My petition on the White House website asking President Obama to appoint a Traffic Safety Ombudsman did not get the necessary 100,000 signatures within 30 days. It was archived yesterday.
So now the White House will not have to tell me why they will not do this thing — appoint a Traffic Safety Ombudsman — which could help to end senseless road tragedies.
After posting today on facebook about another terrible truck crash tragedy, this website is getting a lot of views. I wish this were behind us and I didn’t have reason to keep writing and fighting for safer roads. But here I am reminding myself that, yes, a Traffic Safety Ombudsman would be a good thing.
But who will listen? What should I do next? Who will work with me?
I have not heard one word from Washington, D.C., about our 20,000 Vision Zero Petition signatures. That’s a problem. Either they think they are already doing what that Petition requests (with which I would disagree) OR they don’t think that it is important enough to do anything about. That is something which we should all rise up about.
In fact, how I envision it is that the Traffic Safety Ombudsman would be the person to implement the requests of the Vision Zero Petition. Small businesses have a National Ombudsman. Why not do the same for the victims of tragic, preventable traffic crashes?
Responsibility in Engineering: Toward a New Role for Engineering Ethicists
Traditionally, the management of technology has focused on the stages before or after development of technology. In this approach the technology itself is conceived as the result of a deterministic enterprise; a result that is to be either rejected or embraced. However, recent insights from Science and Technology Studies (STS) have shown that there is ample room to modulate technology during development. This requires technology managers and engineering ethicists to become more involved in the technological research rather than assessing it from an outsider perspective. Instead of focusing on the question whether or not to authorize, approve, or adopt a certain technology or on the question of who is to blame for potential mistakes, the guiding question in this new approach is how research is to be carried out.
Responsibility in Engineering: Toward a New Role for Engineering Ethicists by Neelke Doorn, Delft University of Technology, Delft, The Netherlands, n.doorn{at}tudelft.nl
and Jessica Nihlén Fahlquist, Delft University of Technology, Delft, The Netherlands, Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden
doi: 10.1177/0270467610372112 Bulletin of Science Technology Society June 2010 vol. 30 no. 3 222-230
I still can’t believe that they are gone and won’t ever come back.
The circumstances that led to their deaths, and the way that fighting for safer roads has taken over my life, make it all seem so unreal.
Oh, sure, there are big chunks of normal everyday life. But overall, there is a sense that something is very wrong with this world and how can I ever go back to thinking otherwise?
I wrote those words last night in an effort to grapple with the aching grief.
As I reflect more upon that dilemma, I think that it stems from a kind of raging helplessness, an inability to change that which callously tosses aside the value of human life and is able to do so because there is always someone else at whom to point the finger of blame or to expect to shoulder the responsibility to do something about the problem.
So the end result, for the embittered mourner, may be that there is no easily-identified enemy to fight. Victory is elusive. Intangible. Slippery. If a battle is won, too often loopholes appear or the victory has come only through compromise.
And why should that be? Why don’t we place a higher value on saving human life from preventable, senseless deaths? Is compromise the only option?
Is it because of a lurking attitude of c’est la vie, que sera sera — that’s life, whatever will be , will be?
Until it touches your life. Then you’ll understand. Then it will be too late.
Writing this because I miss them. . .
Note: After writing the above, I looked to see what I could find online regarding the ethics of saving human lives related to road safety. [My search terms were:Is it ethical to not use safety technology to save human lives?] I found an interesting essay on the topic, Saving lives in road traffic—ethical aspects, and am pasting the concluding remarks from that article here:
I would like to end this overview of ethical problem areas in traffic safety with some concluding thoughts on how these five ethical topics can be included and inform policy.
Criminalisation
Attempts should be made to analyse the problem at hand carefully and as open-mindedly as possible before rushing to the conclusion that the best way to reduce or eliminate an unwanted and harmful behaviour is to criminalise and punish. Alternatives should be considered and creativity in problem solving encouraged. A good example is drunk driving where the alcohol interlock is a device worth considering as an alternative or at least additional measure to punishment.
