Anyone know what changed circa 2010?
this post was submitted on 20 Jun 2026
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I think that's around when SUVs started really becoming commonplace and "everyday" pickup trucks like the f150 started getting gi-fucking-normous.
This is it. A 2006 Ford F150 has a hood height of 51 inches, or just over 4 feet. Getting hit by one of these would be bad, but for many people it wouldn't likely result in a head injury. A 2026 Ford F150 has a hood height of 75 inches, or more than 6 feet tall. Getting hit by one of these as a pedestrian is practically a guaranteed head injury.
I'm sure there are other factors. Higher speeds, lack of investment in infrastructure, political unwillingness to make any changes that might increase congestion or slow down drivers. But I believe hood height is playing a huge role in the type and severity of pedestrian injuries in the US and Canada.
A 75" hood height is stupid.
Are all your mechanics Swedish volleyball players and where is the shop?
I want to say they meant roof height. Hood heights are stupid but the 150 hood heights isn't 75"
They certainly don't help but according to this, the spike is related to smartphones not trucks/SUVs
That scale though. You could stretch or squeeze any data to fit a curve like that.
This is absolute bullshit, I am just over 6' and there is not a stock car on the market in America that I cannot see over the hood.
Yeah it's maybe cab height? Not hood height for sure haha.
The trick is to put it in a lift before you measure
Not sure where the actual numbers came from that they posted, but pedestrian fatalities correlates well with "hood height" of the vehicle. I'm referencing from memory here and would have to go digging for the actual source. The "hood height" could be slightly ambiguous but was taken as the point where the hood basically turns. Think about a 90's minivan and it's pretty low, a sedan is also low, a new gmc sierra or whatever is not so low.
75 is roof height not hood height.
https://www.jimburkeford.com/ford-f-150-height-research/
2026 to 2021 Ford F-150 Height
(Fourteenth generation: 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025, 2026)
The current fourteenth generation F-150 keeps the same basic footprint and roofline from 2021 through at least the 2026 model year. Ford lists cab height by cab style and trim, with off road models sitting noticeably taller.
Typical factory cab heights for 2021 to 2026 F-150:
Regular Cab: about 75.2 to 75.6 inches, depending on exact configuration
SuperCab: about 75.4 to 77.1 inches, with four wheel drive and off road packages toward the top of that range
SuperCrew: about 75.6 to 77.6 inches for most trims
Tremor: around 79.3 inches
Raptor and Raptor R: around 79.8 inches thanks to taller suspension and tires
Yeah so roof height not hood height. Can you imagine 79 inch front hood
That is like a semi hood height.
The fact that it's more difficult to see someone in front of you when your hood is 6 feet up probably has a lot to do with it too. Takes longer to stop a heavier vehicle too.
Commercial driving licenses exist to ensure there's additional training for people driving a large vehicles. But there's no additional training needed for driving massive pickup trucks.
I don't like my chances as a pedestrian getting hit by even a Honda Civic. But I think someone driving a Civic is more likely to see me and stop their car before hitting me than someone driving a lifted F-350.
Good thing tankies got Trump elected again after Biden pushed to include pedestrian-safety into vehicle design.
Congrats, this is the dumbest fucking comment I've seen on the internet today.
Instead of advocating for proportional representation to prevent vote splitting or vote skipping you tankies demand perfectionism allowing the fascist to win unopposed on the ballot resulting in many people of colour getting tortured and murdered by ice and Israel getting armed no questions asked for their bs acceleration fantasy tearing everything down in hopes a magically leftist government appears out of nowhere.
It was the tankies that decided not to have a primary for the Democratic nominee? Biden was unpopular by the end and Harris wanted to do everything he did, except she wanted to make the military more lethal and said she would have a Republican in her cabinet. Biden pushed through in the last months of his term the opening up of several new ICE facilities and gladly continued arming Israel when it was well documented that they were committing genocide, and Harris would do the same. The dems seemingly did everything they could to sabotage the election. Is your view really that the entire blame for Trump and the fascist rise to power is due to tankies? They really had a tiny impact if anything compared to every other thing that secured Trump's win.
A possible correlation would be that smartphones became much more popular and mainstream during that time.
It's interesting how Europe has a different trend.
Trucks / SUVs / twat mobiles certainly less popular. But perhaps they don't use their phones when driving as much either?
https://road-safety.transport.ec.europa.eu/system/files/2023-02/ff_pedestrians_20230213.pdf
Yeah, that's also a big factor. I think a factor would also be that EU has stricter safety laws, it's usually much harder to get a license than in the US, has better infrastructure, etc.
Not to mention that new US cars (as far as I'm aware) still don't even have a requirement to have ADAS, doesn't really help the situation. If an idiot is on their phone here, there's at least some chance that their car will brake... but even more dangerous if it's a twatmobile of course.
