This type of thinking would do humanity a lot of good if applied to cars & rules of the road. In my opinion using a public resource (roads) you should be compelled to follow the rules
This was my first thought as well. The article quotes a councilmember as saying:
"Can we make sure that if you’re going down a sidewalk and you’re going bump bump bump because you hit everything on the sidewalk — that the scooter knows you’re on a sidewalk and really compels you get off the sidewalk," Ward said.
It would be interesting to apply this technology to cars, as well. Driving or parking in the bus lane or bike lane? "Really compel the driver to get out of that lane." Speeding in a school zone? "Really compel the driver to slow down." It would be nice if public transportation was faster (the point of bus lanes) and if kids could get to school without being mowed down by speeding cars. A much bigger problem than scooters, however annoying they may be on boardwalks.
We have played with such technology in NYC from time to time. One state Senator's vehicle has been caught going 36+ mph in a 25mph school zone 10 times and the same Senator is responsible for renewing the speed camera trials. Needless to say, he is opposed and the state Senate took no action:
This article ended up making the state Senate look so bad that the Governor apparently unilaterally extended the "trial" of the speed cameras, so maybe progress is being made. It still tends to be widely opposed by those in power (police officers are the other loudest anti-advocates); people do not like perfect enforcement of laws that they can't weasel their way out of with "do you know who I am!?" It's unfortunate.
While I think applying this to scooters is one thing, I do not want to live in a world where my car is artificially limited to 15mph in a 15 zone.
Yeah maybe we could reduce accidents by 0.1% or whatever. But you just know the damn thing will go on the fritz at some point or gps will be wrong and you’ll be going too slow somewhere else, or you’ll be a rush in an emergency and be unable to get where you’re going...plus (and this May be unpopular) that world just sounds boring and crappy. I don’t want my life controlled by the cloud.
"I do not want to live in a world where my car is artificially limited to 15mph in a 15 zone."
15 - 20mph is a pretty significant speed limit. At that speed a car - pedestrian collision is highly unlikely to be fatal. Much faster and the chances of a fatality increase quickly.
I would really like to see 20mph speed limits become much more common and strictly enforced. There's no reason we need to risk killing people just to get someplace faster.
There's a difference between saying we should have speed limits and forcing cars to follow the limit. That's like having your computer checking the hash for every image it renders in case you're trying to view something illegal. It just opens itself up to a lot of abuse.
More crosswalks, and enforcement of their use, could also reduce the risk to pedestrians. There is room for give and take here. Trying to retroactively enforce 20mph limits on fast roads is pretty silly, just design the damn roads better and it wouldn't be necessary.
>While I think applying this to scooters is one thing
Yeah. The top of a slippery slope that ends in skateboard insurance, bicycle licesnes the DOT setting up stings to catch overweight wheelbarrows. No thanks. The level of regulation that applies to mopeds is too damn high. The last thing I want is a precedent for regulating even smaller things.
I think this program is dumb and I don't support implementing it. We could easily make our lives worse by implementing various hypervigilant safety measures: no sugary drinks, no distilled alcoholic beverages, no showers without handrails, no pit bulls, and so on. Most people won't vote for such programs because they don't want to live that way. Life is inherently risky, and re-evaluating every activity in terms of someone's right to avoid a tiny probability of accidental death in order to foist a utilitarian orthodoxy on the public is a stupid fad that needs to die. People already voted against Jimmy Carter's lower-all-the-speed-limits programs in the '70s, there's no reason to revive that losing culture war. We have real problems, like climate change, racial inequality and unsustainable land use, and as long as reformers refuse to acknowledge the hamburger problem --
It seems unrealistic to try and get to 0 deaths on the road. Just with every other activity, there are risks that come with driving and I think people should be allowed to accept those risks, just like they do with any other somewhat dangerous activity. Are we going to introduce regulation to prevent people from doing other dangerous things like biking, or skiing?
Vision Zero is about _designing_ roads to be safe for all users. It is not just about driving, nor is it just about speed limits. The "zero" part is the driving vision of the program, it is not a target.
Vision Zero Principles, as stated in the linked Wikipedia article:
Vision Zero is based on an underlying ethical principle that "it can never be ethically acceptable that people are killed or seriously injured when moving within the road transport system." As an ethics-based approach, Vision Zero functions to guide strategy selection and not to set particular goals or targets. In most road transport systems, road users bear complete responsibility for safety. Vision Zero changes this relationship by emphasizing that responsibility is shared by transportation system designers and road users.
> it can never be ethically acceptable that people are killed or seriously injured when moving within the road transport system
This is the part I don't agree with. What makes it unethical that people die while choosing to participate in a somewhat dangerous activity? Sure, we could halve all of the speed limits and put speed cameras everywhere. We could also force people to wear face helmets and kneepads when riding their bike, and wear a life jacket while swimming. But I don't think we should do any of those things since people should have the freedom to take reasonable risks.
What do you mean by "choosing to participate in a somewhat dangerous activity"? Are you talking about driving, or are you talking about using roads in general? 40% of the traffic deaths in my city last year were pedestrians. This is a risk people are exposed to just by choosing to leave their homes on foot, which I find completely unacceptable.
Your libertarian fantasy would be fine if it wasn't for the fact that you 2 tonne steel box can kill /other/ people when you drive excessively fast and crash.
