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Big ass trucks can’t see pedestrians immediately in front and to the side of them because they’re so tall.
I own one of those trucks. There’s several feet in front of me that I literally cannot see. Some models had an optional front facing camera to address the issue.
There’s no reason for the height, other than “We can’t be shorter than other brand”. It’s less fuel efficient, less convenient for hauling things (you have to lift stuff that much further into the bed), makes it handle worse, and makes it less good for towing. Unfortunately there are no heavy duty short trucks being made. Nor can you really lower the current truck due to the design of the rear axle. You might get a few inches, but that’s about it.
I really like the Ridgeline, but it cannot handle the work we do with our 3/4 ton pickup (towing a heavy trailer).
I hope you know you’re an outlier. The vast majority of people who own trucks in the US don’t use them for things like towing or hauling.
According to this data from Axios,[1] on a self-reported survey, only 7% of US truck owners regularly use them for towing, and only 28% regularly use them for hauling.
87% use them for fucking grocery shopping.
They are called pavement princesses and mall crawlers.
Lifted trucks and jeeps that have never even seen a gravel road
I think you mean “street princesses”. “Pavement princesses” seems to be slang for prostitutes.
Yes, and this is the kind of thing I hate. We have tools to use them, but get looked down on because most people are buying completely insane tools for their actual use case / needs. It also leads to the fricken “Luxury Trucks” and all around the trucks costing more and more.
Of course, we’re also privileged to be able to get a truck used, and not drive it unless we need to haul or tow something heavy. So we drive much smaller vehicles for commuting or getting groceries.
Some models had an optional front facing camera to address the issue.
This is bonkers. How can a car company think that this is a reasonable solution to the issue?
Had a friend in tenth grade die that way, large truck hit him while he was crossing an intersection on a bike (they didn’t stop at a stop sign). Even on the bike he wasn’t tall enough to be seen over the hood.
And not just big ass trucks. I sat in a toyota highlander the other day and the hood was tall and massive. Why? Just for style. It has a small 4 cylinder. The nhtsa or whoever needs to add a car safety category for visibility. Until then massive grills and low visibility will be the norm.
Ironically pedestrian crumple zone requirements mean biggers hoods.
Yeah but on the flip side isn’t this really driver Ed problem? I drove a semi truck, which you can hide an entire car in the frontal blindspot of, and I never hit anything (well not with the front of it, backing is hard okay!)
Visibility should always be a consideration in vehicle safety but I feel the bigger problem is people who don’t know how to handle that. If you have limited frontal visibility you should always be paying attention at lights to be sure no one has walked in front of your vehicle, simply doing this almost entirely eliminates the risk. Sadly people are too impatient to wait to get where they are going to fuck around with their phones.
Always the same, self absorbed people causing havoc for everyone else.
Though I also agree that Americans are way too obsessed with trucks but I think that’s a tougher change than long term improvements in drivers education and safety culture. Full size pickup trucks just won’t die, even though they have taken the place of things like minivans and SUVs they don’t have any of the stigma wagons or minivans and SUVs built up with the same trend/bust cycle. My parents think SUVs are cool, I think they are lame family cars or yuppie mobiles.
Also have you seen a new escalade in person? It’s offensive.
The quality of driving on American roads has continually gotten worse year over year from my subjective point of view. It really needs to be turned around if we want to make any progress on road safety for everyone.
A large issue is that SUVs and pickup trucks are classified as light trucks, which means they don’t have to meet the same emission standards as cars. That incentivized manufacturers and sellers to push them in the US, which as led to the situation we’re in now.
Yes that is also a serious problem CAFE categories destroyed the American sedan. Though I think as CUVs became more fuel efficient this was going to happen anyways, tall hatchback is the ideal for a car in a lot of ways as much as I hate them.
This doesn’t surprise me. I’m always so nervous, every driver seems so distracted. I hear everyone wants to keep their autonomy to drive, (this is in theory if autonomous driving was safe or the roads had rails for example) but they also want to look at their phones and do other shit. 😩
It’s not the drivers. I suppose you could say drivers have become slightly more distracted due to touchscreen consoles, but the real issue is vehicles keep getting larger and pedestrians no longer ride up the hood onto the roof when being hit by a car. Instead you are hit by a 5 foot tall wall (grill) and die, and the driver doesn’t brake because they never even saw you due to the enormous blind spot in front of their truck/suv
EDIT: I’m getting a disturbing amount of pushback on this comment, so I’m dropping this video here: These Stupid Trucks are Literally Killing Us | Not Just Bikes
It feels dishonest to say it isn’t drivers. You could see them coming from the sides more if you pay more attention?
