A study of 13 years of crashes in Australia finds a link between car height and risk of pedestrian death, particularly for women and children.
  • hardcoreufo@lemmy.worldEnglish
    10·
    11 hours ago

    I hate that I walk through a parking lot and half the trucks there have hoods that are above my head height at 6 ft and well above the roofline of my car. They are just driving a brick wall at this point.

  • AnimalsDream@slrpnk.netEnglish
    102·
    12 hours ago

    I remember looking up which cars are safest to drive. I remember the article saying, unsurprisingly, the expensive luxury vehicles being the safest, with bigger vehicles being on the safer side too (for the driver and passengers). It also said that it’s only recently that people have been testing the question of vehicle safety as it relates to the vehicles impact on other’s safety, and corroborating this piece here, the answer is pretty obvious.

    My job has a drive-thru that seems to have been built before vehicles started ballooning. I take a lot of satisfaction in seeing people struggle to squeeze their monstrosities through it. Especially when they damage their hunks of junk on the protective barriers.

    Fuck cars.

    • Blackmist@feddit.ukEnglish
      3·
      12 hours ago

      “…but remember that one time you had to transport a whole fridge home because you didn’t want to pay an extra $20 to have them deliver it in a big truck?”

      Most people need a little electric city car for 99% of their usage. The entire car industry spends billions of dollars to convince them otherwise.

    • myyass@lemmy.worldEnglish
      25·
      23 hours ago

      Bro, it hauls groceries so well for me. I thought I ran over a squirrel the other day, turns out it was a 99 Civic. Ooopsies.

  • CombatWombat@feddit.onlineEnglish
    83·
    1 day ago

    We continue to make cars larger to make them safer for the people inside of them, but this is a race to the bottom that makes everyone less safe overall

    When they modelled the outcome of crashes that only differed in vehicle size, they found that every 100kg of vehicle weight increased fatality odds by 6 per cent, and for every 10cm of vehicle height, the odds of a pedestrian death rose by 11 per cent.

    • myyass@lemmy.worldEnglish
      71·
      23 hours ago

      At this point my Jeep is a compact car compared to the whales on the road, sure it maybe taller but I need the square trunk area and height for my back and work.

      • boonhet@lemmy.zipEnglish
        62·
        18 hours ago

        You do realize you can still get 3 door hatchbacks too, right? You’re comparing very different vehicles there.

        Your jeep is also horrendous for pedestrians in a crash compared to that Honda.

        • myyass@lemmy.worldEnglish
          11·
          4 hours ago

          I would have to get the Honda lifted if I want to not throw my back out. also a swing gate door works great with hydraulic lifts. then I can use a my soft or remove it for bigger things. I use the Jeep like a mini pickup truck.

    • LibertyLizard@slrpnk.netEnglish
      152·
      2 days ago

      I feel like it’s more of a crossover but yeah that’s basically the smallest car they sell nowadays, at least here in the USA.

      • ChexMax@lemmy.worldEnglish
        2·
        10 hours ago

        Wait are you saying they don’t sell sedans in the US? I feel like every 4th car I see is the Toyota corolla

          • hemko@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
            4·
            13 hours ago

            A crossover, crossover SUV, or crossover utility vehicle (CUV) is a type of automobile with an increased ride height that is built on unibody chassis construction shared with passenger cars, as opposed to traditional sport utility vehicles (SUVs), which are built on a body-on-frame chassis construction similar to pickup trucks.[1]

            So Lada Niva, Subaru Outback a d many others are still technically crossovers despite being very capable outside the pavement

            • infinitesunrise@slrpnk.netEnglish
              1·
              10 hours ago

              Yeah so a hatchback on stilts. Both of those cars predate the industry term “crossover” by decades. Sometimes their height is enabled by being RWD, you can only lift a FWD car so high before the CV axle angle is too extreme.

              • Blaster M@lemmy.worldEnglish
                2·
                8 hours ago

                The funny bit about this is, my Subaru appears lowered in stock height, as my CV axles angle upwards to reach the wheels.

          • infinitesunrise@slrpnk.netEnglish
            1·
            10 hours ago

            Who actually offroads, anyway? And I mean actually off roads, not just driving down a dirt double track. Cause I regularly do that in my hatchback when I go camping.

