This morning while jogging in the US I came to an intersection. Green lights and walk on in my direction. A car approaching from my left had a red light, the driver glanced to his left and without stopping or looking in my direction, turned right across my path. I expected this of course, so avoided being run over. If I wasn't watching for this, it likely would be a different outcome.
So why do so many pedestrians get killed in the US? The two main reasons to me are: 1. Drivers don't look for pedestrians, and 2. pedestrians expect drivers to follow rules.
Another contributing factor is of course the huge vehicles that crush people with drivers barely noticing...
This is exactly why this turn is illegal in nearly every country in the world except the US and Canada. [1]
If you are in the UK, this turn is illegal always and everywhere, so it basically never happens.
I grew up in the US with right turn on red, so I was used to it and accepted it as normal. But after living the UK for 6 years, I'm now physically shocked when visiting the US at how dangerous it is to walk around even very dense urban US areas like Chicago's north loop. Cars are constantly trying to run you over by turning across active crosswalks. It's totally absurd to experience once you've lived somewhere else where that would result in you immediately losing your license. US culture in general has no respect for pedestrians (although of course some individuals do).
This isn't some utopian dream of ultimate walkability achieved through pro-pedestrian urban redesign. This is the most basic laws that govern cities actively making it dangerous to walk around because it saved a bit of gas during the 1970s oil crisis.
In Sweden you are not allowed to turn on red, but the crossroad on the right and left are often aligned to be green at the same time as the cars has green. As such, both the car lane and crossroads are active at the same time, and drivers are expected to turn across active crosswalks. Pedestrian has priority, and there is usually a short period between green -> yellow -> red, where the crosswalk will be red, which allow for around 2-3 cars to pass if the crossroad has people on them during the full active duration.
I think the major difference lies elsewhere. A major one could be that teaching drivers to ignore red is just a very bad idea. An other aspect I find quite different when I visited the states was that the transition time was extremely long compared to Sweden. Here it is not uncommon to see green to be only active for a handful cars worth of traffic before changing, or about the estimated time that it takes for a person to cross the road. It not designed to drive fast and do a quick turn.
I'm convinced this is a big cause as well. Reduced visibility greatly exacerbates this (as a driver looking for visibility while in the turning lane) trying to see if walkers or cars are coming over the very high hoods of other vehicles. Multiple lanes, signs and etc. all vying for attention all cause a drain on focus which wouldn't exist if the turn was outlawed in the first place.
I'll also say, it's not only pedestrians affected by this, anecdotally just this morning a car turned right on red directly into my path, while the driver was making eye contact with me as I was turning left through a green arrow.
> permits the operator of a motor vehicle to turn such vehicle right at a red stop light after stopping
Quoting GP, emphasis again mine:
> the driver glanced to his left and without stopping or looking in my direction, turned right across my path
The driver turned without stopping. That is explicitly and clearly illegal throughout the US.
This is one of those rules drivers are supposed to be trained on (and tested on) before being given a license, but it doesn't seem to stick.
The Wikipedia article notes that allowing turn-on-red became widespread in response to fuel scarcity. Fuel efficiency is dramatically higher in modern vehicles. Maybe it's time to repeal it after all.
If only there was public interest in public safety...
While it's true that this particular driver probably violated existing law, it's also true that this particular maneuver is inherently mistake-prone. The driver still has to look three ways - across the intersection (for left turners), at the crosswalk, and behind them for cyclists (or fast pedestrians). It's too easy to miss one while checking for another, even for a diligent driver following all laws. The statistics on "right hooks" and the pedestrian equivalent don't lie. Right on red is just a bad idea.
any time there is a right turn you can still end up in this same situation, whether it's right turn on red or not, if the driver does not look to their right: there have been plenty of times I have been nearly ran over when a car turning right on green did not notice that the same direction pedestrian crossing light was green also and I was about to cross.
Same thing for cars turning right in front of me riding my bike in the bike lane, it's just par for the course, so pedestrians should ALWAYS make eye contact with the driver before crossing, and cyclists should NEVER be side-by-side with a car when approaching an intersection.
If the light stays red while the "walk" sign is active (usually the case) it's a whole lot less likely that there will actually be a pedestrian there during the turn. There's also a bit more time (while waiting for the light) to see a bike approaching. Yes, all parties still violate the law and accidents can still happen, but they become less likely.
Agreed. Right on red is similar to a stop sign. Driver has to come to a complete stop, not roll through the intersection. Most folks I talk to don't even know this. In other words, it's not that they admit they are breaking the rules, but say everyone else does it. They don't even know they are violating the law. Also, many drivers roll through while essentially cutting off oncoming traffic, instead of realizing they don't have the right of way.
> This is exactly why this turn is illegal in nearly every country in the world except the US and Canada.
