Articles Posted in Motor Vehicle Accidents

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A deadly crash in Queens has sparked heated discussions about bicycle safety in New York City. As Gothamist reports, a 35-year-old delivery worker driving a motorized scooter, Alfredo Cabrera Liconia, “was killed by the driver of a Bud Light truck” last Thursday. Video of the incident shows Liconia’s Scooter “trapped under the wheels of the semi-truck, which appears to be making a right turn onto Crescent Street.” The collision occurred while the driver “appeared” to be turning right from Astoria Boulevard to Crescent Street, where trucks are not permitted unless they’re making deliveries. Gothamist reports that it was not clear whether Liconia was using the bike lane when struck.

One image of the truck reportedly captured it “crushing the flexible posts” separating the lane from vehicle lanes. These “flexi-posts” have been criticized by cycling accidents as too insubstantial to prevent vehicles from passing into protected bicycle lanes. A group of local lawmakers reportedly asked the city’s department of Transportation to replace the flexi-posts with “concrete jersey barriers” as a way of protecting cyclists from cars. Continue reading

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One curious feature of the Covid-19 pandemic’s effects on American roadways is that while there were fewer vehicles on the roads, there was also an increase in reckless driving, accidents, and deaths.

As Axios reported in October, data provided by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration found “traffic fatality rates increased 30%” in the second quarter of 2020. Officials attributed this spike to an increase in “risky behavior.” When researchers looked at patient data in trauma centers, they found that many “seriously injured or fatal crash victims” had been speeding, driving under the influence, and/or not wearing seatbelts. Researchers found specifically a higher presence of “alcohol, cannabinoids, and opioids” than in the same time period in previous years.

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Research conducted by State Farm Insurance indicates that the autumn months are when motorists are most at risk of crashes involving deer. Deer-vehicle accidents reach their peak in October, per a recent article by New York Upstate, though the risk persists until the end of January. As the article notes, the risk is so high in those months because they constitute both the mating season for deer, as well as a period of heightened activity as deer forage in advance of the winter months.

A 2018 analysis by State Farm estimates that the risk of hitting deer or other large mammals “doubles in the fall.” The risk of hitting deer is highest at the dawn and dusk hours, raising the need for drivers to be vigilant. State Farm advises drivers take a number of precautions, including: driving slowly, especially at dawn and dusk; wearing seatbelts; anticipating additional deer to follow any deer they see; using high beams, unless oncoming traffic are approaching; and avoiding distractions, such as phones or food. In the event that a driver encounters a deer, State Farm advises braking if possible, but not swerving, which “can result in a more severe crash.”

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A new law in the State of New York requires all car passengers, even those riding in the backseat, to wear a seatbelt. Before the law went into effect on November 1st, passengers over 16 years of age were not required to wear a seatbelt when they were sitting in the rear seat. With the new legislation, New York becomes the 31st state in the nation to require backseat passengers to buckle up. While the law exempts bus passengers as well as people riding in emergency vehicles like ambulances, it does not exempt passengers in taxis and other ride share vehicles.

New York’s Governor’s Traffic Safety Committee has estimated that 30% of highway fatalities in the state involve passengers who aren’t wearing seatbelts. When Governor Cuomo signed the new legislation in August, State Senator David Carlucci said: “The injuries you can sustain from not wearing a seat belt can be deadly, and that’s a fact whether you sit in the front or the back of a vehicle. With this bill signed into law, we will help prevent tragedies and save lives in New York. Thank you to the advocates, including AAA for their strong support of this legislation.” Continue reading

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To keep children safe from vehicle accidents, cities need to develop more green space, build protected infrastructure for pedestrians and cyclists, keep speed limits low, close off some streets to cars entirely, and implement clean air initiatives. Thats the argument of a recent article in TheCityFix, a website covering urban issues in the US and around the world.

