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Dangerous to be on the road these days

Not Sure

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One of my friends was in a serous accident yesterday and was fatal for the guy who he hit. He was driving his RV on a straight section of road when someone was distracted and swerved around a stopped vehicle at a stop sign and into his path.

20 min ago I witnessed a car swerve to miss another car stopped at a light . The car snapped a telephone pole in half and rolled 3 times ,I called in the accident , I don't know if they will survive . It was good to see all the good samaritons helping 5 to six people trying to stop the bleeding .

Both of these accidents were caused by distraction , I'm guilty of it myself from time to time but after the last two days I will keep my phone out of reach ! Stay safe please!!
 

Abubob

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In the few months before moving to NH from CT I witnessed 3 accidents right in front of me. Thankfully there were no fatalities.

World Health Org reports that in 2013 there was a little over 34,000 highway deaths in the US. Over 261,000 in China! 1.2 Million world wide. Dangerous is an understatement.

http://www.who.int/gho/road_safety/mortality/traffic_deaths_number/en/
 

hammer

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Aftermath of accident my wife had last weekend near Wellington station (rts 16 and 28 I believe). Guy ran a red light, crashed into a RAV4 which then crashed into hers. No injuries but she was shaken up a bit.

attachment.php


Insurance actually says the fender and doors can be repaired...will have to see.
 

deadheadskier

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Scary. Glad she's okay.

We had a woman die crashing head on into a tree at the end of our street just this week. 40mph speed limit, so no idea how fast she was going and no major curve in the road. No skid marks what so ever so it doesn't appear any attempt was made to slow down. Maybe texting, maybe asleep at the wheel or medical emergency. Haven't heard a cause yet, but see the giant scar on the big oak tree everyday now reminding us of it.
 

Not Sure

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Aftermath of accident my wife had last weekend near Wellington station (rts 16 and 28 I believe). Guy ran a red light, crashed into a RAV4 which then crashed into hers. No injuries but she was shaken up a bit.

attachment.php


Insurance actually says the fender and doors can be repaired...will have to see.

Likewise glad she's ok , my wife had a life changing accident in 1999 , waiting for a light to change in an active school zone was hit by two cars from behind and pushed her into a truck .Guy who was behind her claimed he was stopped but wife said two impacts . An exec at the Co. She worked for and a little old 75 yr old lady who could could be in A Norman Rockwell painting . She started getting calls from the exec telling her to "Say he was stopped". She refused to say so because she as not looking it the mirror.

Three totaled cars in a active school zone WTF ! Wife kept complaining of neck pain and headache and after a year doctors finally discoverd four bulging discs , a nerve oblation and and a many years of pain . She refused surgery as she didn't want to have her whole neck fused. I am not one to sue but the insurance co stopped paying after 3 months leaving us with no alternative . The insurance company refused to settle . Apparently my wife's trip to the chiropractor for low back issue left them an out .Three months before the accident we to a trip to NH and hiked Cannon , I had a picture of her with my 3 yr old standing on a huge boulder she climbed, judge wouldn't allow the picture in also he threw out all the medical bills ! A "pain and suffering " amount of $ 15,000 and a lawyer Bill of $21,000

A year later her job gets "eliminated" .
My "Stephanie " rant basis !
 

hammer

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Picture issues on post...also seeing some issues with editing posts lately.

Wife's Jeep:
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Other two cars, Camry hit RAV4 which ran into the Jeep:

attachment.php
 

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ctenidae

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When you're driving, drive. That's it. Radio at a level that allows you to hear what's around you. Phone in a pocket. Hands on wheel, eyes on road.

People need to remember they're piloting a couple thousand pounds of steel around at speed. F=MV.
 

Puck it

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When you're driving, drive. That's it. Radio at a level that allows you to hear what's around you. Phone in a pocket. Hands on wheel, eyes on road.

People need to remember they're piloting a couple thousand pounds of steel around at speed. F=MV.
F=ma. P=mV
 

yeggous

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This is why the self driving car is going to be one of the biggest public health advances in history.


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deadheadskier

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In addition to improving public health, I wonder how much the technology will improve upon traffic congestion.

A comedic writer could probably write a pretty good skit about what a family of four would look like in one of those cars. All with heads buried in smart phones, no communication other than texts, dad pounding whiskey while behind the "wheel", mom popping valium and checking Pinterest, kids in the back seat sucked into video games while on a Ritalin regimen.. All completely dull to each other and the world around them. The medicated and programmed life of the future.
 