I think variations of this are pretty common in Europe. Your link says this actually. Details vary, but as the GP post says, it is not uncommon that the pedestrian has a green light and the car can still turn right across it. UK, indeed, does not have it. But frankly I find it frustrating, both as a driver and a pedestrian, as I feel waiting time on junctions is always infinitely long.
I'm not familiar with how it works in the US, but in Europe pedestrians have priority in such cases, and it's fairly well respected.
The light will be either green or flashing yellow, and drivers turning right KNOW to look for a pedestrian (or even a bicycle passing them on the right). In the US the combination of a large vehicle and car-prioritising culture makes this much more dangerous.
The reason drivers are able to drive like that is the design of the streets themselves. Things like raised crosswalks[1] and corner extensions[2] slow cars down and force them to pay attention. A lot of intersections in my area are the opposite, where they lower the whole curb to road level so cars can cut onto the curb to make the turn faster. There are lots of ways that the US builds infrastructure in ways that make it much more dangerous for pedestrians and bikers.
This comment makes it seem like people are built differently in the US than they are in the rest of the world, but that obviously isn't true. The roads (particularly intersections, where crashes tend to happen) are in fact built differently though. Urbanist resources like NotJustBikes and Oh The Urbanity! YouTube channels do a great job of highlighting the differences, and how they force drivers to pay attention through the laws of physics rather than the laws of signage.
No, the US has a culture of not giving a single shit about anyone but yourself. A frighteningly large fraction of drivers will do anything they can get away with. Here in the land of the free, rules are for other people, not for me.
Pedestrians are the same people: I often see a person nonchalantly crossing a six lane street in the middle of a block to get into a parked car on the other side. If someone decides to post on Instagram while driving at that time then it's another innocent pedestrian taken out by evil drivers but a few minutes later the same person could be posting on the Instagram while running over another.
I don't think it's a culture though, it's just people genuinely not being punished/rewarded for putting themselves in danger and avoiding danger when growing up.
american cars are measurably bigger/taller/heavier than in EU/JP. and they drive measurably faster than in EU/JP. and the walking infrastructure (crossroads/pavements) is measurably worse.
also anecdotally it's way easier to get a driving license in the US than in France or Japan (I don't know for the other EU countries) so i suspect there is a higher number of bad drivers on the road, but i have no proof for that.
that said, i went to my license renewal training session in japan last month and they informed us that the most accident-prone situation is similar to the op's one. (left-turn but on green, since turn on red is illegal and we drive on the left). when those happen generally there is a big rework of the spot to avoid repeat accident. and we have a lot of old drivers too...
German drivers are objectively WORSE than MOST American drivers, speaking from experience driving thousands of km/mi in both. German drivers completely unnecessarily accelerate very strongly, take corners quickly, and slam on the brakes when stopping much more so than in the USA. The main difference I can attribute fewer deaths to by observation and critical thinking, is that Europeans have to be far more vigilant of random stuff appearing on the side, since many streets can have cars randomly coming from the right side because of what qualifies as a secondary road, and in some cases, you must yield to them, so the paranoia is much higher in towns. Of course, there are way more stops and crosswalks, cyclists, and pedestrians in most European towns, also elevating ones alertness. Finally, speed limits in European towns are much lower than anything in equivalent US towns because everything is more compact. Also of note is truck speed limits in Europe are generally 80 KILOMETERS/H whereas American truckers frequently drive north of 80 MILES/H. Cattle haulers are known for going 90-100 MILES/H on I-10.
That would train higher reflexes in the drivers.
I drove in Rome, Italy, for 8 years and another 7 years in Canada.
While Rome is far more dangerous because of the stuff that happens on the road, the drivers are way more ready to avoid incidents.
I have no idea if this is better or worse,just giving my perspective.
I find driving in Canada very relaxing,but it often puts all my senses to sleep,which is scary.
Also nobody shoulder check left when turning left in Canada (Vancouver). That's a 100% kill of a scooter in Rome,because the swirvle between the cars.
Not driving like a grandma is not a big security issue if drivers are accordingly trained and expect it. Not looking for other participants, especially pedestrians, is one.
Considering driving and road rules is entirely learned behavior that requires tens / a hundred hours of training before they let you do it unattended, it seems pretty reasonable that the environment you learned in plays a pretty big impact on how you drive.
The problem is that even if they look back and fourth and know you're there the "go" condition (no incoming cross traffic) is the same for both parties so it's a ready made "two idiots trying to pass each other in the hallway" situation.
I think it speaks volumes that the discussion is anchored around whether cars look or not despite the fact that the underlying algorithm will produce conflicts even if they do.
The algorithm (if followed) does not produce collisions. Pedestrians have the priority, and in many countries (inlcuding Poland where I live) cars have to stop even if nobody's on the pedestrian crossing yet - it's enough that pedestrians are approaching the crossing.