            • boonhet@lemmy.zipEnglish
              2·
              9 hours ago

              I’ve been known to take sedans and wagons to places crossover drivers wouldn’t dare go pretty often, once or twice needed shovels and a friend with 4WD with lockers to pull me out.

              If you don’t do off roading, you don’t need an SUV. If you don’t need an SUV, you should get a wagon or hatch like you already have.

              If you live in a place where you can get snowed in, An SUV might help you out, but most crossovers are useless

          • hemko@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
            11·
            2 days ago

            I had to double-check, but the difference seems to be that traditionally SUV has a frame separate from the body construction, and crossover has the body form frame

            But also, that definition is not always followed and people just call the stupidest size cars SUVs, and the less-stupid-but-still-stupid-size crossover

            But for example, by that definition this lada niva is a crossover, not an SUV

            • infinitesunrise@slrpnk.netEnglish
              1·
              9 hours ago

              That Lada is also a lot smaller than that camera angle makes it look. Way smaller than a Wrangler, probably even smaller than a Suzuki Sidekick. People called that a 3-door hatchback when it came out.

              But it came out in Europe, long before the differentiation between body-on-frame vs unibody became a significant cost consideration in America through our domestic CAFE standards legislation.

            • LibertyLizard@slrpnk.netEnglish
              13·
              2 days ago

              Yeah I also looked it up and it doesn’t really seem like there’s a consensus on whether they count as SUVs. So I guess we’re both kinda right.

              Either way fuck cars that are bigger than they need to be. That’s the ultimate point.

      • pHr34kY@lemmy.worldEnglish
        10·
        2 days ago

        The smallest car you can get in Victoria is a Kia Picanto or a Suzuki Ignis. We’re talking under 900kg. They’re usually driven by the very young or very old.

        I get around Melbourne in an old Ignis. The government frames us like we’re the unsafe ones. The road blimps are getting out of hand.

        Fun story: I annoyed a guy in a Silverado last month by (gasp) getting in front of it so I could see. He pulls up next to me and starts yelling at my roof. I couldn’t even see the dickhead’s face.

        • caurvo@aussie.zoneEnglish
          5·
          1 day ago

          I drive a Swift and a motorbike in Melbourne. I’m convinced 2 out of three drivers in Melbourne have zero ability to recognise they are part of an ecosystem and that the road doesn’t uniquely belong to them.

          And tell me about being blamed for our own safety. Can’t even go for a decent ride any more because I’ve seen potholes that can swallow a man. And now they have.

          • pHr34kY@lemmy.worldEnglish
            6·
            1 day ago

            The potholes were definitely not caused by motorcycles and Swifts. I can’t believe the hypocricy of people who buy a 3 tonne rolling whale and complain about the prevalence of potholes.

    • Ooops@feddit.orgEnglish
      5·
      2 days ago

      Also the one with a lower, clearly sloped hood and the biggest windows, not only relative to it’s size but in total. Yes size matters, but those stupid modern city tanks also bring a lot of additional “features” making them more dangerous for pedestrians alongside their ridiculous size.

  • Notyou@sopuli.xyzEnglish
    8·
    1 day ago

    All the more reason to get one of these bad boys.

    https://www.motor1.com/news/615702/2023-rezvani-vengence-suv-pepper-spray/

    Of course armored body panels and bulletproof glass are on the list, but how about armor for the passengers? Vests and helmets are available, along with gas masks, magnetic deadbolts for the doors, run-flat tires, sirens, ultra-bright lights, a thermal night vision system, and we aren’t joking about shooting pepper spray. It’s also an option, and if you need to find cover for a quick escape, it even has a smoke screen feature.

  • Octavio@piefed.socialEnglish
    171·
    2 days ago

    There should be a word for things like this where my first reaction is, “Well, duh! What are you, some kind of idjit to need a study to tell you that?” But then I think about it for a second and I’m glad they studied it because we should be making policy decisions based on data.

    Now if we could just start actually doing that…

  • Jiral@lemmy.worldEnglish
    51·
    2 days ago

    And smoking isn’t good for your health! Yeah, I know. Shocking.

    Like with smoking, there is a lot of effort going on to deny the obvious though and a lot of people are in denial.