Let’s not demonize driving, just stop subsidizing it

Re:Let’s not demonize driving, just stop subsidizing it by nommm-nommm on Thursday February 16, 2017 @11:25PM (#13665925)

What's with the tone? Think about the people you know who "died too young." They probably died in a car accident. Vehicular crashes are the number 1 cause of death in the US among people 15-45 (or thereabouts).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traffic_collision

>Road injuries occurred in about 54 million people in 2013.[1] This resulted in 1.4 million deaths in 2013, up from 1.1 million deaths in 1990.[2]

The citation: GBD 2013 Mortality and Causes of Death, Collaborators (17 December 2014). "Global, regional, and national age-sex specific all-cause and cause-specific mortality for 240 causes of death, 1990-2013: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2013.". Lancet. 385: 117–71. doi:10.1016/S0140-6736(14)61682-2. PMC 4340604 . PMID 25530442.

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Re:Let’s not demonize driving, just stop subsidizing it by brandur on Thursday February 16, 2017 @11:20PM (#13665901)

The OP is right, and actually understating it if anything. Here's a report from the WHO [1] where they cite 1.25 million from 2013. If anything, that number has probably increased significantly since then given the rapid industrialization (and automobilization) of developing countries, especially China.

http://www.who.int/gho/road_safety/mortality/traffic_deaths_...

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Re:Let’s not demonize driving, just stop subsidizing it by flukus on Thursday February 16, 2017 @11:21PM (#13665902)

Isn't it 50,000 in the US alone? A million worldwide doesn't sound too exaggerated. And that's directly killed, not taking into account pollution and climate change.

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Re:Let’s not demonize driving, just stop subsidizing it by wtallis on Thursday February 16, 2017 @11:28PM (#13665939)

The US peaked at a little over 50k per year, but is down to ~35k (and was lower a few years ago).

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Re:Let’s not demonize driving, just stop subsidizing it by dashundchen on Thursday February 16, 2017 @11:51PM (#13666014)

MIT estimates pollution from road vehicles causes 53k premature deaths per year in the US.

http://news.mit.edu/2013/study-air-pollution-causes-200000-e...

I wouldn't hesitate to guess sedentary auto-oriented lifestyles also have an enormous health cost, along with stress from road noise, traffic etc.

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Re:Let’s not demonize driving, just stop subsidizing it by closeparen on Friday February 17, 2017 @12:10AM (#13666093)

If you're going to point to environmental stress, let's not forget that a stuffy, smelly subway car at rush hour pressed up against hundreds of strangers' bodies is also a less than ideal environment.

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Re:Let’s not demonize driving, just stop subsidizing it by dpc59 on Friday February 17, 2017 @01:17AM (#13666313)

Places dense enough to have a subway can be commuted through with a bicycle.

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Re:Let’s not demonize driving, just stop subsidizing it by virmundi on Friday February 17, 2017 @12:26AM (#13666160)

Stuffy and smell does correlate to disease spread. How many people die from the flu or other disease as a result of being pressed upon during their commute?

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Re:Let’s not demonize driving, just stop subsidizing it by arjie on Friday February 17, 2017 @04:21AM (#13666999)

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1750-2659.2012....

Use of Metropolitan public transport is not associated with the flu (and considering the way it's transmitted it's a very good candidate for a disease that would spread in that environment).

I don't want to get into the whole driving debate. Just wanted this fact out there.

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Re:Let’s not demonize driving, just stop subsidizing it by khedoros1 on Friday February 17, 2017 @01:55PM (#13670717)

http://bmcinfectdis.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1471-...

Recent bus or tram use within five days of symptom onset was associated with an almost six-fold increased risk of consulting for ARI.

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Re:Let’s not demonize driving, just stop subsidizing it by arjie on Friday February 17, 2017 @04:03PM (#13671688)

Well. How about that.

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Re:Let’s not demonize driving, just stop subsidizing it by thrw11212 on Friday February 17, 2017 @09:50AM (#13668569)

What fact? This is a single government funded study. Surely they wouldn't say "avoid the subway like hell"?