As many as 500 children die in car crashes each day, with magnitudes more suffering the long-term consequences of the trauma that results from nonfatal car accidents. TheCityFix argues that in order to become more “child-friendly, cities need to take bold, holistic public policy approaches that prioritize the needs of children. Continue reading

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Scooters and other micromobility vehicles may be the future of urban transit, argues a new article in TheCityFix. The Covid-19 pandemic’s effects on mobility patterns are likely to increase the speed with which urban dwellers adopt new transportation modes, like scooters, e-bikes, mopeds, and traditional bicycles. Studies show that some cities have seen as much as 90% declines in public transit use, with people shifting to micromobility vehicles. This trend raises important questions, especially when it comes to safety issues.

Most cities do not have the necessary infrastructure to keep micromobility users safe, according to TheCityFix: due to the dominance of urban development that favors car riders, absent are structures like bicycle lanes separated from traffic, or “connected corridors where people can safely ride and scoot over long distances.” In the absence of such structures, the use of micromobility vehicles can put riders at risk of injury and death. Continue reading

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Is it time to repeal jaywalking laws? A new column in Bloomberg CityLab argues it is, citing their alleged role in systemic racism. The column points out that in September, a Black man in San Clemente, California, was shot and killed during an altercation with police when he tried to cross a street. “Black and Brown people, especially men, are routinely targeted by police for jaywalking or simply existing in public space,” the authors write, noting that while some infractions result in fines, others result in violence or death.

The column’s authors, who are both “experts on pedestrian safety” in the US, go on to argue that the rise of pedestrian deaths over the last ten years demonstrates the ineffectiveness of jaywalking laws when it comes to public safety. Then they lay out nine reasons to get rid of them in the US. Continue reading

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A recent study by the virtual insurance agent Insurify identified the ten car models associated with the most motor vehicle accidents. To arrive at its findings, Insurify looked at its database of “over 2.5 million car insurance applications.” When drivers apply for quotes via the website, according to its description, they enter information including their car’s model and whether they have been responsible for any motor vehicle accidents. Insurify’s researchers then compared “the number of car owners with a prior at-fault accident against the total number of drivers for each model to determine the proportion of drivers with an accident on record.”

Included in their data is each car’s safety ranking, as evaluated by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, another insurance industry group. The IIHS Specifically evaluates safety by examining a car’s crashworthiness, or “how well a vehicle protects its occupants in a crash,” and its crash avoidance and mitigation technology, which “can prevent a crash or lessen its severity.”

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A new study published in the scientific journal Current Biology finds that the spring transition to Daylight Savings Time may result in an increase in fatal car accidents in the US. The study’s authors include Josef Fritz, Kenneth P. Wright Jr., and Céline Vetter of the University of Colorado, and Trang VoPham of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center.

The study, published in January 2020, found evidence that the springtime Daylight Savings Time shift “acutely increases motor vehicle accident (MVA) risk,” a phenomenon that “has been partly attributed to sleep deprivation and circadian misalignment.” Its summary, available via Current Biology, states that the shift one-hour forward results in darker mornings and brighter evenings, which change “illumination conditions for peak traffic density,” which may reduce MVA risk in accidents and evenings.

Another factor identified in the study is the changing sunrise and sunset depending on where you are geographically in your time zone. “The sun rises at an earlier clock time in the eastern regions of a given time zone than in the western regions, which is thought to induce higher levels of circadian misalignment in the west than in the east,” the study says. This phenomenon is known as “time zone effect.”

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A new car insurance industry analysis by virtual insurance agent Insurify reveals the industry’s systemic racism, according to an analysis by StreetsBlog. A close examination of pricing trends revealed that Black drivers with clean driving records receive higher prices than white drivers with spotty records, in addition to “other racist practices.”

The report states that “Cities and towns with majority Black residents experience among the  highest quote prices compared to cities of any other racial makeup, regardless of how clean their driving record is.” It describes “redlining,” a practice in which drivers in “majority-Black neighborhoods” pay nearly “20 percent more for car insurance on average than a driver living in a majority-White neighborhood” with violations on their record. Continue reading

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