This has changed in the last 10 years in Poland, and there have been numerous angry debates. It was introduced anyway, and the safety improved.
It's only a problem if we let drivers get away with making it a problem. The inherent asymmetry in the driver-pedestrian relationship must be taken into account by the law and road design.
>The algorithm (if followed) does not produce collisions. Pedestrians have the priority,
Yes, in magical textbook land sure. In reality there are signaled crosswalks and most pedestrians abide by them so it's not clear if any given pedestrian wants to cross at that time and the pedestrian is also looking for traffic coming from the right if they're crossing against the signal (perfectly legal, but ill advised in the face of social norms) it's a recipe for confusion. Multiply by a nation of hundreds of millions and you get a lot of near misses and accidents.
>It's only a problem if we let drivers get away with making it a problem. The inherent asymmetry in the driver-pedestrian relationship must be taken into account by the law and road design.
I propose a 3 step solution to this "problem":
1)ignore anyone who talks like that from any side of the issue because they're probably gonna make it worse and not better and piss everyone off in the process and make the problem harder to solve.
2) Slap up "no right on red" signs and adjust signals accordingly
On signaled crosswalks, it obviously only applies when the light is green for pedestrians. Somebody's near the crosswalk and they have green light = you stop. It doesn't matter if they want to cross. Simple as that.
> Multiply by a nation of hundreds of millions and you get a lot of near misses and accidents.
Nation size doesn't matter for this. Poland based this law on experience from Lithuania which is 20 times smaller than us. It worked for Lithuania and it worked for us. Why would it suddenly be worse for 350 million people if it worked for 2 million and 40 million?
> ignore anyone who talks like that from any side of the issue because they're probably gonna make it worse and not better and piss everyone off in the process and make the problem harder to solve
When they teach you to optimize polynomials at school, they tell you to look for zeroes of the derivative and check which one is the global maximum. But they also tell you to look at the edges of the domain, because the highest peak might be outside the domain altogether.
I'd argue that the US is so car-centric that any effective solution will be outside of the perceived "practical" domain.
Cars (or more precisely, drivers in cars - that false equivalence is part of the problem) look for other cars. They do not look for pedestrians, cyclists, or motorcycles, they assume that if there's not another 5000 lbs shiny steel box in the lane that they're clear to go.
Last weekend after my son's elementary school soccer game, someone wasn't interested in trying to join the line of cars exiting the parking lot, and tried to pull forward over a grass patch that separated the parking area from the driveway by the field. Except there was a 2000 lbs boulder, 3' tall, just in front of their car... which they entirely forgot about after walking past it. Their head was on a swivel looking for a gap in the line of cars on the driveway, but not for anything else. They destroyed their bumper, probably damaged their radiator or suspension, and got the left front tire partially up on the rock.
I was just glad it wasn't one of the multitude of 3' tall kids at the game.
One thing I always do is say a car is stopped at an intersection and is making a right turn while I'm in the crosswalk, I always look at the driver and where they are looking. Often times what I see is the driver will just look to see that the road is clear and never looks to see that the sidewalk is clear and just goes. I can count maybe 2-3 occasions where had I not done this I would have been run over.
This was one thing not talked about in the article: drivers in the US are not used to pedestrians outside of major cities like Boston, NYC, etc. I've seen drivers blow past me while I was in the crosswalk to rush and make a right turn and were bewildered that someone was actually using the crosswalk.
I was just in Montpelier, VT yesterday, which has a population of just 8000 people, but as the state capital enjoys a busy downtown with a lot of activity. The moment a pedestrian approaches a non-signal crosswalk, traffic in both directions immediately stops to allow them to cross.
Not sure why the people in Vermont have all worked this out, but they do.
Drivers in Hawaii have taken this to an extreme level and will stop in the middle of the road to let pedestrians or other cars go ahead of them even when they have the right of way. And they throw the shaka when they do it.
> So why do so many pedestrians get killed in the US? The two main reasons to me are: 1. Drivers don't look for pedestrians, and 2. pedestrians expect drivers to follow rules.
You think that isn't the same everywhere? I've got some news: in every country there are parents distracted by kids fighting in the back seat, and in every country pedestrians walking into light poles while on the phone is a running joke. Also: the USA has managed to export it's love for large cars to most countries. Here in Australia we call large SUV's shopping trolleys.
Despite this, if you look at the graphs in the article, you will see most countries have managed to drive down pedestrian deaths. Except the US, where the curve trends up. The reason is pretty straight forward, and has nothing to do with the cars, the attitudes of drives or pedestrians. Hell, you can even ask an AI what it is, and you will get a reasonable answer:
[Countries] have historically managed to drive down pedestrian deaths due to motor vehicle accidents primarily by adopting the Safe System approach, which includes elements of Vision Zero, a long-term goal of zero road fatalities and serious injuries.
