American drivers even more distracted by phones. Pedestrian deaths are soaring | Hacker News Reader

American drivers even more distracted by phones. Pedestrian deaths are soaring

vox.com

43 pointsneallindsay97 comments

I bought a new car this year.

It has HUGE blindspots behind the pillars (it's an SUV). They're placed in line with the crosswalk when I'm at a red light. So I have to bob my head around if I want to see anyone about to cross

the mirrors FOV also are extremely limited!

My last car was a 1998 volvo. It had side mirrors that were half convex to give you a wider FOV. I can't believe how much better it is than my 2024 SUV!

I can't understand how cars have any blindspots in 2024. Surely we have the ability to design better mirrors, more cameras, smaller pillars..

Return the car and buy one without those defects?

Pretty sure crash test requirements are the cause of a lot of the shrinking sight lines in modern cars so any newer car is going to have these kinds of problems to some degree.

Those crash test requirements should take into account what you’re crashing into :) it’s all the protection for the car occupants and none for those in the real word.

Pillar mounted airbags are one reason pillars got so much wider in the mid-2000s.

Those are on the B-pillars, near the driver/passenger heads - but they don't put em on the A-pillars, too, do they?

They are in A-pillars on most cars I think, as part of the overhead curtain airbag system. (They are on both of mine, anyway; I don’t have a full dataset.)

There will usually (maybe it's mandated?) be a little symbol on the pillar, like this one: https://imgur.com/20lNA99

My truck has big labels letting you know there are airbags in the A-pillar.

Speculation: total car mass implies the need of increased structural support in the case of a roll. I'm also guessing it's regulated

If it's not airbags, it's crash test ratings. The death machine must only be a death machine to people on the wrong side of the line in the venn diagram depicting the set of owner and family.

Any vehicle I have ever owned has them in the A-pillar. Not sure how they would work in the B-pillar with the seatbelt and all, but I am no auto expert.

That's what we get if we let the market figure it out... This should be regulated by the state I think.

Wider A pillars and worse visibility has a lot to do with mandated stronger roofs. Good for rollover survivability but bad for pedestrian safety. SUVs are a ridiculous trend and are more prone to rollovers.

In addition, the rearview mirror completely blocks an essential part of my view to the road. It is mounted too low for my height. I tried many new cars and it’s everywhere the same problem. Of course, I could lower the seat, but then my long legs require me to move further back while my arms are too short to still reach the steering wheel, even in its most outward position. So I resorted to remove the rearview mirror, which is allowed if the rear window is blind.

really? wow!

I wonder if it's a result of the Flaw of Averages problem

https://www.thestar.com/news/insight/when-u-s-air-force-disc...

Yes, I remember that article well; thanks for the link. This resonates well with me. I guess its due to “safety” optimization and a trend to aerodynamic, smaller windows. Also, the roof needs to support a much higher car weight in case of an accident, requiring more sturdy structures. I don’t know. But I am not the only one: https://tall.life/best-cars-for-tall-people/

Having went from a late 90s vehicle to a 2010, I can agree with this. The visibility out of this truck is incredibly poor compared to the one from the late 90s.

Were those flaws not obvious on the test drive? I also bought a car this year and the mirrors + pillars aren’t like that - I would say maybe we shouldn’t support manufacturers with our money who are pushing unsafe designs.

a 10 minute test drive in upstate new york does not give you the time to understand all the issues, unfortunately. quite a few things I did not realize I didn't like until about 2-3 months driving the car daily.

I would agree in general. I think that if I knew about them I would probably have evaluated other car manufacturers more closely.

I rented a ford ecosport a few years ago and couldnt believe how bad the forward visibility was. Huge fat pillars positioned perfectly to block the drivers view of where the car is headed when turning left at typical intersections. Now when i cross roads as a pedestrian i regularly spot the faces of drivers completely blocked by the front pillar as their vehicle careens toward me. Better hope they are paying attention during the half second window they have to apply the brake after finally seeing me. Sometimes i open an umbrella before crossing.

> It has HUGE blindspots behind the pillars (it's an SUV). They're placed in line with the crosswalk when I'm at a red light. So I have to bob my head around if I want to see anyone about to cross

Doesn't the angle of the pillars help with that?