Paternalism
Most measures to increase safety in road traffic can be motivated by the notion of protecting others against harm, which means that even a liberal can endorse them. However, there are some measures where the most beneficial to society may be to ignore it, for example motorcyclists not wearing a helmet, but where most people still believe society should protect individuals against harm by legislation or technology. It should be acknowledged that this is the case, and it would be helpful to carefully analyse and discuss new measures, keeping in mind the distinction between harming others and harming oneself. In some cases, most people share an intuition that a measure is justifiable even though it is paternalistic, but in other cases paternalistic measures appear unjustifiable. By acknowledging and discussing such issues freely and publicly we make sure that new laws and technologies are at least closer to being ethically justifiable.
Privacy
There appears to be a fundamental difference between privacy in our own homes and privacy on the road. The reasons we are equally attached to the notion of privacy in our cars as we are to privacy in our homes are tradition, culture and habits. We should recognise that the great degree of risk-exposure associated with driving may imply that the expectation of privacy on the road is not reasonable.
Justice
A humane society protects vulnerable human beings. A humane infrastructure protects vulnerable road users, for example children, the elderly and disabled people. This implies that we should not count their lives or the quality of their lives less than others. It may even mean that additional attention should be directed at protecting such groups. A minimal requirement should be that potential damaging effects on vulnerable groups should always be taken into account when planning infrastructural projects.
Responsibility
The traditional view of responsibility for traffic safety is closely attached to the notion that safety is about individuals driving safely and that accidents are caused by drivers. While this is true to some extent, the emerging view that a major role can and should be played by institutions, for example governments and vehicle-producing companies, is useful and reasonable. The implied notion is that responsibility has to be distributed and shared between different actors if a safer road traffic environment is to be achieved.
People in industrialised societies are so used to road traffic that it is almost considered a part of nature. Consequently, we do not acknowledge that we can introduce change and that we can affect the role we have given road traffic and cars. By acknowledging the ethical aspects of road traffic and illuminating the way the choices society makes are ethically charged, it becomes clear that there are alternative ways to design the road traffic system. The most important general conclusion is that discussion concerning these alternative ways of designing the system should be encouraged. Here are some examples of questions to address in public debates:
What are the reasons for prohibiting certain behaviour or requiring a certain safety device—to protect the individual from herself, to protect others or to save money? Which of these reasons are valid?
Should society criminalise unsafe behaviour or use technology (when possible) to eliminate the unwanted behaviour?
To what extent is it reasonable to expect privacy on the road?
Should additional measures be used to protect vulnerable road users?
Should safety be seen as the result of individuals behaving responsibly or the system designers designing safe systems?
Every day that goes by, someone in our country is impacted by Vehicle Violence. So in the next 100 days, as we approach the 2016 Election Day in November, what kind of crash statistics might we expect?
According to Lou Lombardo, we can estimate what we have to look forward to in the next 100 days, as well as the next 4 years:
Next 100 Days
Over the next 100 days Vehicle Violence, in the U.S.A. alone, will result in:
~10,000 Deaths. Current rate about 100 deaths per day.
~ 40,000 Serious Injuries. Serious injuries include Brain (TBIs, Spinal Cord (quadriplegia and paraplegia), amputations and burns at a current rate of about 400 per day.
~ $200 Billion in losses. Current rate about $2 Billion in losses per day. Next 4 Years
Over the next 4 years Vehicle Violence, in the U.S.A. alone, can be expected at current rates to result in:
~ 140,000 Deaths. Current rate is about 35,000 Deaths per year.
~ 560,000 Serious Injuries. Current rate is about 140,000 serious injuries per year.
~ $3 Trillion in losses. Current rate is about $836 Billion per year using 2010 NHTSA estimates.
“When quality of life valuations are considered, the total value of societal harm from motor vehicle crashes in 2010 was $836billion.”
If you are hoping that automated safety technology for trucks could make a big difference, be sure and read the opinion of one truck driver, who is concerned that developing automated safety systems for trucks is more difficult.
While these electronic systems have lightning-fast reactions, they don’t have the nuanced judgment of an experienced over-the-road trucker — someone who over many miles has likely encountered every type of road hazard. . .