This approach focuses on creating a road system that is safe for all users, particularly vulnerable ones like pedestrians, by managing speed, designing safer infrastructure, and ensuring safe vehicles and road user behavior.
The AI drones on and on, listing the many changes to road design and rules that caused the drop. This is not rocket science. Everybody can do it, and it's trivial to find out what needs to be done. What the USA lacks is a political system that can deliver it.
Yes one of the hardest things is to train a toddler for the hostile road conditions when she's biking, walking or scootering to school from the train station. Obviously I'm with her, but it's hard to explain the art of making eye contact to make sure the motorists acknowledge us at a crosswalk or stop sign
>> The two main reasons to me are: 1. Drivers don't look for pedestrians, and 2. pedestrians expect drivers to follow rules.
If that is the cause, why did the number of drivers not looking for pedestrians suddenly start increasing around 2010?
>> Another contributing factor is of course the huge vehicles that crush people with drivers barely noticing
"If the increase of size and frequency of trucks and SUVs was behind the increase in pedestrian deaths, we wouldn’t expect to see an increase in the frequency of pedestrians killed by sedans or compact cars. However, if we look at pedestrian deaths by model of car, we see that pedestrian deaths involving popular sedans have increased as well. Pedestrian deaths involving Honda Civics and Accords, Toyota Corollas and Camrys, and Nissan Altimas have all increased substantially"
To me the reason is the right-on-red rule. I still find it insane, and I have been in Canada for 9 years.
In my driving classes, I have been clearly explained that a right-on-red must be treated like a stop sign and that to turn, there needs to be two lanes free of cars: the one you are getting into and the next one (if one lane is available,this doesn't apply).
Many,many drivers treat the red light like a green light for turning right and that's the root of the issue.
Looks like most of these comments aren't reading the article. Most of the pedestrian deaths are not at intersections. Likely it's a combo of big vehicles, distracted pedestrians and distracted drivers. One thing I've noticed in other countries is people are much more likely to jaywalk. I wonder if that is becoming more common as our share of immigrants increases.
Pedestrians pay with their lives so that we can have butch looking trucks in the US. Seriously. It's for the vanity of pavement queens. And it's measurable. Quantifiable. Regulators are unwilling to take on this problem because they'd be called woke.
The "pavement queens" have been convinced they need larger by companies that sell trucks, because larger trucks have lower legal requirements for fuel efficiency.
"""
The strongest evidence seems to be for the “Big SUV hypothesis” — it’s hard to see what else could be causing the increase in deadliness of pedestrian accidents, and not cause a similar increase in other things. The Big SUV hypothesis also seems like something that could be limited to the US. But this on its own isn’t completely satisfying: if its big SUVs, why are pedestrian deaths for sedans increasing too? Why aren’t deaths increasing on rural roads? There are still unanswered questions here.
"""
Even when they do see you they have an air of entitlement and/or don't know any of the right-of-way rules. I've had drivers honk and yell at me when they want to cross a sidewalk driveway I'm currently moving through.
Except this seems to differ from the article in that the article notes that the vast majority of fatalities are the fault of the pedestrian. What you describe would be the drivers fault.
>> vast majority of fatalities are the fault of the pedestrian
>> This doesn’t necessarily mean the pedestrian was at fault — it could simply indicate that in a pedestrian death we only get one side of the story, which makes it hard to charge the driver with a crime.
But I have to say, I agree with both of you there. I lived in a country where car drivers are explicitly required by law to avoid killing people, and therefore are always at fault, even if pedestrian was crossing illegally. Law even requires drivers to speed down if they reasonably couldn't see a pedestrian. Basically, if you can't not hit people, you might as well abandon you car.
Just the fact that the pedestrian could be at fault for their own killing, I think, makes the chances of that happening way way higher.
It's insane that "well my car weights 8 ton and cant stop in time even when im under speed limit" is even an argument for an innocence, and not a jail ticket that has "didn't care enough about not killing people" written on it.
Authority bias is very real, very problematic, and very well documented. As a consequence, those in authority must always be held to a high standard. Always doubt an assertion by authority unless accompanied with sufficient evidence.
> Spotted hyenas are successful pack predators, usually found in a variety of habitats in sub-Saharan Africa. They can travel up to 27 km in a day, shadowing semi-nomadic, human-managed livestock migrations and subsisting on occasional kills.
> The individual described in this study killed two goats herded by people in Wadi Yahmib in the Elba Protected Area, and was subsequently tracked, spotted, chased and killed in late February 2024.
My first reaction was the same - then I read this and I don’t hold it against the people anymore.