Is driving with a blind spot NOT something we are taught to check and eliminate and are the fault of the driver to chose that vehicle/not adjusting or getting mirrors, not driving slower, etc?
I think we’re lying to ourselves if we don’t think people could do better.
In theory. But how will that behavioral change be implemented? In my view this is unrealistic and often used as a cop out to avoid the more difficult infrastructural changes needed. Many countries in Europe have developed proven strategies to reduce pedestrian deaths but in the US we choose not to implement them. The carnage will continue until we decide we’re actually going to solve the problem.
You discount that we have a horrible and state-by-state driving rules and training? We do not have skilled people on the road, we have people who have no respect for the machine they are in. Do you not think the government could regulate that, too?
Some room for improvement here but many people will ignore training regardless of how in-depth it may be. So I think the bigger issue is the infrastructure that allows and encourages unsafe behavior.
If it’s going to work you’ll need meaningful levels of enforcement and punishments for unsafe behavior, including license suspension. Suspensions are rarely used today because it’s seen as “too harsh” for most infractions. The lack of alternatives to car based transit makes it an economic death sentence. So again, the solution will need changes to and investment in infrastructure.
But the problem is bad so I’m certainly open to these educational approaches in combination with other changes. What I’m not open to is the common attitude of “It’s those other bad drivers’ fault so I personally don’t need to change anything.” Until this gets better I think all road users have a moral obligation to advocate for change.
Im saying none of the drivers earned driving in the first place. You act like we have a good and vigerous process, like we don’t all know people who shouldn’t be on the road who get their license?
Just because someone has a license doesnt meann they arent an idiot. Where i came from you could do training OR have a patent sign a form that you trained. Training was 4 weekends and a few hundred dollars.
This is ridiculous, how much of this would be better if people didn’t get their license until they actually had some proficiency?
I edited my post to include a video I highly recommend you watch as it will better explain what I was saying.
Here’s one of the comments on the video:
We know someone who’s 4 year old child was killed in a crosswalk. They were walking as a family and their daughter was walking just behind the dad. The SUV thought everyone was through the crosswalk and drove right over the child and killed her. She didn’t see her. It’s absolutely heartbreaking.
Oh wow. One event! Definitely clearly we don’t have a road full of people who were teens who halfassed their license in big vehicles they likely should have more license to handle.
But you know. We currently dont have a federal standards for regular class C i am sure we can definitely just get smaller cars made, that’ll fix underqualified drivers.
You tell me a story of a driver who doesn’t pay attention to the number of people who enter and leave the walkways and the car is the issue?
it feels more like everyone in the entire society is more stressed and desperate and that’s reflected in the driving
I remember seeing studies in the US[1] that showed that wreckless driving had drastically increased during the pandemic… and stayed high afterwards.
Everyone is at the end of their rope. The problem is that everyone is also taking that out on everyone else, even though everyone else is in the exact same position.
I’d rather meet the consequences of being late, then being an unsafe driver.
Just take a moment to slow down, and look out for pedestrian crossing signs. Drive the speed limit, You will make it to your destination, it’s not a race.
People have been driving like goddamn maniacs ever since the pandemic. It’s like the lack of traffic hit a reset switch and made everyone forget how to behave.
I was about to ask whether they were killed by car accidents or by drive-by shootings
Mandatory in-person yearly testing for drivers over 59 and those numbers will plummet
I understand the reason people say this, but… This country runs on making individuals take care of themselves. A lot of people who reach that age literally have nobody else. We don’t have a sufficient public transit system to accommodate the people who really shouldn’t be driving.
So I’m not really sure about this one. In a way, it’s just punishing lonely old people with no extra money and no one to do errands for them, and leaving them to possibly die from being unable to take care of themselves.
I’m not saying the way things are is okay. We really need more support for the elderly in this regard (especially in regards to public transit), because this is why a huge number of them continue driving beyond when they should be: because they literally have to because they have no one else they can rely on but themselves.
