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Originally Posted by jamesqf
I think you're in desperate need of someone to give your factoids a reality check.
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You ain't half kidding there. I've edited it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jamesqf
In any case, you're quite missing my point, which was that large numbers of people didn't die in auto accidents in 1960, and don't now. Though vehicles are safer, the cars of those days were by no means "deathtraps", and many supposed safety improvements have yielded marginal increases while imposing considerable weight, fuel economy, & driveability penalties which IMHO aren't worth the cost.
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True, although a factor of three is still pretty impressive. The odd part is that we in the United States seem to have agreed that roughly 40,000 deaths per year are okey-dokey. The numbers don't seem to go lower, but when they get much higher (52,627, 1970; 51,091, 1980) are times that I seem to recall having much higher safety pushes.
The other rows in the table are kind of interesting. Passenger car occupant deaths have gone down, mostly, along with pedestrians and bus occupants (ok, three guesses on that one; first one's right). Motorcyclists peaked in the '70's (Hurt Report, anyone?) although they are higher now than previously; light truck occupants are also up (not a surprise, either).
Here's that URL:
BTS | Table 2-1: Transportation Fatalities by Mode
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On the other hand, back then there was 1 car/mile vs 50 cars and semis/mile now (warning: made up stats).
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1960 System mileage, Highway[1]: 3,545,693
1960 Total registered vehicles: 74,431,800
2000 System mileage, Highway: 3,936,222
2000 Total registered vehicles: 225,821,241
1960: 20 vehicles / mile
2000: 57 vehicles / mile
[1] Ahem: "All public road and street mileage in the 50 states and the District of Columbia. For years prior to 1980, some miles of nonpublic roadways are included. No consistent data on private road mileage are available. Beginning in 1998, approximately 43,000 miles of Bureau of Land Management Roads are excluded."
I think I love that site:
RITA | BTS | National Transportation Statistics
What, so I have two cars (and a motorcycle). I've got two buttocks, don't I?