Plus car companies starting to aggressively push larger and larger SUVs + Trucks onto the US market. The visibility out the front is worse, more weight = more energy = harder to brake, higher center of mass on the grill means people are more likely to roll under the vehicle instead of over when a collision actually does occur.
This pdf shows that it seems "light trucks" which includes SUVs account for pretty much all the growth in pedestrian fatalities - GHSA Pedestrian Fatalitis
What's interesting is that the growth is pretty much all night time crashes. If this information is correct, it raises the question if the increase is due to slower reaction times at night compounded by the heavier vehicles or is it simply that SUVs when involved in an accident lead to death over injury.
Sadly I can't find a "pedestrian accidents" by year, as that would help to better understand if less people are surviving the same number of accidents or if more accidents are happening due to the increase in SUV usage.
USA smartphone adoption, pedestrian fatalities, and the average weight SUVs/pickups https://lemmy.world/post/48427091
With different scales like that, you could make any data fit that curve.
Smart phones
Cultural changes. More people started preferring bigger vehicles, becoming more aggressive, seeing pedestrians as adversaries, and voting for the far right
Idk. I remember cars getting crazy big in the early 2000’s. The COMPLAINING when gas went nuts in the mid 2000’s was hilarious.
You bought an Expedition or Hummer and want to cry for cheap gas? There was an old lady in a newish (no idea how new) Corvette at the gas station complaining about the cost to me. While I was driving a POS 1990 VW Jetta. Amazing
I’d like to know the real reason the rate is going up though.
Early 2000s big vehicles are tiny compared to modern SUVs and trucks. I work somewhere with a garage that sees mostly SUVs, and one day someone had brought in a Hummer H2. The classic monstrosity of its time. That thing parked next to a brand new Escalade or Yukon is absolutely dwarfed. Its about the same size as the average modern SUV. But compared to the average size of a 2000s sedan its huge.
Up until recently I drove a nice early 2000s passat. That was a family car in its day, but its easily dwarfed by any modern sedan.
Has there been any recent effort whatsoever by a regulator or government policymaker in reigning in the size of these trucks? It's truly absurd
Appro of nothing, I just checked my country's data. The US has roughly three times the pedestrian death rate to that of Australia.
I don't know what that means. I have only been to the US once, and that was in the 90s. I was very surprised at how difficult it was to be a pedestrian there. Australia does love cars too, but it is also relatively easy to leave them at home for small errands. Not sure how much of a contributing factor that is?
Was curious if we’d improved:
- 2022: 7,508
- 2023: 7,318
- 2024: 7,248
- 2025: 3,024 (Jan - Jun, full year forthcoming)
When maga hates on roundabouts.
I don't hate them but I have almost no experience with them and never one with pedestrians trying to cross it.
Are you supposed to not enter the roundabout if you see a ped going to cross the road where you would exit? Or stop in the middle if they step into your exit road? Or keep going around and around until your exit is clear?
As a pedestrian, can you walk counter to the spin? Can you cross the circle ⭕ or do you have to go around?
I'm not stupid but I am ignorant and I hope I'll soon have more opportunities to use the information you're about to impart.
Are you supposed to not enter the roundabout if you see a ped going to cross the road where you would exit? Or stop in the middle if they step into your exit road? Or keep going around and around until your exit is clear?
You stop and wait for pedestrians to pass, then exit or enter the traffic circle
As a pedestrian, can you walk counter to the spin? Can you cross the circle ⭕ or do you have to go around?
Yep. For you it's just a walkway that goes all way around the traffic circle, with no extra rules. Though sometimes there's just a bypass line for pedestrians, if there's 1 or more exits to highway or something where pedestrians do not go
You enter the roundabout normally.
If the pedestrian is crossing your exit, you wait by your exit until they are clear.
Most pedestrians will try crossing when they are sure nobody is about to enter, but obviously that is never a guarantee, and pedestrians have right of way.
you shouldn't be navigating a roundabout at such a speed where you cannot stop, so coming to a gentle stop to let them pass shouldn't be an issue.
The only roundabout hereabouts replaced a 4 way stop in a residential area. Little thing, one lane. So if I stop to wait for a pedestrian, the person behind me who's planning on continuing around to another exit will have to stop too. Which, given that the whole point of a roundabout is not to stop, they will not be expecting. I will get honked at and/or rear-ended, depending what they're doing on their phone. I think I'll circle around until it's safe.
Taking a lap is also an option.
While the purpose of a roundabout is better flow, pedestrians have right of way and if you'd rather get dizzy than make someone behind you wait 5 seconds and get honked at, go for it!