The New York Times takes to the New York streets to show how new research trumps traditional ideas about pedestrian and bike safety.
Pedestrians struck by cars are most often hit while in the crosswalk, with the signal on their side. Taxicabs pose a disproportionate threat to cyclists, who often compete for the .Read more...
Wired looks at failure.
Building 4 is Ford’s Tough Testing Center, where the company evaluates nearly all of its nonengine parts, from seat belts to axle assemblies. The facility is a monument to a dark truth of manufacturing: Even the best-engineered products fail. Some percentage of all mechanical devices will break .Read more...
abcNEWS reports on the worst driving distractions on the road.
In a first-of-its-kind study, Australian researchers found that children are 12 times more distracting to the driver than talking on a cell phone while at the wheel. According to their findings, the average parent takes their eyes off the road for a .Read more...
Wired looks at why Russians have dash cams
How is it possible that a dozen different motorists around the Russian city of Chelyabinsk were able to capture video of a massive meteor flying through the sky? Because almost everyone in Russia has a dash-mounted video camera in their car.
The sheer size of the .Read more...
Freakonomics looks at a study comparing deaths from traffic pollution versus traffic accidents.
A new study claims that traffic pollution “is more than twice as deadly as traffic accidents.” Scientists Steve Yim and Steven Barrett “estimate that combustion exhausts across the U.K. cause nearly 5,000 premature deaths each year,” writes Roland Pease. “The pair also estimate that exhaust .Read more...
Allianz created an attractive infographic chronicling the rise of safety in the automobile. From GPS to Infotainment.
Infographic source: Allianz
Freakonomics claims that legalizing marijuana could lead to fewer traffic fatalities.
That’s the claim of a new paper by D. Mark Anderson and Daniel I. Rees, put out by the IZA, titled “Medical Marijuana Laws, Traffic Fatalities, and Alcohol Consumption”:
To date, 16 states have passed medical marijuana laws, yet very little is known about their .Read more...
The Insurance Institute For Highway Safety has a new crash test to evaluate frontal crashes.
“Nearly every new car performs well in other frontal crash tests conducted by the Institute and the federal government, but we still see more than 10,000 deaths in frontal crashes each year,” Institute President Adrian Lund .Read more...
The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety has a new ‘Small Overlap’ test to evaluate automotive safety.
Here is the Mercedes C class.
The Economist looks at why British drivers are slowing down.
Compared with other European countries, Britain’s top legal limit of 70mph on motorways and some dual carriageways is comparatively low. That may be one reason why 49% of drivers broke it in 2010, a higher proportion than almost anywhere else. Yet .Read more...
Popular Science reviews the work at MIT regarding typography’s effect on driving.
The basic interior of the automobile changed little in the latter half of the 20th century. “You had the steering wheel, the gas pedal, the brakes. And the display in there might have been providing a digital readout of .Read more...
The Wall Street Journal considers Nissan’s bid to reintroduce the Datsun as a no-frills, low-cost entry-level auto.
In a bold move into the auto industry’s fastest-growing category—emerging-market countries—Nissan Motor Co. is planning a revival to this Beatles-era star that might surprise its fans. According to interviews with Nissan’s CEO, Carlos Ghosn, .Read more...
