I want to learn more about “it did not work in the us… excess deaths”

Do you have a link handy for this?

https://www.elkandelk.com/washington/seattle-car-accident-st...

Since it started in 2015, accidents are down 50%, but deaths up 90%. This analysis leaves a lot to be desired. I didn't see per-capita stats (Seattle had massive growth during a lot of those years), and we don't really enforce traffic laws at all anyway, so IDK what to think without digging in further.

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brailsafe 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

The numbers seem a bit alarmist on the fatality front, seems like it would make more sense to account for fatalities as a proportion of accidents overall. In absolute numbers, we're talking tens of deaths and thousands of accidents.

As a visitor (periodically throughout the whole timespan) it's seemed to me like there's massive growth in population in the metro area and more densification inside the Seattle downtown area. Tough to tell what geography this exactly captures. Assuming the numbers are valid, I do wonder if there's a significant demographic or exurb shift, where older drivers became a higher proportion of all drivers where they already lived, and a bunch of others either stopped entirely or moved outside the city boundaries.

If memory serves, I feel like there's also a tendency to accidentally end up committed to a toll bridge crossing by getting stuck on an exit/on ramp off one of the highways, which might make people panic and bail at the last second erratically, but that idea seems a bit farfetched

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piva00 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

How have average car sizes and weight changed in this period of time?

	▲	irishcoffee 3 hours ago \| parent [-]
		You're asking the wrong question. The answer is 10% The interesting question is power-to-weight, which was (apparently) a direct result of EPA regulations that were enacted in 1975. The below article, which I found from a search engine copying your question and looking at a few results, is an interesting read. Ignoring all that, the actual question would be: how have car sizes and weights changed _in this region_ during this period of time. Sizes and weights of cars in brasil have little bearing to accidents in the PNW, for example. https://carbuzz.com/new-vehicles-bigger-heavier-more-powerfu...

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convolvatron 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

this reference does talk about those stats, but doesn't link in any way to adverse affects of attempting to bring down deaths.

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cyberax an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

Seattle traffic deaths: https://wtsc.wa.gov/dashboards/fatalities-dashboard/ - select "Seattle" in the city filter and "Pedestrian" in the filter below.

This article has SF pedestrian deaths by year: https://www.sfchronicle.com/projects/2026/pedestrian-fatalit...

For Portland you need to check their police news archives, I couldn't find a dashboard. Here are the data from 2016 and 2024: https://www.portland.gov/transportation/vision-zero/document... (13 pedestrian deaths), https://www.portland.gov/transportation/vision-zero/document... (22 pedestrian deaths). The population growth was 9% between 2016 and 2024.

I don't have an explanation for these increases, and there are no good papers that explore this in depth. I need to write a meta-research paper: "On the lack of research on urbanism-related policy failures".