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Comment by 1970-01-01 | Hacker News Reader

1970-01-01

Safe public roads haven't existed since 1900.

You’re off by about 20 years - it was the 1920s when car manufacturers were able to get legislation restricting public streets to their customers[1] - but also this ignores the magnitude: yes, cars have always been a public health hazard but the manufacturers reversed a multi-decade safety improvement trend a decade or two back because it boosted their profits, and that happened only in the United States. If our roads were as safe as Germany’s, while still not absolutely safe there would be an annual death toll reduction in the tens of thousands and 1-2 orders of magnitude more for series injuries. That’s huge even if it’s not perfect.

1. https://www.vox.com/2015/1/15/7551873/jaywalking-history

I don't think so. The first killed pedestrian was dead for 22 years before the roaring 1920s.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38466522

First, yes, but it’s not like people weren’t killed by horses or trolleys either. The death toll was never zero but it went up sharply when everyone was expected to drive much heavier vehicles at higher speeds.

One person dying does not equate to "unsafe roads" in the way that "widespread adoption of motor vehicles" does. People were frequently trampled by horse-drawn carriages prior to cars, but not at anywhere close to the rate after cars became so ubiquitous.

Before cars it was highway robbers. Being in between places is always a higher risk location and roads are the guaranteed routes someone will go down. Cars make it safer for the people in them, the same way a stagecoach protected people up to a point.

"Cars make traveling safer than before, so we shouldn't care about improving automotive safety" is such a weird take.

I'm more trying to point out that traveling safety is always viewed as being about the traveller, not the people around them. So of course drivers love safer (for them) cars, while caring less that such safety comes at the expense of pedestrians.

I am less concerned with how today's car's relate to roads from 100 years ago and more interested in how today's cars relate to other options we have today, like bicycles and public transit.

> Before cars it was highway robbers.

This is a bad comparison. One occurs when travelling in unpopulated areas. But most pedestrian fatalities occur in populated areas which should be safe for pedestrians (and historically were).

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