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Re:Let’s not demonize driving, just stop subsidizing it by ant6n on Friday February 17, 2017 @12:21AM (#13666139)

They're walking and then standing. It's good exercise combated to sitting on a moving couch.

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Re:Let’s not demonize driving, just stop subsidizing it by closeparen on Friday February 17, 2017 @12:30AM (#13666171)

It's an immense amount of time that's no longer available for actual good exercise such as lifting and running, meal prep, etc.

Some will not "exercise" unless forced, sure. For others, the best way to promote exercise is to promote free time.

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Re:Let’s not demonize driving, just stop subsidizing it by dashundchen on Friday February 17, 2017 @12:45AM (#13666219)

The average American commuting by car is already spending an hour a day doing it.

Even if the commuter has to spend the same time on transit, they have time to relax, read, work etc.

This is ignoring the strides we can make with bike infrastructure which provides excercise along with the commute, even in low density suburban areas. Or encouraging remote work, which eliminates the commute entirely and frees up much more time.

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Re:Let’s not demonize driving, just stop subsidizing it by flukus on Friday February 17, 2017 @01:49AM (#13666435)

It's an immense amount of time because of urban sprawl and the cars that enable it.

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Re:Let’s not demonize driving, just stop subsidizing it by closeparen on Friday February 17, 2017 @01:51AM (#13666445)

So if you can't afford to live downtown, you should be disconnected from the city altogether, rather than having a reasonable way to get to it?

Sprawl exists because people want to be connected to cities without paying downtown luxury condo rents, and it's the only viable option (considering public school quality, neighborhood safety, etc.) we're being given.

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Re:Let’s not demonize driving, just stop subsidizing it by dashundchen on Friday February 17, 2017 @02:00AM (#13666487)

The ridiculous prices in many urban cores is driven by the same supply constraints that cause urban sprawl.

When the only place where zoning and planning boards allow density is a relatively tiny downtown, surrounded by low density development, it's no surprise prices shoot through the roof.

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Re:Let’s not demonize driving, just stop subsidizing it by flukus on Friday February 17, 2017 @02:04AM (#13666504)

> Sprawl exists because people want to be connected to cities without paying downtown luxury condo rents, and it's the only viable option (considering public school quality, neighborhood safety, etc.) we're being given.

That's a very America centric view.

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Re:Let’s not demonize driving, just stop subsidizing it by ant6n on Friday February 17, 2017 @09:57AM (#13668610)

So we already moved the discussion from subway cars being uncomfortable because you have to stand and being smelly (or something) to it taking a lot of time.

Well it turns out driving takes a long time too, but you're really just being a moving couch potato.

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Re:Let’s not demonize driving, just stop subsidizing it by flukus on Friday February 17, 2017 @12:13AM (#13666103)

Stuffy and smelly has no correlation with toxic.

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Re:Let’s not demonize driving, just stop subsidizing it by khedoros1 on Friday February 17, 2017 @03:19AM (#13666762)

How about with stress and transmission of disease?

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Re:Let’s not demonize driving, just stop subsidizing it by lorenzhs on Friday February 17, 2017 @04:57AM (#13667155)

See arjie's comment in another branch of the thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13666999

Quoting the linked paper:

> Conclusion: The home environment appears to play an > important role in the spread of influenza in adults, > but not the use of public transport.

Personally, I find public transit much less stressful than driving in a large city. Probably because I'm used to one, but not the other.

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Re:Let’s not demonize driving, just stop subsidizing it by khedoros1 on Friday February 17, 2017 @01:35PM (#13670551)

I wasn't trying to compare the stress of public transit to driving, just "stuffy and smelly" to "not stuffy and smelly". Arjie's government-funded study notwithstanding, it's common sense that you're more likely to get sick when being around sick people. Someone in the office gets sick? It spreads like wildfire, after that one borderline day that they decide to come in anyhow. How could it possibly be better, having much closer contact with many more people?

> Personally, I find public transit much less stressful than driving in a large city.

I'll agree with that, with the added asterisk that I try to avoid high-traffic times in both cases (and actually large cities in general).

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