I'm pretty critical of police forces -- but my experience living in Charlotte NC for the past 8 years leads me to believe that police enforcement is at least a part of the equation.
We had a pretty large step-back in traffic enforcement [1][2] starting in 2019. Since the pandemic, traffic around the city has taken on a decidedly Mad-Max vibe. _Every_ time I drive, I see red lights get run. Most times I get on the interstate I see people passing on the shoulder. _Every_ time I get on the interstate I see people driving recklessly fast. Not high-speed flow-of-traffic fast, but 20-30 mph faster than traffic, weaving in and out of traffic without using indicators. Uptown residents have been complaining about the regular street-racing incidents since 2020.
I'm confident there are other factors, and I know not every city has the same problems as Charlotte. But for sure the fact that the police have just stopped enforcing most of the traffic laws has played a part.
Why? In San Francisco the number of traffic citations issued has fallen to essentially zero. The cops are on strike and no longer perceive any marginal benefit from doing their jobs. They get paid either way.
There are more plausible explanations that have been extensively studied, like cars getting bigger. Where are the data showing a causal relationship between police enforcement of traffic laws over the past three years and increased pedestrian deaths? Do we even have indirect data, e.g. Sun Belt traffic enforcement declining more than in other states?
Not sure, and those are all good avenues for exploration. But it doesn’t look to me as if vehicle size, power, and weight can have caused the sudden increase because that happened over 20 years.
I personally don't think its "police enforcement" but I would wager a large % of deaths (at least in New Mexico, the state with the highest rate) are from panhandlers in the street. IIRC, they're trying to make new laws to prevent ppl from standing in the middle of the road.
