produce RTA contributory causes that are cross-referenced to some degree, haven't time to find it again myself but some time on google should find it. Try googling contributory factors road accidents scotland.

I don't believe such cross-referenced data is available for England or UK as a whole.


just looked, try http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications ... 20143740/0

Could be good info there - keep us informed of what you find, and good luck!!!!!

In my experience people who use the words 'hypothosis' and 'quartile' are often after something other than an answer to their posted subject, sometimes a bit of attention me thinks? But as the poster has'nt even replied or added why should anyone help to answer?

The real answers to road safety ARE out there but, if you have a job and a life, it may take years of the odd day here and there to uncover the evidence.

I tend not to get much response on here, maybe people are just busy?

And there again, maybe we haven't come up with the answer he wants?

It's a shame the government feels the need to hide the information that could lead to safer roads!

I think you need to give Dusty a little more time to expand on his theory once he has had time to collect a little more data!
I guess he sees a connection between incompetant drivers who are overly cautious and therefore drive slowly, and the same colliding because their slow speed fails to address their lack of observational skills.

I dont know that you can prove it with statistics, but if you close your eyes and try and make your way around a busy street, chances are you would bump into somebody who didn't realsie that you could not see them, no matter how slow you walked.

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Time to take responsibility for our actions.. and don't be afraid of speaking out!

It's an interesting thought though from Dusty, after all, try it your self.....slow down tomorrow, and see how many more people walk out in front of you, how many more people pull out at road junctions because your speed is slow, how many more people tailgate you because you're travelling so slow ......even if you have the right of way and they should wait!
I think that I agree.......after all, you may stop suddenly enough. But the bugger following closely behind wasn't concentrating because his speed was so low and he didn't expect you to stop so suddenly...WHOA!!!!!!!...........and the one after him as well....

The following is a non sequitur.

And now, for something completely constructive ...

The most important question, is why?

[Since most people see themselves as crossing 'in front of vehicles, and not behind them,]
Most pedestrians would be more likely to walk in front of a slower vehicle, than a faster one

The above statement is backed up by two childhoods worth of experience and observation - mine, and my elder nephew's - not only learning how to cross Queens Boulevard (do a search, it's worth it), but also by learning various forms of jaywalking there. (I used to be good at it, but my nephew would regualrly cause onlookers to swoon. He is now in training as an MMA fighter, and jests that there's no money to be made jaywalking.)

Back then, both of us would not hesitate to testify that we generally viewed slower cars as having implicitly given us permission to walk in front of them; else they'd be going faster, no?

(We have long since cured ourselves of the vast majority of our jaywalking behaviors. Still, being NewYawkas, we must maintain some innate jaywalking abilities for selfdefense purposes.)

Consider clicking this. Enter the mindset of those who regularly cross in front of cars as a way of life.

Or, Google the word "jaywalking" ...

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The Rules for ALL ROAD USERS:
1) No one gets hurt
2) Nothing gets hit, except to protect others; see Rule#1
3) The Laws of Physics are invincible and immutable - so-called 'laws' of men are not
4) You are always immediately and ultimately responsible for your safety first, then proximately responsible for everyone's
Do not let other road users' mistakes become yours, nor yours become others
5) The rest, including laws of the land, is thoughtful observation, prescience, etiquette, decorum, and cooperation

If I am driving at a given velocity, see a pedestrian, and intend to allow them to proceed in front of me, that would be signalled by my decelerating.

The pedestrian would notice at least one change - if not two changes - in vehicle pitch, followed by visual confirmation of my deceleration.

I cannot tell whether each pedestrian is looking for X amount of decel, or is simply waiting until I appear to get below a certain speed, but I suspect either or both behaviors as possibilities. (I suffer those who wait until I come to a full stop. I generally prefer to jog across streets when safely possible, so as not to keep drivers waiting unnecessarily; I see it as a courtesy to drivers, and appreciate those who move at the first sign of my decelerating.)