I'm not a libertarian, I just think the current speed limits should be increased to the speed people actually drive at, and then enforced. Speed differential is a big component of what makes driving dangerous, rather than just speed itself. 120km/h-130km/h is not excessively fast on a highway when everyone else is going that speed. If you don't want to take the risk of going on fast roads, that's fine, just take country roads or slower city roads, pretty much the only risk you have is crashing on your own.
Honestly I am much more in favor of better pedestrian protection, looking critically redesigning bad intersections & traffic calming measures than speed limit reductions.
Moving towards zero deaths from road way transportation seems like a worthly goal
It's a 6 lane highway, the speed limit is 55, and everyone is going 75, including police officers. That's an indication the speed limit is unreasonably slow.
This has been studied to death, seriously, it doesn't need to be argued here. Actual traffic engineers design roads all the time for a particular speed limit. A lot of the actual limits implemented, however, are purely political. And basically ineffective, as has been documented repeatedly. If you want people to go slower, there are easy ways to achieve that through correct road design.
Sure, they design the road with a target (including non-speed-related requirements), then observe, then recommend a speed limit. If it's too fast, they can do things like narrow the lanes, etc, which will slow traffic down. Changing the signs does nothing, more or less, because only about 10% of drivers base their speed on the sign.
Portland is going through this right now. Dropped the speed limits on all the former 25 mph roads to 20 mph. The result is predictable. If the city wanted people to slow down on the small surface streets, they should make them narrow enough that it's somewhat challenging to fit two cars on side by side. Works every time, needs no more enforcement to make it work.
It would have to apply to all vehicles because any new vehicle which enforced either would be unmarketable to a large number of people. Honestly, as much as I hate the idea, I do like the fact that the value of my non-nanny vehicles would likely increase if such a thing were to be mandated in new vehicles.
The likely truth is that any attempt at gov't enforcement of driving behavior at this level would immediately result in the politicians suggesting it losing their job. Maybe in Europe it would fly (I'm not convinced, though), but in the USA definitely not.
If we creep toward perfect enforcement the legislators and the cops should be in prison long before you or I and there will be nobody left to write laws or enforce laws. Of course that's assuming that they have to follow the same laws that we do. /s
Sure, as long as we remove the financial aspect of it. Right now enforcement is more about revenue, so we need to cut that link before we get wild with automating enforcement.
I don't care if someone does 10-15 MPH over on a highway. However doing 40 MPH in a 25 MPH zone could have fatal consequences for pedestrians, bicyclists and scooter riders. That should not be open to "local interpretation," that's one of the reasons America's roads are much more dangerous than European roads. Speed, stop light and stop sign cameras should be placed in areas of high and/or recent injury areas to ensure that people who don't have 2 tons of metal protecting them can use the streets safely.
Designing and building safe roads costs money. Of course that money should be raised primarily from taxes. But that doesn't remove the need to punish dangerous driving (red light running can still happen even on the safest street). I would personally rather pay a fine than go to jail or spend the day in the stocks and pillory.
Red lights are a whole conversation by themselves.
One of the jurisdictions local to me makes the yellow light 4 to 5 seconds long, depending on road speed, and puts a 2 or 3 second delay after one light goes red before the opposing signal goes green. They have no red light cameras for enforcement.
Another jurisdiction, adjacent to the first, has lowered their yellow light timing below 4 seconds, sometimes lowering it to the point where it takes as long to go across some intersections as the length of the time is yellow, assuming you are at the speed limit. They love red light cameras.
Until we remove the monetary incentive from enforcement, we have no business further automating it. Use points, remedial training, reduction in driving privileges, whatever, but the incentives currently benefit those who make the rules, and the result is not safer roads.
Where I live, lawmakers and police openly admit that 10-15 mph over is perfectly fine, and expected.
Unfortunately, assurances from lawmakers and police are worthless unless they're written into the law. No matter what they might say, you're still open to legal liability for going even 1 MPH over the posted limit. Worse, this attitude makes the problem more difficult to fix—once they get everyone used to going 10-15 MPH over the posted limits they can't very well update the signs with the real speeds since that would lead people to think they can go 10-15 MPH over what the new signs say.
Selective enforcement results in injustice. Any law which is routinely broken without penalty should be considered null and void. Either set the limits properly and enforce them strictly, or do away with them entirely.
"Can we make sure that if you’re going down a sidewalk and you’re going bump bump bump because you hit everything on the sidewalk — that the scooter knows you’re on a sidewalk and really compels you get off the sidewalk," Ward said.
It would be interesting to apply this technology to cars, as well. Driving or parking in the bus lane or bike lane? "Really compel the driver to get out of that lane." Speeding in a school zone? "Really compel the driver to slow down." It would be nice if public transportation was faster (the point of bus lanes) and if kids could get to school without being mowed down by speeding cars. A much bigger problem than scooters, however annoying they may be on boardwalks.
We have played with such technology in NYC from time to time. One state Senator's vehicle has been caught going 36+ mph in a 25mph school zone 10 times and the same Senator is responsible for renewing the speed camera trials. Needless to say, he is opposed and the state Senate took no action:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/26/nyregion/marty-golden-sch...
This article ended up making the state Senate look so bad that the Governor apparently unilaterally extended the "trial" of the speed cameras, so maybe progress is being made. It still tends to be widely opposed by those in power (police officers are the other loudest anti-advocates); people do not like perfect enforcement of laws that they can't weasel their way out of with "do you know who I am!?" It's unfortunate.