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Comment by firesteelrain | Hacker News Reader

I am not an expert on car safety standards in either US or EU. Nitpicking this quote: “ Europe currently has mandatory requirements for life-saving technologies, such as pedestrian protection, automated emergency braking and lane-keeping assistance”

My cheap, Chevy Trax has some of these features. Lane keeping assistance is there. It will tell me if there is a pedestrian in front of me. If it sees someone’s brake lights then it will flash a red light on the windshield to warn me that I am too close.

It doesn’t have emergency braking but my Wife’s 2019 Honda Odyssey had all those things except the pedestrian protection. All US vehicles.

What standards are we really talking about?

This is one of these articles that feels more like clickbait and judging on the emotional responses I see in this comment section it worked. The top comment is railing against Dodge Rams which wasn’t mentioned in the article.

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One of these features is "Active Hood" or "Pop Up Hood" which uses pyrotechnic to pop the hood of the car in case of a frontal collision with a pedestrian, thus making the front hood of the car acting as some kind of stiff airbag for the pedestrian. This helps reducing the risk of life-threatening injuries. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q4zfwUL3joI

NotJustBikes on youtube has a video listing more of these features which don't exist in cars sold in the US: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=--832LV9a3I

NotJustBikes cover's this in the latest video, starting here:

https://youtu.be/--832LV9a3I?si=HpfmA8mFIsJJ_Uhp&t=333

Of course, I think if a company is targeting both markets, you may benefit from some features.

And it's not just about you, but the other people driving around you who pose a danger to you.

That’s why the US vehicles focus on occupant safety since the US does not have a pedestrian centric culture - it is now built around cars. Some places in small pockets are trying to change that but it’s slow and unlikely to be widespread. Other roadway safety features for pedestrians by cities or counties have been enacted. But these lessons are learned in blood. Recently there was a case a couple years ago in a beach town in Florida where a girl died crossing A1A. That town put in a bunch of safety devices after aggressively lobbying the State. But the vehicles weren’t modified.

[1] https://www.clickorlando.com/news/local/2020/02/26/driver-wh...

[2] https://www.wesh.com/article/calls-for-crosswalk-changes-aft...

The US, at least at the state level, has often adopted standards far earlier than Europe. Seat belts, the latch system (called ISOFix in Europe) for car seats, and airbags come to mind.

Agreed that this feels like click/rage bait mostly against US pickup trucks, which many people in the States express frustration with too!

>EU vehicle safety regulations have supported a 36% reduction in European road deaths since 2010. By contrast, road deaths in the US over the same period increased 30%, with pedestrian deaths up 80% and cyclist deaths up 50%

There might be something in those stats other than anecdotal vibes.

Devils advocate

How do we really know that? If people walk more and drive less one could argue that road deaths go down too. US has a lot more cars and roads than EU. And we have this massive Interstate system.

Have you verified your numbers? With some basic searching I found that the amount of cars registered in the EU seems to be comparable (if not slightly more than) than the USA, while the total length of public roads in the USA is about 10% more than that one of the EU. Keep in mind that in the EU you have a lot of European routes which can stretch vast amount of distances over several countries, similar to the US' interstate system. The biggest factor I can think of is the lack of sidewalks and bike lanes in the US on many roads, additionally there's a disregard of bicyclists by car users, which negatively encourages these two to be as prevalent on the roads as compared to in the EU, since everyone is incentivized to just get a car anyway.

You might want to double check your own numbers. EU having “comparable or slightly more” cars than the US depends entirely on whether you count the EU as a single bloc or as individual nations. Per capita car ownership is still higher in the US. Road length is also not the relevant metric. What matters is road design, lane width, speed environment, lighting, and pedestrian exposure.

Pointing to “a lot of European routes” does not explain why US pedestrian deaths climbed 80 percent in 15 years while EU rates fell. Road geometry, car size, and enforcement patterns do. Sidewalks and bike lanes are part of the story but not the whole story.

If we are trading verification requests, the burden applies both ways.

>How do we really know that?

As the Devils advocate, the burden is upon you to propose a viable alternative.

Merely asking "what if it's not that" is called sowing doubt, a practice that aims to undermine trust in established information.

Suggest a viable reason for any of the below figures, and then others can chime in with their criticisms of your rationale.

USA car fatalities over the last 15 years:

- 30% increase in road deaths

- 80% increase in pedestrian fatalities by car

- 50% increase in cyclist fatalities by car

You are mixing up “Devils advocate” with “prove the negative for me.” The point of Devils advocate is to test assumptions, not to accept the first correlation as gospel.

If pedestrian and cyclist deaths rise 80% and 50% while vehicle size, road design, lighting, speeding, and impairment trends also shift, then asking whether those factors matter is not “sowing doubt.” It is literally how causal analysis works. If your position is that questioning causality is illegitimate unless I hand you a fully formed alternative theory, then you are not defending evidence. You are defending certainty.

nope, and arguing the point was anticipated. You've still not presented anything.

You're free to suggest an alternative concept, and that would be discussed because this is a forum, and not a place to play transparent political games.

No. I am not required to present an alternative explanation just to question someone’s claim. Challenging an inference is valid on its own.

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