Submitted 1 year ago by L4s@lemmy.world [bot] to technology@lemmy.world
Drivers Tend To Kill Pedestrians At Night. Thermal Imaging May Help.::Pedestrian automatic emergency braking (AEB), which may become mandatory on U.S. cars in the future, tends to not perform well in the dark.
What if we reduced the size of cars, reduced speed limits and created cities and towns that are safer to walk in
Also, increase public transit options & availability.
No thats communism
Yep! America: Of the Cars, By the Cars, For the Cars
Funfact! Can’t be bothered to look it up but I remember reading that lower speed limits actually make people more prone to speed. In most cases, if speed limit is low, people will try their best to hit it and even slightly go over it. In higher speed limits people tend to actually drive slower than speed limit dictates.
This does, however, only apply to express ways and similiar, not city’s limits…I mean, people are still gonna try to max their speed but I really don’t think we can put it high enough for this to not apply and be safe anyway.
Also, how the hell do americans have this problem when their cities spend 2/3 of the day being locked in slow moving traffic? .-.
Adjusting a speed limit is not enough, road engineers need to implement actual traffic calming measures to slow people down…
Fun fact, US pedestrian deaths went up during covid because there were fewer drivers and people could speed more easily.
I mean, long term that’s a fantastic solution. Pretty sure this change can be implemented a lot sooner and a LOT cheaper, and save lives tho.
Limit the speed of private vehicles mechanically, the same way they do with ebikes.
100%
It will help with pedestrian accidents but it will also be terrible for driving since you cannot reduce the distance between cities/commute length
I’d rather commuting take longer if less people die. But that’s just me.
Good.
Maybe we’ll start designing our cities and lives for shorter commutes, benefiting ourselves and our environment? Might just be me tho.
People could also wear something other than black clothes when they go outside at night.
Dude. For real. The number of jump scares I’ve had on a dark fuckin back road, and some bastard in all black seemingly materializes in front of me… Same thing with people who drove at dusk without lights on, MALE YOURSELF VISIBLE
It is your responsibility as the operator of a car to see pedestrians even if they are wearing black
No, it’s not. I’m the most responsible driver there is and even I draw the line here. When driving next to park cars I pay extra attention because someone may want to cross the road and walk out from behind a car but if someone hides behinds a bush and jumps out right in front of my car it’s not my fault. At night it’s my responsibility to drive below the speed limit and pay attention to the road but if some black ninja hides on the curb there’s not much I can do about it.
Said the non car driver.
yeah I just murder people based on the color of their clothes. if they didn’t want to be murdered they wouldn’t have dressed like that
Fuck you, that is obviously not what I said. You people should really learn how to read, instead of just making shit up and then believing I actually said it.
Whew, I’m not alone.
In IIHS’ latest tests of car headlight systems, fewer than half (43%) earned a good rating. […] “Vehicles that earn a good rating for visibility in our tests have 23% fewer nighttime pedestrian crashes than those that rate poor.”
That’s a lot of room for improvement without new technology.
It’s the kind of thing you assume would have been empirically tested and have minimum safety regulations, instead of the wild variability we see from dimly lit up close to blinding pulsar from alpha centauri.
There is a minimum and regulations, in the US the legal range is between 500 and 3000 candelas. And it results in exactly what you describe.
Europe actually has incredible adaptive headlight technology that AFAIK was illegal in the US up until very recently. It’ll be great to see this rolled out here as it’s better for everyone.
Do we? I think they’re really annoying, blinding the shit outta me, then finally adjusting correctly just right before we pass each other.
I’m curious what their “good” rating entails. Hopefully not just brighter lights, that just makes oncoming traffic blind. That could end up being more dangerous overall, even if it’s not the car with “good” headlights doing the killing. Realistically, if you’re going to walk at night somewhere there are cars, wear a light, high vis vest, reflectors, SOMETHING.
We have the tech, what needs to improve are regulations based on performance instead of tech.
That would leave room for innovative design that achieves the performance requirements.
hmm thermal imaging in cars… or just more public transit and street lighting… give me the expensive capitalist hellcreating thing
That only works in more urban areas.
Its impossible to covered every road in lights and it can get very dark when you are far away from a city. Same with public transit. I am all for it, but it’s only reasonable in more densely populated areas. There just won’t be enough people using it in th middle of nowhere to just something like that much less staff it.
Meanwhile helping cars see people even in those less common and more difficult situations is a good thing. Why would you NOT want your car to be safer for others around you?
80% of the US population, and about half of the world population, lives in urban areas.
By 2050, those figures will be 90% and 75%, respectively.
Planning better urban areas won’t help everyone, but it will help the supermajority.
Awww shit bois the huge country with plenty of money cannot afford to do it
Where do you think people lived during westward expansion when every town was connected by rail? There weren’t too many urban places out there.
It’s a myth that it only works for urban areas. Switzerland has their trains travel to basically every town on time and frequently, and those towns in the alps are sure as hell a lot harder to reach than whatever rural place you’re thinking of. Admittedly, getting from the station to your destination will be harder without a car until things are built or changed to replace car dependence, but car dependence was manufactured, not intrinsic.