Not Sure

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In addition to improving public health, I wonder how much the technology will improve upon traffic congestion.

A comedic writer could probably write a pretty good skit about what a family of four would look like in one of those cars. All with heads buried in smart phones, no communication other than texts, dad pounding whiskey while behind the "wheel", mom popping valium and checking Pinterest, kids in the back seat sucked into video games while on a Ritalin regimen.. All completely dull to each other and the world around them. The medicated and programmed life of the future.

Sort of been done, now that you have a young one check out the movie Wall E

IMG_5397.jpgThis is what makes me nervous about driverless cars , Feb 2014 skin and ski track from Ski Tracks , People like to say how accurate Ski Tracks is but a simple straight as an arrow skin up a path and up hill zig zag ski and follow same tracks back the path , errors all over ! The biggest one had me doing 40mph a 10th of a mile and back up again . I'm sure the technology is better but I don't like to be R&D stats LOL . I'll go kicking and screaming into driverless.
 

yeggous

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In addition to improving public health, I wonder how much the technology will improve upon traffic congestion.

A comedic writer could probably write a pretty good skit about what a family of four would look like in one of those cars. All with heads buried in smart phones, no communication other than texts, dad pounding whiskey while behind the "wheel", mom popping valium and checking Pinterest, kids in the back seat sucked into video games while on a Ritalin regimen.. All completely dull to each other and the world around them. The medicated and programmed life of the future.

Dirty secret from within the industry: traffic is expected to get much, much worse with self driving cars. We expect people to drive many more miles and purchase many more vehicles.

Without the labor of driving Joey from Jersey is more likely to make that drive to Killington. And your suburban family of four will need four vehicles so that everyone can get to their activities independently.

If the current fuel efficiency and tech stays the same, expect oil prices to skyrocket as consumption grows. But there are a lot of other variables in play.


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deadheadskier

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Gotcha. I guess I just envision a lot more 7-8 passenger vehicles. If you can't drive the car, there's no point in having a performance sedan or sports car.

In regards to traffic, in addition to vehicles being able to travel closer to one another, I would think there would be a big centralized data network managing the roadways. Everyone signs into the network with destination coordinates and the network determines the most efficient way to the location based upon all other vehicles on the road. I'd guess there would likely be a toll type system that charges more for peak travel times. Basically, complete and total automation of the fleet.

Hopefully all of this doesn't occur during my lifetime even considering the ease of getting to work or the ski hill. I rather enjoy driving.
 

benski

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Dirty secret from within the industry: traffic is expected to get much, much worse with self driving cars. We expect people to drive many more miles and purchase many more vehicles.

Without the labor of driving Joey from Jersey is more likely to make that drive to Killington. And your suburban family of four will need four vehicles so that everyone can get to their activities independently.

If the current fuel efficiency and tech stays the same, expect oil prices to skyrocket as consumption grows. But there are a lot of other variables in play.


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On the other hand urban areas are growing faster so fewer people will even want to bother owning a car since keeping a car in many cities is a pain.


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yeggous

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Gotcha. I guess I just envision a lot more 7-8 passenger vehicles. If you can't drive the car, there's no point in having a performance sedan or sports car.

In regards to traffic, in addition to vehicles being able to travel closer to one another, I would think there would be a big centralized data network managing the roadways. Everyone signs into the network with destination coordinates and the network determines the most efficient way to the location based upon all other vehicles on the road. I'd guess there would likely be a toll type system that charges more for peak travel times. Basically, complete and total automation of the fleet.

Hopefully all of this doesn't occur during my lifetime even considering the ease of getting to work or the ski hill. I rather enjoy driving.

This type of system is exactly what we are working on. A big hurdle is going to be who controls this system. I suspect there are a lot of people who are going to be opposed to the government fulfilling this roll. On the other hand, no single company can serve this purpose either for several reasons. Capitalistic economies are not organized in such a way that a non-government entity could ever do this.
 

ctenidae

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My kids are three and five, and it's possible, even likely, that they'll never won a car. On demand autonomous vehicles makes it pointless and wasteful to have an empty car sitting around 22 hours a day. My six speed mouth breather will be a relic from a bygone age.
 
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