MG: My opinion is that speeding itself is not the problem. It's the stopping.
Bad joke.
A lot of people do not drive consciously. They are on auto-pilot. I could go to the extreme and ask how rally drivers can do the speeds they do with less fatalities (on average)? Because they had good training, they are alone on the road (or at least traveling in the same direction) but most of it is they are focused on one thing. Go as fast as possible until you reach the finish.
If we would partly adopt the same strategy, a lot of enforcement would not be needed.
To quote a piece from that text: "Third, there is a general apathy to the risks associated with traffic crashes. Most drivers consider themselves above average and substantially “in control” of their likelihood of crashing. Many also have a “do as I say, not as I do” attitude. For example, nearly 80 percent of motorists rated distracted driving as a serious problem, yet more than two-thirds of those same individuals admitted to talking on the cellphone while driving in the past month, and 21 percent even admitted to reading or sending text messages while driving. "
And later: "The vast majority of crashes, well over 85 percent, are behavior-related. In other words, someone — a driver, a pedestrian, a trucker, a motorcyclist, a bicyclist — did or didn’t do something that set off a chain of events that resulted in a crash. "
Of course, we are human beings, and apparently need to be checked upon. We don't do as we say and I am no different!
I like the last sentence of Jill Cooper. In Germany, a law maker was on television stating the exact reverse on why German driver's licences do not have an expiry date.
In the US - but also elsewhere - the has been a trend towards SUV's and MPV's (people carriers). Especially SUV's have a bad effect on fatalities. On a testing ground I drove a ten year old Ford Mondeo around a course at speed and then did it with a brand new Hyundai SUV. I got the car clear off the ground on one side. Still, these cars are seen as safer by the general public. Another issue is that Pick-up trucks are build more like trucks in that they often contain a real chassis. Which becomes like a big spike penetrating in "lesser" cars in a crash. MPV's too are higher, making sudden changes of direction more hazardous.
Mr. Kip Viscusi is plain wrong when saying "Efforts to limit greenhouse gas emissions by improving vehicle mileage rates lead to smaller fuel efficient cars that are less damaging to the environment but also are less protective of the passengers." The Smart ForTwo, Toyota iQ to name 2 very small cars, are considered very safe.
By the way, in the Netherlands is a TV-Series called "Blik op de Weg" (translated roughly Cans/View on the road, it has a double meaning).
The series follows police officers carying out traffic policing. They show people speeding, ignore stop signs and such, but also what secondary tasks a policeman has, focuses on how accidents can be prevented, dubious laws and how they are interpreted by the police etc.
The nice thing is that - in stead of series like "Road Wars", "Police Camera Action" etc. they do not seem to focus on the spectacular, not on the high speed chases. The commentator does not say that someone is "a complete tool", instead sometimes even understanding towards the person commiting an offence. Stronger then that, sometimes they even question decission by the police and do some investigations. The focus on road safety, rather then showing spectacular chases I believe has had a good impact on driving in the Netherlands. Can I cement that with numbers? No.
The population of the US: 307,000,000. Road casualties 40.000. (0.0130%) Population in the Netherlands: 16,000,000. Road casualties: 750. (0.0047%)