I consider the above separate from those who simply begin moving, and then - perhaps - check crossing conditions. Even among these, I have, in rare instances, succeeded in convincing them to retreat by going into neutral and gunning my engine.
(Like most American vehicles, I drive an automatic. Unlike most Americans, I am constantly using my left foot on the brake, so as to be able to step on the brake at least three tenths of a second sooner.)

Were I to actually speed up, I suppose I might convince more people to retreat, provided I gave them enough spacetime to do so? I won't experiment with this variable, but would those who chose to retreat, do so because of the engine's increased RpMs? The vehicle's upturned nose? Both?

_________________
The Rules for ALL ROAD USERS:
1) No one gets hurt
2) Nothing gets hit, except to protect others; see Rule#1
3) The Laws of Physics are invincible and immutable - so-called 'laws' of men are not
4) You are always immediately and ultimately responsible for your safety first, then proximately responsible for everyone's
Do not let other road users' mistakes become yours, nor yours become others
5) The rest, including laws of the land, is thoughtful observation, prescience, etiquette, decorum, and cooperation

_________________
The Rules for ALL ROAD USERS:
1) No one gets hurt
2) Nothing gets hit, except to protect others; see Rule#1
3) The Laws of Physics are invincible and immutable - so-called 'laws' of men are not
4) You are always immediately and ultimately responsible for your safety first, then proximately responsible for everyone's
Do not let other road users' mistakes become yours, nor yours become others
5) The rest, including laws of the land, is thoughtful observation, prescience, etiquette, decorum, and cooperation

I assume they can still feel pain though? Not everyone gets killed. Religious or not, I also assume they would prefer not to go through the rest of their lives in a wheelchair or worse?

That said, however, there was a guy on the TV the other day who made me laugh. I can't remember who was recounting the story now, but it was about the far east and the peoples different mentality and attitude towards life and death in general, but especially their terrible driving. They just didn't seem to be bothered about danger and drive like madmen!

I can't remember which country he was talking about now but it went somethig like this: -

Interviewer – “What if your bad driving get’s you killed?”

Interviewee - "Well that was my day to die".

Interviewer - "But what if you crash into someone else and kill them?"

Interviewee - "Well it was his day too"

Different mindset or what?

I like Clint Eastwood, (hence my Avatar), who’s quoted as saying his philosophy is "Everyone leaves everyone else alone".

That works for me.

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The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not necessarily represent the views of Safe Speed.
You will be branded a threat to society by going over a speed limit where it is safe to do so, and suffer the consequences of your actions in a way criminals do not, more so than someone who is a real threat to our society.

Ahh yes, the "It's god's/allah's/whoever's will that I have an accident" argument. I really can't follow that argument it seems like the ultimate excuse to shirk responsibility for your own actions.

I'm told that the Koran has a line in it something like "Trust in Allah, but tie up your camel" that addresses personal responsibility, so is it just a cultural thing?

The following actually happened to me, several years ago.

Driving down a one way street not far from to a Jewish temple at about 7:30AM Saturday morning, I'm approaching a green light (which means the pedestrians have a 'red hand'). Yes, the pedestrians are all - excuse me - Jews in uniform. I'm accustomed to seeing all of them begin crossing anyway, but for reasons that add up to one half mischief and one half social research, I go to neutral and rev my 5.7L Corvette LT1 V8. Most of them register this 'clearing of a throat' as a threat to be respected, but one particularly brazen man [who seems to be] in his late 20s or early 30s continues. I am now close enough to hear his father [ - I'm almost sure - ] yell, "No, son, don't!"

The son's answer?

"I'll sue him!"

To shorten the rest of the story, he had to walk an extra five minutes for his hat, and five minutes back to temple, while a hundred people were forced to enter a temple through the back door, single file. (For those of you who forgot that I am a self-confessed former hoon ... I was giving a nonverbal sermon on humility and nonviolent protest )

This was the first, but not the last, of several variations on this theme, with less and less mischief on my part as I've matured[?].

Trust me, I also have a point.

It isn't just a cultural thing - usually.

Some people are brazen.

Some people are showing off in the company of their peers. (This behavior has evolved into a jaywalking game that gets played every day after school, where the amateurs develop their skill in groups, and the experts do it alone.)

