Comment 114236

By CharlesBall (registered) | Posted October 13, 2015 at 11:17:53 in reply to Comment 114234

I don't know what this anonymous guy is talking about, but 5 deaths per year in a population of 520,000 is less than a 1 in a 100,000 chance of being killed.

In a world of risks, compare that to say heart disease, stroke or lung cancer which is easily mediated by exercise, diet and elimination of smoking. I think stroke deaths are 7% of all deaths and the rate of strokes is something like 900 per 100,000.)

A 2010 study found that 139 pedestrians are killed every year in Ontario. That works out to about 1/100,000.

5 (or 1/100,000) is a statistically insignificant number. What I take him to mean is that if the Ontario average was .8 as opposed to 1 in Hamilton, that .2 is an even more statistically insignificant number. That would be about 1 person a year. But in fact the number is lower such that it is not even a whole person.

That does not mean that 5 deaths is acceptable at all. None are. Drivers and pedestrians have to be more careful. But the logical conclusion that everyone should drive at 30 km an hour does not necessarily follow. You have to weigh whether or not the result you are trying to achieve will be accomplished while weighing the cost involved.

So the extreme answer is, if no one drives, no one is killed. But then you don't have the benefits of a post industrial society.

I think the answer will lie in driver-less cars and buses in the long term.

They are testing small driver less taxi type vehicles in Greece. Could you imagine if we had hundreds of those zipping around the city. You wouldn't need a car. (or the LRT for that matter.)

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