| Road Toll | |
SO, this year's road toll looks to be a 43 year low, coming in at under 400.
This is obviously great news. But as with all things statistically, a bit of a police and politician statistical tweaking.
1963 - What did a loaf of bread cost?
- What was the average wage?
- What was the population?
- What was the number of cars in New Zealand?
- What was the average number of hours each car was on the road?
Now compare the same answers to today, and I think people will find that the Road Toll is so much lower that 1963 that we need to all pat each other on the back.
The other issue I have with the simplistic use of a quantitative death count is it skews the results.
1 crash could result in 1 death or 20. The fact it is one crash is the important part, not how many were killed in that single incident.
If we used the number of fatal incidents as a measure, I believe we would see an even better indication of the driving carnage.
If we then took that and applied the above "inflationary" considerations with the fact there are more cars on the road, a higher population, and on average each car drives for more hours, we really should be taking a step back at the amount wasted on road safety campaigns targeting speed and drink driving on TV, and focus on the balance of the real issues.
1. driver skill improvement
2. road quality
3. vehicle quality (e.g. WOF should include shock absorbers in the same things like brakes are tested)
These, not speed or alcohol are the biggest contributors to road deaths.
Fix those three things, and I believe we will see less people dying on New Zealand roads.
To those who have lost loved once this year, my thoughts are with you, and please don't take my position as trivializing the loss. My position is simply that the "powers" that can affect the road toll are focused on the emotive rather that the true situation, and this allows them to hide the more costly, but effective fixes.
Be safe in 2007 - and have your car serviced, get the shocks tested, and go on that defensive driving course.
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| Posted by Karl Rohde on December 26, 2006 at 12:00 am | Politics | Trackbacks (0) |
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