Also, it helps to read the article which references many reasons this is happening, and none of them are the elderly.
From the Fucking Article:
Pedestrian deaths have been climbing since 2010 because of unsafe infrastructure and the prevalence of SUVs, which tend to be more deadly for pedestrians than smaller cars, according to Martin. When the pandemic arrived, there was an even greater surge as empty roads gave way to speeding and distracted driving.
The pandemic has waned, but cases of reckless driving — and subsequently the number of Americans killed while walking — has not. The new data, released on Friday, shows the U.S. continues to lag in its effort to improve road safety, even as experts say some solutions are within reach.
Nary a word about elderly drivers making an impact. I’d suspect the NHTSA probably has more data about this than either of us do, so I’m gonna go out on a limb and say it’s “not the fucking elderly.”
I actually did read the “fucking article”, and others besides. Also, if you’re going to be condescending to people on Lemmy, at least stop talking like you’re narrating the next 2am chili. It is the judgment of this court (me) that you have posted cringe.
Anyway:
https://siegfriedandjensen.com/passing-the-test/
https://crashstats.nhtsa.dot.gov/Api/Public/ViewPublication/813266
https://www.iihs.org/topics/older-drivers/license-renewal-laws-table
Example 1, New Mexico:
- While New Mexico allows you to renew your license every 4 or 8 years as a personal option, drivers 71–79 have to renew every 4 years
- Drivers 75 and older must prove adequate vision every renewal and must renew in person
- Drivers over 79 must renew every single year
- NM is rated as the 10th most difficult state to get a license
- New Mexico was one of only four states to post a decrease in road fatalities from 2019 to 2020
Example 2, Ohio:
- While Ohio allows you to renew your license every 4 or 8 years as a personal option, drivers over 65 have to renew every 4 years
- Drivers over 65 and older must prove adequate vision every renewal and must renew in person
- There are no additional restrictions past 65
- Ohio is rated as the 2nd-easiest state to get a license, eclipsed only by SD
- Ohio posted a 6.7% increase in road fatalities from 2019 to 2020
Conclusion? Being too old to drive has even more of an impact on road unsafety than giving out drivers’ licenses in cereal boxes does.
I feel sorry for old people who have no other way to get around, I really do. Letting blind people with dementia unsafely operate motor vehicles so they can run people over while trying to get to grocery stores and medical appointments isn’t a solution, nor is it an acceptable stopgap till public transportation can pick up the slack. It’s gotta stop right now.
I feel sorry for old people who have no other way to get around, I really do.
This is a problem POV however. It’s like - I don’t care about old people. Just like the pandemic in fact - those olds should count for less than anyone else. I could make a similar stupid comment like “I feel sorry for these people who choose to walk near roads where it’s dangerous, I really do.”
Do you see how insane that sounds?
I don’t have a solution, but saying as soon as you retire (turn 65) you should be locked in a house and out of cars because now you’re dangerous is wrong too. I personally think the most likely solution politically and realistically is going to be self driving cars. Cause I don’t see you forcing elderly out of driving in the US.
You are making a lot if assumptions there, and a lot of factors go into those numbers outside if age and easy of getting a license. Not saying you are wrong, and it certainly is something we should be addressing, but this doesn’t prove your point.
It probably isn’t good enough for an official NTSB report, but it is good enough for a reasonable person—i.e. someone who isn’t trying to emotionally argue backwards from their pet conclusion—to draw a conclusion from it as long as their scope is conservative.
I really don’t know how someone can take the things you said that wrong and at the same time write replies that long. Amazing.
Some people simply won’t allow themselves to be reasoned with. They make up their minds based on an emotional reaction, and then they see every attempt at explaining why they’re wrong as sophistry. They deliberately misinterpret everything you say in order to have a dragon to slay. I’m surprised that person isn’t a conservative, they think like one.
When I walk along a street, I count the number of drivers I see using their phones. It’s been a consistent 50%. And the ones who aren’t on their phones tend to be elderly. So what’s surprising about an increase in pedestrian deaths?
Cars. Ruin. Cities. If you want to reduce or eliminate pedestrian deaths you need to restrict autos in ways. Traffic calming measures to take the speed of the street down, eliminate right turns on red lights (this alone would probably make an IMMEDIATE dent). Make the sidewalks and pedestrian areas larger and more inviting.