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Most accidents are at low speed, especially when you are talking about hitting pedestrians and cyclists. Your suggestion is non-sensical.


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Most harm occurs with high-speed collisions.

I was hit while cycling, by a car which pulled out of a minor junction as I was turning into it. As it was an extremely low speed collision, there was no real harm to me, although the (cheap) bike was not worth repairing. The worst I can say about my injury was not having any memory between being in contact with the bonnet at 45 degrees while thinking “oh no”, and finding myself horizontal looking up to a bunch of strangers insisting I didn’t get up. I didn’t even have any grazing.

If a pedestrian is struck by a car at 40 mph, there is an 85% chance of death. This percentage drops to 45% at 30 mph and 5% at 20 mph. - https://mdot.ms.gov/safetyeducation/parents/facts-and-stats/

I was probably hit at 5-10 mph.


So if you slow the cars down to 40 mph you are still probably dead. Pedestrian / cyclists don't get hit where cars are actually going fast.

Pedestrians were 16% in of US RTA fatalities in 2017: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motor_vehicle_fatality_rate_...

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