My SUV is on the smaller side (Honda CR-V) and is also fairly old (2006) so maybe its pillars aren't as big as those on bigger and/or later cars.

My pillars do look pretty big, but because of their angles they actually are much less effective at hiding pedestrians (unless they are walking like a Robert Crumb character [1]) who are close enough that a collision is possible.

For the passenger side front pillar because I'm seeing it mostly from the side its apparent angle is quite far from vertical. If it blocked my view of someone's head their chest and below would be visible. If it blocked their chest their head and their hips would be visible. If it blocked their hips I'd see their chest and head.

For the driver side front pillar I'm seeing it from about equally from the back and side, so its apparent angle is not as far from vertical is that of the passenger front pillar. That does make it better at blocking views of pedestrians.

If the pedestrian is close it still won't be able to block all of them, but with that pillar I think the distance at which it is possible to block all of them is close enough that they could move into range of a collision fairly quickly.

However, because that pillar is close to my head it doesn't take much change in my eye position to make a significant change to the location of the volume of space that is blocked.

In particular I don't have to bob my head. Just rotating it moves my eyes enough that if someone was in the region where they are close enough to be in danger but are blocked from my peripheral vision when looking ahead they would not be in the blocked region when my head is turned to look toward that side.

I've done some tests of this just sitting in a busy parking lot watching as pedestrians walk by or near my car to see if/when I lose sight of them.

> My last car was a 1998 volvo. It had side mirrors that were half convex to give you a wider FOV. I can't believe how much better it is than my 2024 SUV!

My mirrors are flat, but I bought a small stick on convex mirror that I stuck on my driver side mirror. With that when something comes from behind on the driver's side it is always visible in at least one of {center mirror, convex side mirror, flat side mirror}. On the passenger side when something leaves the center mirror it is visible in the side mirror so I didn't need to add a convex mirror.

[1] https://www.amazon.com/Truckin-Crumb-Laminated-Blacklight-Po...

Only 15% of pedestrian hit by car fatalities are prosecuted. Of those, the vast majority were DUI as well.

So 85% if the time, there are no consequences for killing a pedestrian with your car. If you are sober, it's like 95%.

Even when they do prosecute, juries tend to acquit on major charges. They put themselves in the shoes in the driver instead of the victim.

My feeling is that, in the US, automobile regulations are derived from horse and carriage regulations.

When the horse was pulling the cart, it could get spooked and run off, killing or injuring pedestrians. Even though the driver nominally has control of the horse, the horse is an independent entity. This limited the liability of the driver. For example, if the horse ran off and killed someone, as long as the driver stuck around to explain, they wouldn't suffer very much in terms of consequences.

It seems today that automobiles, although not an independent entity, still get the same kind of protections as a horse does. That's why and automobile driver who kills a pedestrian in the street can basically get off scot-free, even though the driver has full control over the automobile at the time.

And with self-driving we're moving back toward that lessened liability because who knows how the damn thing works.

As the saying goes: If you want to murder someone and maximize the chance you get away with it, hit them with your car. The US criminal justice system is ridiculously permissive on car accidents even when people die.

If smartphones were the root cause - it wouldn't diverge between USA and Europe.

The insanity of driving trucks instead of compact cars in cities is a big factor.

Being hit by 1 ton of metal vs. being hit by 3 tons of metal still sounds rather painful.

You have more visibility in a smaller car. So the smaller car has a lower chance of hitting you.

Not sure if you’re being sarcastic, but the research is clear that trucks (and other high front end vehicles) are more likely to kill pedestrians:

https://www.iihs.org/news/detail/vehicles-with-higher-more-v...

> Whatever their nose shape, pickups, SUVs and vans with a hood height greater than 40 inches are about 45 percent more likely to cause fatalities in pedestrian crashes than cars and other vehicles with a hood height of 30 inches or less and a sloping profile, an IIHS study of nearly 18,000 pedestrian crashes found.

Trucks have turned into real monsters. Others on here have mentioned that legislation intended to improve fuel economy had some sort of yearly increasing weight category that was suppose to reduce the amount of large vehicles. But manufacturers all gamed it by just increasing the weight and size vehicles to stay above the line.