Right. I can’t wait for the thermal camera on my ridiculously expensive car to break so it can become a lawn ornament until I spend thousands on a new camera.
I’m all for more public transport but I’m also all for improving safety features for pedestrians. Not sure why anyone would be against putting the cost on car owners.
Drivers Tend To Kill Pedestrians At Night. Thermal Imaging May Help.
Thermal imaging will definitely help spot those dirty walkers so I won’t miss as many. Those bastards can blend in sometimes and some of them are deceptively quick. The little ones especially are tough to take out. Of course, sometimes those guys just run right in front of you which are easy points but it takes the sport out of it.
Anyway, it’s about time someone put the right tools in the hands of us hunters. I can’t wait to have an evening cruise with my lights off and really get a good stalk on, you know?
ITT: “What was the victim wearing at the time? Was the car acting in self-defense? Do cars have qualified immunity? Did the pedestrian pose a threat or instigate the car? Were they wearing their officially state-sanctioned Pedestrian uniform and helmet? Did the pedestrian have any pre-existing conditions?”
Remember when Biden said that pedestrian could use beacons to alert autonomous cars of their location?
No I don’t remember that. Any chance you have a link?
I remember Tesla fanboys crying when Biden appointed Cummings to the NHTSA, but I can’t think of anything else connecting Biden to self-driving cars.
As a pedestrian, this is why wearing high viz/lighted clothing at night is so important.
A high percentage of the people who are hit at night are on drunk, drugs, or mentally ill. Not exactly the type to heed this advice. Maybe homeless services could pass out reflective clothes.
I would absolutely love a source on that one, still not a great look to disregard safety and life so nonchalantly
A high percentage of drivers are drunk, on drugs, or mentally ill* especially those hitting people
This has been a thing for decades now at least in Mercedes (S & E) and BMW (5+).
And it’s not just the camera alone, car headlights have a special projector that illuminates pedestrians. Works as intended, but few people opt for it … and gov are still not mandating it (like automatic breaking).
My parents gotba relatively new Merc and I’d to turn that auto braking off. Its far too sensitive and nearly had me rear ended driving around a bend. My guess is its picking up the retroreflective spots on the markings as there usually isn’t a car on that bend but the Merc is beeping at me like I’m about to be in a collision
Something must be wrong then.
Or its just a (now) standard emergency braking feature (not meant as a substitute, but to lessen crash outcomes), not radar cruise control. If it is tho, look in the settings, maybe you can adjust something there. But radar breaking on all new-ish cars is smooth. But it does tend to sightly mimic the driving (accelerating and braking) style of the car in front, especially in cities as it tries to be polite & not make others impatient.
Anything but slowing down when it’s difficult to see ahead. We’ll just victim blame dead pedestrians, deer and raccoons for wearing dark colors at night.
I know I am part of the problem, but the number of people walking around in dark colors and dark jackets at night baffles me. Bonus points if they are jaywalking because they have the right of way.
Combine that with spending any time after sunset either partially blind from super bright LEDs or fully blind from high beams and yeah. Constantly having to drive defensively and try to spot potential hazards a mile ahead in the brief window of just being partially blinded.
So I am all for some thermals I can glance at
My genuine favorite is a motorcyclist who lives out near my ex. Lights off more often than not and he has jet black leathers and helmet and bike
If you cannot drive safely around pedestrians in normal street clothes, you should not be driving. You are the one bringing a lethal machine into the equation, they’re just out living.
Sure but people can be a little more sensible to think not to dress as a fucking ninja at night and expect to be seen?
Then please enlighten me as to how you manipulate the laws of physics to increase the reflectivity of clothing while your night vision is impaired by all the headlights at face level angles too far to the left?
Defensive driving is acknowledging problems and trying to mitigate them. Stupidity is pretending there isn’t one
You clearly have never driven at night.
A pedantic point from me here, but it’s not ‘jaywalking’ if you have the right of way. It’s only jaywalking if it’s against regulations.
Still stupid to be in the road at night I agree, right of way or not.
“Jaywalking” is propaganda, not a legitimate thing.
AFAIK the law here in Ontario is that pedestrians can cross mid-block on a non-controlled-access-highway (ie a regular road not expressway) as long as any oncoming vehicles have plentiful space to safely come to a complete stop. You only lose the right-of-way as a pedestrian if you’re doing something that forces drivers to make emergency manoeuvres.
I nearly killed a group of people one night.
Full on slamming of brakes and trying to not have another sort of accident.
Roughly 3am, a major major highway, and a group of people decides to dash across.
Dark clothing. Crossed between where any lights were.
Everyone involved was very lucky in that moment.
I wanted to bring this up, I’m glad others also see it. (Or rather don’t? :p)
People often don't help themselves either. I remember this time, I was driving on a country road in the fog. Suddenly I saw my foglights light up a dog walking in the road. So I drove around, then as I got closer I saw a man walking this dog, dressed all in black, on an unlit country road, walking away from traffic, in dense fog.
