[DeTomaso] NPC: Traffic fatalities in Sweden 2009

[Thomas Tornblom]

I saw a figure of 6.5 mil registered vehicles, of which 4.3 mil are cars.

I believe fairly good average annual driving distance is around 15000km, 
or around 10000 miles.

Remember that Sweden is about the same size and shape as California and 
many still have fairly long daily commutes.

Thomas


MikeLDrew at aol.com skrev:
> 
> In a message dated 1/4/10 10 05 51, Thomas.Tornblom at hax.se writes:
> 
> 
>> Sweden had the lowest number of traffic fatalities since they began
>> tracking it in the 1930:s. A total of 355 deaths out of a population of
>> about 9.2 mil.
> 
> 
> That's an amazing statistic--although perhaps a bit misleading.
> 
> Rather than tracking fatalities vs. population, it would be more 
> accurate to track fatalities vs. miles driven.  The USA is huge, and is 
> also a very mobility-driven society.  As a broad, general guess, I'd say 
> that the typical American driver travels much, much further in a given 
> year than his European counterpart.  This is due to a number of 
> unrelated factors--Europe's smaller geographic separation, more 
> effective mass-transit systems, much higher cost of fuel, and a 
> lingering 'village' culture that causes people to shop, dine etc. close 
> to home.
> 
> We have none of that here.  We chose to live a long way from where we 
> work, quite often.  We're unable or unwilling to use mass transit to get 
> back and forth.  And our cheap gas lets us do things that would be 
> unheard of anywhere in Europe--like driving 50 miles each way to go to a 
> favorite restaurant.  So the average American's exposure to the threat 
> is probably far greater than his European counterparts, and it's only 
> natural for the statistics to be a bit higher as a result.
> 
> Having said that, I'm positive that once the statistics were revised, 
> the European results would still be far, far better than ours, by orders 
> of magnitude.  For we are still plagued with a culture that is very soft 
> on driving while drunk.  There isn't nearly enough safety ingrained into 
> our culture so seat belts use is far from universal (although it's 
> improved substantially from years past), and our driver training is 
> abysmal, so there are an awful lot of poor drivers out there who don't 
> even realize they're poor drivers.  Vehicle maintenance standards are 
> generally poor to nonexistant, so there are some real deathtrap cars 
> rattling around on our roads (despite the appearance of some of my 
> Sciroccos, mechanically they're all tip-top!).  And finally, in some 
> areas we have a substantial immigrant population, people who were not 
> necessarily raised in an automotive culture, and thus are still quite 
> new to the whole concept--or who resolutely refuse to learn and adapt to 
> it, and drive their cars the same way they used to ride their bicycles 
> through the streets of Beijing or Hanoi or Mumbai or wherever.
> 
> All of these things combine to result in a death rate that is astronomical.
> 
> Using the Swedish population model, their death rate is 3.85 per 100,000 
> people.  Meanwhile, the best rate in the USA (2006 statistics) was 6.8 
> per 100,000 in Washington DC (a tiny area, with an effective mass 
> transit network), going all the way up to 33.3 per 100,000 in Mississippi.
> 
> It's interesting to look at a map of the US that shows death rates vs. 
> population by state.
> 
> http://www.statehealthfacts.org/comparemaptable.jsp?ind=118&cat=2
> 
> Note that in the more cosmopolitan, densely populated east coast region 
> the rates are the lowest.  That can be attributed to the high number of 
> people living in urban areas (many New Yorkers don't even own a car), 
> the relative close proximity of everything, effective mass transit, and 
> a generally more educated populace.  Meanwhile, the death rate is the 
> highest in the southern states, where poverty and ignorance are far more 
> prevelant.  There's also a high incidence in the remote states in the 
> north, where people are often VERY removed from civilization and thus 
> have to drive great distances on a routine basis, often facing severe 
> weather challenges.
> 
> It would be interesting to chart the death rate versus a number of 
> different factors, i.e. average income, average education, average 
> mileage driven, average age, and compare the differences.
> 
> As bad as things are in the USA, it's nothing compared to China.  
> According to the latest figures from the World Health Organization, 680 
> people die and 45,000 are injured every day in motor vehicle accidents 
> there.  For comparison, in the United States where there are more than 
> 600 cars for every thousand Americans (versus 7 or 8 out of every 1,000 
> in China), daily deaths are around 115.
> 
> Mike !DSPAM:4b423c0396052219129925!


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