Sure. Pedestrian protection on trucks, especially US trucks / SUVs is much worse compared to more compact designs. As is visibility forbthe driver. Combined, this is bad news for pedestrians and cyclists. Add distractions by phones, and it is a potential desaster.

It's more about visibility and ease of maneuvering the vehicle.

One of the first public videos of the Cybertruck showed it hitting an object as exited a parking lot. It's just way harder to drive a huge truck than it is to drive a sedan, but everyone thinks they are an above average driver so that doesn't aply to them.

> If smartphones were the root cause - it wouldn't diverge between USA and Europe.

The article says "We’re also spending nearly three times more time distracted by our phones than drivers in the United Kingdom and several other European countries. US drivers spent an average of 2 minutes 11 seconds on their phones per hour while driving, compared to 44 seconds per hour for UK drivers, CMT found."

> The insanity of driving trucks instead of compact cars in cities is a big factor.

No argument there.

Penalties for being on your phone while driving are fairly different between different countries. In the UK it's 6 points and £200 if you're caught. It's a fair deterrent

In addition to lighter penalties, there's no enforcement of the law in much of the U.S.

Last I heard, it was around $100 here. But I can't imagine that it's enforced. If you walk three blocks downtown without seeing a drive using a phone, you aren't looking.

Difference in enforcement, consequences, and social norms.

Europeans avoided the cupholder for so long.

A significant and costly driving test, versus practically free and quick in the US. A $100 fine for being caught with a cell phone versus losing your license. And, of course, a realistic alternative in public transit and walkable communities.

In 2023 I moved into an apartment across from a school in Chicago. The room I work in looks over the street. It's shocking how many drivers are looking at their phone as they approach a crosswalk where children are actively crossing to go to school! It's worse in the morning: parents drop off their own child and they just pick the phone right up, I guess. Other kids be damned.

My living room backs up to a T-intersection in the alley. I also live next door to a school.

Every. Single. Day. I see parents on their phone blowing through the stop signs in the alley at that intersection. During school drop-off! While there are kids and parents walking in that alley to get to the school!

It is utter madness.

No enforcement, no consequences, so nobody is going to change.

This is the major reason I sold my motorcycle this past summer. It's bad enough that drivers have a hard time seeing motorcycles, multiple in-car distractions just make it worse. It was fun while it lasted.

I don't ride my bicycle on the roads for the same reason.

I'm saddened when I see people insulate themselves from life's pleasures. I don't wish for this to come across in a way that makes you feel defensive — it's your life to live as you choose.

I have friends that seem to have settled into a lifestyle that steers clear of dangers and I have watched as they have lived, from my point of view, very insular lives lacking that rare excitement that the world has to offer.

Every motorcycle owner I've known has been struck by others or had very serious close calls, except one who didn't have it very long. Of those struck two of the five nearly died, one is a quadriplegic.

Riding motorcycles in urban areas is betting your life on other people's awareness.

I think I only know one motorcycle owner that was seriously injured (on a scooter, in college).

I've owned a motorcycle more years than not since I was 12 years old. For some stretches of that time the motorcycle was the only motorized transportation I could afford and I relied on it (even in the winter on icy streets) to get to and from work and college. And I've dropped motorcycles a few times, slammed into the back of a bus once (icy), but otherwise have been okay.

I'm older now and less desperate and so can afford to take the motorcycle out only on joy rides where I can pick the weather and the destination (out of the urban areas). And not to stereotype bikers too much, but I might add that I have never owned a sport/racing bike. I am more like the gentleman motorcyclist of an earlier era, ha ha.

Obviously the above has made riding much safer. I don't think I could completely give up riding though until I become physically unable to.

I don't offer this to refute your experience but rather to complement your comment with an example of a rider (turning 60 this year) that has not been seriously injured and has enjoyed the "sport".

I'm saddened, too, but it seems strange to frame the problem as people complacently embracing dull and insular lives, rather than a proliferation of dangerous jackasses who leave us no choice but to alter our behavior.

I wouldn’t expect much to change.

We love our cars and we love our phones. The number of pedestrian deaths we’re willing to tolerate is going to be much higher than anyone is willing to admit.