If he made it back home alive, it's purely down to luck (or his dog being seen before him again).
How about not driving while on dense fog?
I would love to never have somewhere I needed to be when weather made driving dangerous.
Unfortunately most people don’t have that kind of freedom to always be able to leave early enough before bad weather starts, or to stay where they’re at during bad weather until it ends.
Best most people can do is drive more carefully and slow down as appropriate for the visibilty.
this is gonna be super bad for lizard people 😱
mark Zuckerberg is crying right now…
Oh good, anything to help me kill more at night!
Well yea, more chances of witnesses during the day, so obviously night time is better for… oh wait, we’re talking about accidental deaths?
As much as I like the anti-car think, this really shouldn’t be blamed completely on cars. Especially in the US, pedestrian infrastructure in general is lacking. This includes thinks like sidewalks, but also proper lighting at places where people could be (See the sample image of a petrol station in the article, why are there no lights there?).
Additionaly, a lot of people dress dark with no reflection surfaces whatsoever (And some ciclelysts are insane enough to go without light at night). Try wearing stuff with some build-in reflectors at night. It does not need to be an ugly big yellow patch for that. I own a backpack with nicely worked in reflectory surfaces which makes me highly visible at night.
Ofc there is also a component to the Cars and drivers here, but if thermal cameras are the first solution someone can come up with, maybe the start needs to be somewhere else.
Especially in the US, pedestrian infrastructure in general is lacking.
“Pedestrian infrastructure” is really car infrastructure, because it’s designed for the benefit of cars to get pedestrians out of the way.
By all rights, the entire street has been “pedestrian infrastructure” for thousands of years.
The part that is shared with cars is, yes. Still doesn’t mean that it should be shit. This problem is there because it does suck. The US is a stand out in regards to non-car safety in a bad way. Trying to blame it on cars only is stupid. Demand better infrastructure, not even more bloat on cars.
Clearly you’ve never met some assholes on bikes.
I do a lot of night driving and haven’t killed anyone.
I don’t need a thermal camera to pay attention to the road in front of me. Drive to the conditions.
This is so fucking stupid because you can apply it to literally any safety standard.
I do a lot of driving and have never needed a seatbelt.
I do a lot of driving and I’ve never needed ABS.
I do a lot of driving and I’ve never needed disc brakes.
I do a lot of driving and I’ve never needed modern headlights.
I do a lot of driving and I’ve never needed a properly developed crash structure.
And of course it’s not just driving:
I don’t wear a hardhat or any other protective gear for my job. It’s never done me any harm.
Etc.
This is so fucking stupid because you can apply it to literally any safety standard.
And then you write something exactly opposite.
OP writes about “drive to the conditions” which is like… Your responsibility as the driver. If you can’t react to people on the road, slow down.
And you write about being recless.
Like the case with the paintball guy a few years ago. Someone was driving on a road in the woods at night when he suddenly hit a guy - dressed in dark camo, face blackened, etc, anything not to be seen - who came running out of the woods onto the road. He was a paintballer being persued by members of the opposite team. The car took him out of the game, though.
Probably because people are tired or drunk. Thermal Imaging won’t fix that.
I know I am part of the problem, but the number of people walking around in dark colors and dark jackets at night baffles me. Bonus points if they are jaywalking because they have the right of way.
Combine that with spending any time after sunset either partially blind from super bright LEDs or fully blind from high beams and yeah. Constantly having to drive defensively and try to spot potential hazards a mile ahead in the brief window of just being partially blinded.
Have you maybe thought about the fact that 99% of nice and thich winter jackets come in a full 3 colours: yellow-khaki, dark blue and black.
Bonus points if you are speeding over a pedestrian crossing or if there’s nos sidrwalk so you have the choice of not going anywhere or using the only other option, i.e. the road
Combine that woth the fact that headlights are exponentially more blinding to pedestrians, that cars zooming by produce very calming and enjoyable noises, especially if it’s a beefed up BMW louder than a jet engine.
Oh and also if you’re in a car and hit a pothole you’ll just get a little shake. But if you’re a pedestrian and it’s raining, there’s a non-zero chance you’ll ebd up soaking wet and catch a cold
TLDR: How the FUCK can someone be jaywalking if they have the right of way?
It means he’s confused and has fallen for the automakers’ propaganda.
It means someone isn’t using a crosswalk but still has the right of way by virtue of being a pedestrian.
Judging by the heading, most people driving at night must be blind and speeding. Just keeps your eyes open and drive responsibly!
Cadillac and Mercedes has had thermal cameras on their cars since the early 2000s. There is probably enough data from their vehicles to see if this technology actually helps reduce collisions at night.
Anyone remember those Cadillacs that had thermal night vision?
TurboHarbinger@feddit.cl 1 year ago
Yes, I need more incentives to kill pedestrians.
scarabic@lemmy.world 1 year ago
LOL yes. Even the first sentence in this headline reads funny on its own.
milkjug@lemmy.wildfyre.dev 1 year ago
Thermal imaging can help to shift those killings to daytime!