Why Is America Falling Farther Behind Other Nations on Street Safety? | Streetsblog USA

Headlines are quick hits from media outlets from Missouri and around the world. Follow the headline link for the full story. The source of this headline says:

Americans are killed by traffic at an appalling rate compared to residents of peer nations, as shown in a review of dozens of countries by the International Traffic Safety Data and Analysis Group [PDF]. In Japan, the traffic fatality rate is much lower — 4.3 deaths per 100,000 people in 2011. In Germany, the rate is 4.9 per 100,000. In Sweden, 3.4 per 100,000. And in the United Kingdom, just 3.1. If the United States had a comparable street safety record, tens of thousands of lives would be saved each year.

What’s shocking is not only that those countries have much lower rates of traffic deaths — it’s that they’ve also reduced those rates at a much more effective clip than the United States. The streets of our peer countries are becoming safer, faster.

Link: 

Why Is America Falling Farther Behind Other Nations on Street Safety? | Streetsblog USA

We are making progress on this issue, but not nearly as fast as our peer countries across the globe.

Although we are making progress on some fronts, such as improving safety and collision mitigation systems in automobiles, we are making little headway in improving safety for non-motorists and in designing a transportation system and communities that allow us to get to the places we need to go while driving fewer miles.

The Vision Zero movement is growing in strength across the U.S., and has some real promise in dramatically reducing these traffic-related deaths and injuries.

http://www.visionzeronetwork.org/