You can handwring all you want about how that’s not true but just look around.

Ultimately, cars and pedestrians need to be kept apart. Cars belong on a mode like a controlled access highway. Pedestrians belong basically everywhere else.

Right. Great to say, but in the US nobody really gives a shit. They’ll say they do but their actions tell the truth.

> The United States is increasingly an outlier when it comes to...

...any form of industry regulation.

Don't expect this to improve. The US is firmly entrenched in 1950s arrested development.

WRT pedestrian deaths, pedestrian cell phone usage is also culpable, but cell phone use behind the wheel, especially at freeway speeds, is straight up criminal negligence.

But everyone knows: "driving is such a distraction from playing w/ the phone"...

This will get worse until self driving cars are common. Collectively we value using our phones and driver safety much more than pedestrian lives.

Self-driving could be one way to fix the problem at some hand-wavy time in the future. Right now, however, reducing the number of cars in cities, slowing them down, making alternatives to driving more attractive, improving driver education and awareness, and changing the concept of car safety to include people outside the vehicle are all options available to us. Unlike automated driving, these address other problems our society faces, too, like obesity, insularity, pollution, and climate change.

That would be great, but history has shown doing those things to be less realistic. I'm in Phoenix and Waymo is all over and driving safely. We need this everywhere ASAP.

History hasn't shown that at all. In many places, these changes are already happening, and fast. Meanwhile, self-driving cars are a relative pipe dream and likely to cause even bigger problems than we have now, if and when they ever materialize.

It seems like CarPlay an Android Auto should work against this trend. Maybe cars with those features aren't entering the pool fast enough to overcome how much our attention on our phones is growing?

Except when CarPlay(can’t speak to Android) doesn't work as intended, requiring you to still pick up your phone after you tried to accomplish something on CarPlay.

I’m on the road about 3,000 miles/mo and CarPlay not functioning properly happens so often that I don’t even really notice anymore how often I have to pick up my phone.

The correct thing to do in that case is to stop before picking up your phone and if it happens to much stop using it altogether and switch to a more reliable system.

And not driving at all for the entire day if you slept poorly the night before. And pulling over into a parking lot before attending to your toddler’s question. Follow at a safe distance. Slow down in rain. Completely stop at stop signs. Strictly follow speed limits in residential areas. And a thousand other things that unreliable humans aren’t going to do 100% of the time, but if done would improve safety.

What system is available for iPhone that is more reliable than CarPlay?

Are you pretending people can't be distracted by choosing which song on spotify they want on android auto or car play?

distracted != tapping on your phone

Having a handless call in your car arguing about what to buy at groceries in your return trip from work with your significant other can be a dangerous distraction. Sure your eyes may be steered towards the road but your focus might be somewhere else and make you miss important stuff. Or telling the kids at the back to shut up and stop fighting.

I wish people would be more aware of that and wouldn't think they can just drive their car as if it was an extension to their living room.

No, of course you can be distracted operating the infotainment systems in your car, but directly manipulating your phone is much worse.

I could see people still being distracted scrolling through podcasts.

And for some reason voice commands for podcasts have never been figured out.

"Play a different episode"

"Sorry, I have no idea how to do that"

Them: Be scared. AI is really smart and is going to take your job.

In fairness, I think there's reasons they're intentionally making it different to select what you want to play... but WTF is up with that, too.

My favorite is, some time around last summer, whenever I told Google to play the latest episode of Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me, it invariably plays some random unrelated (not even a similar name) music on Spotify.

I have no idea if this would work with Google, but I've noticed with Alexa it seems less likely to play a song when I ask for a non-song if I tell it to "listen" to the non-song rather than to "play" the non-song.

As the user replying to you said, there are voice commands. But I get what you are saying — not everyone knows about or trusts the fidelity of the voice software.

I wonder though if Apple and Android could remove non-voice functionality from their platforms thereby forcing users to use voice to navigate certain features like song selection.

Or perhaps changing songs mechanically can only be done when the velocity of the vehicle is zero.

I suspect people will be pissed off about those changes, but I think if I were CEO and had the authority, I would sleep better at night knowing I am doing everything to try to curtail pedestrian deaths because of my product.

