Be careful on dangerous roads
20/05/24 01:04
Yesterday when we were driving to church, traffic on the highway slowed and merged into a single lane to go around emergency vehicles helping to assist at the scene of a motorcycle accident. We couldn’t see the details of the accident, but we did see the motorcycle in the median between the lands, lying on its side with obvious damage. We also saw two ambulances with EMTs tending someone on the ground. Because there is no news of the accident on any of the local online media sources, we are assuming and hoping that the accident was not fatal and that the person or persons involved will be able to fully recover from injuries sustained.
I do not know what happened other than a motorcycle seems to have lost control and drifted into the media where it crashed. It was raining at the time and the road surface was wet - an added danger to motorcycles on a highway with a speed limit of 70 mph. There are also dangers to motorcyclists caused by road debris. Probably the biggest danger to motorcyclists traveling on that stretch of Interstate highway is that drivers of cars and trucks can fail to see motorcycles and pull into their way when changing lanes or executing other driving maneuvers.
I have said that I believe that our children are better drivers because they learned to drive in Rapid City where motorcycles are very common and where the annual Sturgis Rally means that motorcycles outnumber all other vehicles for more than a week each summer. When you learn to drive around motorcycles, you learn to be more careful to look for them when driving. Motorcycles can accelerate more quickly than cars and can appear to be very small in rear view mirrors and there are some important techniques to be learned to always look twice, and to give extra space to motorcycles. I know that 25 years of driving on South Dakota roads including occasional trips into Sturgis during the rally has made me a more cautions driver and more sensitive to motorcycles on the highway.
Drivers and passengers of motorcycles are obviously more vulnerable to the effects of accidents. Accidents that might not involve serious injuries if they were between two automobiles can be fatal for motorcycles.
There is an important principle involved in motorcycles operating on highways. All drivers, regardless of their vehicle, have some responsibility for the safety of motorcycle drivers. Because we moved to South Dakota from a more populous city and moved to an even more populous area when we left South Dakota we are well aware that all vehicle operators pay increased insurance rates for living and driving in an area with more motorcycle accidents. Insurance rates are based on overall traffic liabilities and some of the cost of accidents is spread out over entire groups of drivers through insurance premiums.
We also participate in the costs of accident prevention by paying for additional safety devices in our vehicles. In the span of my lifetime several items from seat belts to air bags to adaptive cruise control to lane departure warning systems have been installed in vehicles. The cost of these safety measures is reflected in the cost of vehicles. The cost of designing and installing lane barricades, sign posts, guard rails and other highway features are shared by taxpayers.
By and large, however, we shy away from taking responsibility for the mistakes of inexperienced drivers or the behaviors of reckless or irresponsible drivers. Accident investigators are quick to name drivers as cause of accidents. Nonetheless we continue to enact some policies that hold society partially responsible for highway safety. Laws are enacted to establish speed limits, fund enforcement, restrict the use of devices such as cell phones, prohibit driving when impaired by the consumption of alcohol or other drugs. To a certain extent we understand that irresponsible behavior can affect innocent persons and invest in systems to limit the damages caused by irresponsible or impaired drivers.
One example of a change in public policy is the increased use of traffic circles and roundabouts by urban traffic designers. Such features often result in more accidents at a given intersection. The accidents, however, are generally less severe than those at intersections governed by signs or traffic lights. Municipalities install traffic circles and roundabouts in part because they cost less than signal systems. They also result in lowered serious injuries and fatalities as well as lowered total accident costs. Cars colliding when they are flowing the same direction are less dangerous than those going in opposite directions.
There do seem to be limits to what safety measures we are willing to accept. The statistics of the nationwide 55 mph speed limit imposed in the 1970s through the mid 1990s are very clear. Slower speed limits resulted in dramatically decreased fatalities and serious injuries. When the limits were raised again, fatalities and serious injuries increased. However, most legislative bodies proceeded to increase speed limits. In South Dakota, where we lived when the nationwide limit was removed, raising speed limits took place in an emergency session of the state legislature without any serious debate. Legislators were eager to raise limits by 20 mph including on highways that were designed and constructed during the nationwide limit. Similar changes took place in other states.
The Interstate highway where we drive most days was designed and built during the time of 55 mph limits. This is especially evident in the design of on and off ramps which often do not allow sufficient space for those coming onto the highway to accelerate to the speed of the traffic on the road. An additional 15mph takes significant space to accomplish. Sight lines are shorter, increasing the challenge in estimating where to merge into traffic that is traveling at speeds much faster than designers and engineers envisioned when the highway was constructed.
In contrast to US highway statistics since the mid 1990s, Sweden has decreased highway fatalities and serious injuries by more than half and has officially legislated the goal of zero fatalities. Sweden has the lowest rates of traffic fatalities in the world.