Some people are reckless. Shinimal Jose ring a bell to anyone?

These individual personality traits can be encouraged and thus magnified, left alone, or discouraged and minimized - in many, but never all - by sociocultural influences, but the traits begin in the individual, and are then affected from the outside one way or another.

I can't think of the other so-called 'reasons' right now, because I don't think in terms of crossing in front of vehicles anymore. I find that thinking in terms of crossing behind vehicles whenever reasonably possible is safer to me and more polite of me. Suffice it to say that I think that etiquette and decorum have to be taught, it is seldom innate.

_________________
The Rules for ALL ROAD USERS:
1) No one gets hurt
2) Nothing gets hit, except to protect others; see Rule#1
3) The Laws of Physics are invincible and immutable - so-called 'laws' of men are not
4) You are always immediately and ultimately responsible for your safety first, then proximately responsible for everyone's
Do not let other road users' mistakes become yours, nor yours become others
5) The rest, including laws of the land, is thoughtful observation, prescience, etiquette, decorum, and cooperation

Duty is a respected poster in my books. The use of "quartile" is indicative of an older poster than some one who uses "percentile". I think it was a reasonable line of thought. I have notice that there are a small number of accidents with very serious consiquences where an older driver loses all control.
such as : parking an automatic car in a shop window: driving through the garage : over the sea front: wrong way on a one way road: pulling out infront of a HGV: backing out of the drive over partner:

These accidents are just the tip of an iceberg, there are many smaller accidents and dusty was trying to measure the iceburg.
Personaly I doubt it is bigger than the youth accident rate but you dont kow untill you have found the stats.

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Speed limit sign radio interview. TV Snap Unhappy
“It has never been the rule in this country – I hope it never will be - that suspected criminal offences must automatically be the subject of prosecution” He added that there should be a prosecution: “wherever it appears that the offence or the circumstances of its commission is or are of such a character that a prosecution in respect thereof is required in the public interest”
This approach has been endorsed by Attorney General ever since 1951. CPS Code

It is a bit discouraging when Dusty asks a question, then seems to have disappeared !

Perhaps the problem here is that we've failed to answer it ?

But then he's asked an impossible question !

I've found what I was looking for saved to my PC called 0041882_Scottish_cont_factors.xls
I can't find where I got it from but it was a simple google search finding an official govenment website. It's contributory factors for 2005 and much of it is cross-referenced in a way that I've not found elsewhere.

eg contributory factors for deaths of each type of road user are given.

eg Deaths with "Exceeding speed limit" as a factor then "Traveling too fast for the conditions" then total:

Pedestrian 1/3/65
Pedal Cyclist 1/1/16
Motor Cyclist 7/5/33
Car/Taxi user 18/37/153
Other 0/1/17
Total 27/284

So out of 65 Pedestrians killed in 2005, one had "Exceeding speed limit" as a factor and 3 had "Traveling too fast for the conditions" as a factor (this is defined as WITHIN the speed limit).

That means that 61 (the VAST majority) were killed by drivers/riders traveling at reasonable speeds that were within the limit.

And that still doesn't tell us what other contributory factors were involved (ie was it a drunk driver above the limit, or a stolen car?).

So if speeding is an extraordinarily rare factor in the deaths of pedestrians, why do they die?

Pedestrian only / Failed to look properly / 26
Driver/rider error or reaction / Failed to look properly / 18
Pedestrian only / Failed to judge vehicle's path or speed / 13
Pedestrian only / Impaired by alcohol / 13
Pedestrian only / Careless / reckless /in a hurry / 10
Pedestrian only / Pedestrian wearing dark clothing at night / 10

And then into single figures (remember each death may have several contributory factors).

So it seems that if you want to know why Pedestrians die, you should concentrate on drunk people not looking where they are going dressed such that drivers have no hope of seeing them.

Nothing to do with speeding, or even speed !

But even that doesn't answer the original question because how do you measure the slowest drivers and then relate that to crashes?

Has dusty been on here since asking the question? People do have lives and jobs to hold down away fron Safespeed you know!