People are making snaps (I see ZILLIONS of stories made by car drivers), scrolling through TikTok, watching YouTube, sending texts, not just making calls.

There is a very simple technological solution to this - disable screens on phones in motion faster than xmph - but people are violently against this minor inconvenience for passengers and mass transport commuters for the same reason drivers can't put their phone down, so this problem will likely continue to get worse, especially as the younger generation becomes drivers.

I am more or less in favor of this - but how do you solve for the problem that not everyone in the car is actually driving and may not want to be prevented from using their phone when riding as a passenger? If we can solve that one, it sounds like a no-brainer to me.

I don't think you can in an intelligent way. One simple solution would be to only disable the screen if the phone is connected to car Bluetooth - but this would just result in most phone addicts not connecting their phone to the car.

That's why people are against it - the idea of passengers returning to the pre-smartphone era while traveling seems to be considered by most people totally outrageous and and unacceptable price to pay for lowering the accident rate, which has climbed almost solely to due smartphones.

> most people totally outrageous and and unacceptable

What's totally outrageous and unacceptable is the idea that my phone can tell me when I'm allowed to use it or not, based on arbitrary rules set up by tech clowns who are not in my current situation and do not know why I might need it.

It's frankly asinine to suggest I should not be able to look up a map of a city while riding a bus because someone else might be texting and driving.

Most people would find this outrageous because it is.

Even that is stupid. A passenger should be able to add a stop to the navigation while the car is in motion.

I can do this with voice on my iPhone. Worst case scenario you pull over and do it.

Maybe insurance companies can give discounts for installing their app that "locks" your phone while in motion.

If you're the passenger and want to unlock the phone...take a selfie? More psychology than tech here.

This wouldn't affect mass transit commuters since they wouldn't have a car insurance app. The insurance company could sell it as a way to get additional savings...I recently did something similar with safeco that was way more invasive.

Not perfect, but if Im Geico; I have a team mulling over something similar as an easy way to drop accident rates...?

Every phone has a camera. Basically require the forward facing camera to be on if using the phone above X mph. From there, we should have sufficient computer vision processing to identify if someone is driving, and refuse to allow any use until given to a passenger or pulled over.

Additionally we could require all phones to support the SafeDriving protocol, and there be dash mounted camera in all cars with appropriate computer vision to identify unsafe phone use while driving lock ALL phones within the car or slow car to the curb.

There is nothing worse than when techies try to solve social problems with tech solutions.

How about we try and figure out how to train people to be better drivers, and more responsible adults in general, rather than continuing to let people off the hook and treating the whole of society like children that need their phones taken away by big daddy tech?

I hate this sort of petty tech dictatorship stuff.

I sympathize with your sentiments, but the social problem was created by tech solutions in the first place.

> How about we try and figure out how to train people to be better drivers, and more responsible adults in general,

You can't. You may improve things at the margins but it will do nothing to the overall trend. Smartphone use is addictive. Consider that decades of cradle-to-grave anti-smoking education with huge amounts of funding combined with immediate financial disincentives (high taxes) succeeded only in lowering the smoking rate to 12%. People are not ideal rational actors.

And smartphones are an even more intractable problem, because we're suggesting educating people out of smartphone addiction, but only out of not using it while they drive. It is simply not possible to educate a sizable proportion of the population out of this. Even strict police enforcement will not make a big difference.

> social problem was created by tech solutions in the first place.

No it wasn't, people have driven with distractions since cars were invented. Eating in the car, arguing with passengers, wrangling children, looking at paper maps, doing their makeup. etc.

The problem is people

And yet, right in the title, pedestrian deaths are soaring.

Yes, distractions have always existed.

I don’t think it’s controversial to say that smartphone addiction increased the scale and severity of the problem by orders of magnitude.

No, it's not controversial at all, we're in complete agreement.

Tech has taken a lot of social problems and poured gas on them, it's not just this one.

In some of those cases it may make sense to place limits on the tech to try and curb that.

And yeah, if there is a tech way to solve this without negatively impacting passengers or commuters, it might be worth exploring.

But my point still stands. This is a social problem, it was not created by smartphones and it therefore cannot be fixed by changing smartphones. At best you can try and mitigate it.

