mmt@dciem.UUCP (Martin Taylor) (07/31/84)
TC Wheeler says:
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How many times does it have to be repeated that West Germany
has a HIGHER ratio of accidents than the US. The ratio is
higher by 4 times the US rate. The myth of safer driving in West
Germany is just that, a myth. These statistics that everyone likes
to throw around about West Germany are nothing more than holdovers
from the 1950s when there was very few autos that could get up to
80 mph. The drivers over there may well take a libertarian view
of their driving, but it doesn't last long as they are being
scrapped off a bridge abuttment. If that's the attitude the
libertarians take, then I say they are wrong. To say you have the
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What does Libertarianism have to do with driving practices in Germany?
And how can you compare accident rates in a densely populated country
with those in a huge and largely empty land? There are real questions
about the safety of German vs N. American driving practices, but they
won't be answered by selection of spurious statistics.
Subjectively, I feel a LOT safer at 150 kph on an autobahn than at 110
on our local highways. Germans seem to drive more courteously, more
aggressively, and more skilfully than N. Americans. Of course, they
aren't encumbered with having to drive N. American cars because of
some kind of import quota :-)
If my subjective impression of being safer on the autobahn is true, it
is not because faster is safer; clearly faster is NOT safer. But if
drivers have to be more aware of the simple rules of the road because
of the wide speed ranges, then perhaps faster LEADS TO safer driving.
But again, maybe my subjective impression is a delusion, after all.
If we want to compare REAL safety records between German and N. American
highways, we have to match traffic density (say, cars per hour per lane)
and weather (yes, Germany has lots of patchy fogs, which will cause
pile-ups on anybody's expressways). Without the proper control conditions,
we can't easily determine the effects of driving speed.
--
Martin Taylor
{allegra,linus,ihnp4,uw-beaver,floyd,ubc-vision}!utzoo!dciem!mmt