A single accident is enough to get me to think about what might be done to reduce deaths and serious injuries. It seems, however, that it will take something more than current statistics to motivate our society to make necessary changes to make real progress in reducing highway deaths and injuries.
I do not know what happened other than a motorcycle seems to have lost control and drifted into the media where it crashed. It was raining at the time and the road surface was wet - an added danger to motorcycles on a highway with a speed limit of 70 mph. There are also dangers to motorcyclists caused by road debris. Probably the biggest danger to motorcyclists traveling on that stretch of Interstate highway is that drivers of cars and trucks can fail to see motorcycles and pull into their way when changing lanes or executing other driving maneuvers.
I have said that I believe that our children are better drivers because they learned to drive in Rapid City where motorcycles are very common and where the annual Sturgis Rally means that motorcycles outnumber all other vehicles for more than a week each summer. When you learn to drive around motorcycles, you learn to be more careful to look for them when driving. Motorcycles can accelerate more quickly than cars and can appear to be very small in rear view mirrors and there are some important techniques to be learned to always look twice, and to give extra space to motorcycles. I know that 25 years of driving on South Dakota roads including occasional trips into Sturgis during the rally has made me a more cautions driver and more sensitive to motorcycles on the highway.
Drivers and passengers of motorcycles are obviously more vulnerable to the effects of accidents. Accidents that might not involve serious injuries if they were between two automobiles can be fatal for motorcycles.
There is an important principle involved in motorcycles operating on highways. All drivers, regardless of their vehicle, have some responsibility for the safety of motorcycle drivers. Because we moved to South Dakota from a more populous city and moved to an even more populous area when we left South Dakota we are well aware that all vehicle operators pay increased insurance rates for living and driving in an area with more motorcycle accidents. Insurance rates are based on overall traffic liabilities and some of the cost of accidents is spread out over entire groups of drivers through insurance premiums.
We also participate in the costs of accident prevention by paying for additional safety devices in our vehicles. In the span of my lifetime several items from seat belts to air bags to adaptive cruise control to lane departure warning systems have been installed in vehicles. The cost of these safety measures is reflected in the cost of vehicles. The cost of designing and installing lane barricades, sign posts, guard rails and other highway features are shared by taxpayers.
By and large, however, we shy away from taking responsibility for the mistakes of inexperienced drivers or the behaviors of reckless or irresponsible drivers. Accident investigators are quick to name drivers as cause of accidents. Nonetheless we continue to enact some policies that hold society partially responsible for highway safety. Laws are enacted to establish speed limits, fund enforcement, restrict the use of devices such as cell phones, prohibit driving when impaired by the consumption of alcohol or other drugs. To a certain extent we understand that irresponsible behavior can affect innocent persons and invest in systems to limit the damages caused by irresponsible or impaired drivers.
One example of a change in public policy is the increased use of traffic circles and roundabouts by urban traffic designers. Such features often result in more accidents at a given intersection. The accidents, however, are generally less severe than those at intersections governed by signs or traffic lights. Municipalities install traffic circles and roundabouts in part because they cost less than signal systems. They also result in lowered serious injuries and fatalities as well as lowered total accident costs. Cars colliding when they are flowing the same direction are less dangerous than those going in opposite directions.
There do seem to be limits to what safety measures we are willing to accept. The statistics of the nationwide 55 mph speed limit imposed in the 1970s through the mid 1990s are very clear. Slower speed limits resulted in dramatically decreased fatalities and serious injuries. When the limits were raised again, fatalities and serious injuries increased. However, most legislative bodies proceeded to increase speed limits. In South Dakota, where we lived when the nationwide limit was removed, raising speed limits took place in an emergency session of the state legislature without any serious debate. Legislators were eager to raise limits by 20 mph including on highways that were designed and constructed during the nationwide limit. Similar changes took place in other states.
The Interstate highway where we drive most days was designed and built during the time of 55 mph limits. This is especially evident in the design of on and off ramps which often do not allow sufficient space for those coming onto the highway to accelerate to the speed of the traffic on the road. An additional 15mph takes significant space to accomplish. Sight lines are shorter, increasing the challenge in estimating where to merge into traffic that is traveling at speeds much faster than designers and engineers envisioned when the highway was constructed.
In contrast to US highway statistics since the mid 1990s, Sweden has decreased highway fatalities and serious injuries by more than half and has officially legislated the goal of zero fatalities. Sweden has the lowest rates of traffic fatalities in the world.
A single accident is enough to get me to think about what might be done to reduce deaths and serious injuries. It seems, however, that it will take something more than current statistics to motivate our society to make necessary changes to make real progress in reducing highway deaths and injuries.