And an effort to mitigate it will never fly if it has to affect every other person that may not even ever drive themselves.

That’s an excellent set of points. For analogy, people used to smoke on their cars (another very addictive thing), but smoking was not nearly as distracting as smartphone use.

Likewise, listening to the radio is habit forming (some people don’t seem to be able to sit in quiet in their car). But it’s also not nearly as distracting - just turn the radio on and maybe try to change the station.

Ultimately the tech industry needs to first be held responsible and liable for the problems it creates.

Enough of the population simply doesn't have the self control to resist the dopamine IV drip that comes from phone use.

We're so far gone that we now bolt garbage touchscreens into the middle of the car to distract drivers by default. The same thing that would get you a fine if caught is OK as long as it comes with the car.

Or is it? My car has a warning when it starts up that basically says that the factory installed touchscreen is to dangerous to use while driving and I'm liable for any distractions it causes me.

As someone who used to commute every day by public transport for >1 hour for years, I sincerely wish someone would disable the screen on all your devices, permanently.

I've seen plenty of delusional shit on HN when it comes to solving societal problems, and this is easily in top ten.

Will CarPlay read Twitter to me?

As a Carplay user I plead guilty to having been distracted by it in the past while driving, though I think it generally does a good job of it.

Unpopular opinion: pedestrians need to be MORE aware crossing streets. Stop jay walking and assuming people see you and will stop.

Same with bicyclists. You may have the right of way but it doesn't matter when your critically injured or worse: dead.

I don't think that's an unpopular opinion at all, but it's still just victim blaming. People are run over on sidewalks, cyclists on cycling paths or just standing at red lights. There's basically only one type of road user that is a danger to anyone else [0], the focus should be to make drivers less dangerous and not to make everyone else even more aware. Where I live people already wear high-viz clothing when riding a bike or even just going for a walk, but still get run over.

[0] https://transport.ec.europa.eu/system/files/2021-11/collisio...

Story time, I had to dive bomb out of the way of a car that lost it brakes and had ran onto the sidewalk. I am alive today because I keep my head up and pay attention to the world around me.

It's not victim blaming to be aware of one's surroundings and act accordingly. Too many people are passively going through their day and lack complete situational awareness.

Wake up and pay attention when there are 2.5 ton steel death machines around and no I'm not going to click your link.

Story time. I find myself to be pushing a stroller around a lot these days, and the number of times where I have to wait behind some obstacles to make place for another stroller, kids, someone in a wheelchair, a blind person, old people with walkers, is much higher than I thought it would be when I was just my agile, young self. I'm sure they'd all love to dive bomb away from cars that are running into them.

Sounds like a you problem. 〜 ( ꒪ ꒳ ꒪ ) 〜

Nah, it's just good situational awareness.

Maybe look in front of them and avoid trucks of peace.

Part and parcel of living in a big city ♪ ( ´ ε )

That's the world you want to live in?

Sadly, you can't seem to offer up any preventative safety advice to people anymore, without being accused of victim blaming. We tell kids to wear helmets on their bikes and to look both ways before crossing the street, and that's not victim blaming.

We need to normalize accepting responsibility for one's own safety (and the safety of others) in a world full of hazards.

Yup pretty much. Society is filled with pussies.

Look, it's always a good idea to take responsibility for your own safety. I've seen people get in to accidents that were entirely avoidable and no one wins with that. I've often advocated this.

But at the same time, this just isn't a solution to a structural problem like this. All pedestrians and cyclists constantly being in fear and having to be on the lookout for mad idiots driving like a complete muppet because they're looking on their phones is just not a solution.

It's not being constantly in fear. It's called being situationally aware around 2 ton death machines and being mentally prepared to act accordingly.

The reason people get hurt is because they aren't paying attention and react poorly. I said it elsewhere but I almost got hit by a car whose brakes failed. I dove out of the way and live to tell about it because I walk with my head up and look forward. Too many people live with their head in the clouds (or their phones) and act surprised when freak accidents happen.

Situational awareness goes a long way to keeping one safe and it frankly doesn't surprise me that a site like this is filled with people who would rather safety pad the world than pay attention to his surroundings.

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