I am all for anything that will save me time and fuel, and prevent a crash. I really like how when it works, the system tells me the speed and distance of the vehicle in front. That’s really handy when you drive a truck governed at 65 mph. It helps me figure out when to pass in the left lane without affecting traffic flow. The fact that it slows you down gradually to keep you at a safe following distance also is beneficial.
But I worry that turning over control of an 80,000-pound highway missile to sensors and software requires more research and thought. My experience is that these systems are not ready for our highways. Those who want to rush them onto the road in the name of safety better make sure they work.
Let’s do this right. Let’s examine traffic safety from every angle. Let’s work together toward a common goal: saving lives.
A new video game that lets you drive an 18-wheeler big rig. Safely. I hope it has , or they add, features to help truck drivers learn how to deal with real-life trucking issues like driver fatigue. And what it’s like when bad things happen. Like crashes.
Experimental Safety Vehicle (ESV) is the designation for experimental concept cars which are used to test car safety ideas.
In 1973 the U.S. DOT announced its ESV project, the aim of which was to obtain safer vehicles by 1981.[1] A car produced by this effort was known as the Minicar RSV.
What about truck underride prevention? This issue seems to fall between the cracks. Has anyone developed an Experimental Safety Truck (EST) for testing of underride prevention best practices? I’m no expert on how that could work, but surely there is potential there. Without a doubt (in my mind), this Goliath could be taken on as a collaborative effort.
How much money, by the way, has been put into this kind of safety research? Especially compared to trucking industry profit.
Every time I bring up a possible solution to underride crashes, the problem of cost comes up as an obstacle to moving forward — either for the research or the implementation. “Don’t ask for that because then the industry will oppose it.” It is like running into a brick wall.
Oh, well, it is safer to run into a brick wall than the back of a truck, they say.
And then there is the faulty (in my opinion) process of making regulatory decisions based on a cost/benefit analysis that compares industry costs with the worth of lost or shattered human lives. So far, we have gotten ZERO response to our 20,000+ Vision Zero Petitions delivered to Washington, DC, in March 2016.
We asked for President Obama and Secretary Foxx to take some very specific steps to rectify that situation. No response.
I have also asked for help in determining what percentage of trucking industry profit has been devoted to underride research. I have an idea that the results of such fact-finding might prove an embarrassment to them and might even give safety advocates a leg to stand on.
When I find out, I’d like to take a cue from former Senator Robert Kennedy and ask the trucking industry to stop whining about what they “can’t” do to fix the underride problem — because of how much it would cost them — and to stop wielding their unfair lobbying advantage to delay or block needed underride prevention technology.
After all, if you do the cost/benefit analysis math for truck side guards — which DOT intended to mandate for large trucks as far back as 1969 — the cost/”life saved” is not likely to be something for them to complain about.
Following the successful Underride Roundtable on May 5, 2016, a group of thirteen people pulled together a Consensus Comment for submission to NHTSA for their consideration.
Today, I emailed this document to the nearly 100 people who attended the roundtable — inviting them to read and sign this set of recommendations for the current rear underride rulemaking on semi-trailers.
Thank you again for participating in the Underride Roundtable hosted by the IIHS on May 5, 2016.
As a follow-up to that successful event, a subsequent meeting, to which you all were invited, took place on June 24 at the IIHS offices in Arlington, Virginia. A smaller group participated in that meeting and were able to put together a Consensus Document which we will be submitted to NHTSA as a Public Comment.
NHTSA has indicated to me that they, “look forward to your recommendations and encourage your continued submissions to the public dockets on NHTSA’s rulemakings on truck underride safety, specifically Docket No. NHTSA-2015-0070 for NHTSA’s rear underride protection for single-unit trucks. . . and Docket No. NHTSA-2015-0118 for NHTSA’s rear underride protection for semi-trailers. . . As with all of our public proceedings, we will give all comments full consideration to help inform our next actions.”
The Consensus Document specifically addresses the NPRM for semi-trailers. Please review the attached document and, if you agree with the Consensus Recommendations and would like to add your name to this document, please let me know by August 6, 2016. I will be submitting this as a Public Comment at the end of that day.
I look forward to continued positive communication among us all. Marianne
NOTE to non-engineers: This would make the NHTSA’s proposed rule stronger — yielding underride guards which should be able to withstand crashes at the outer edges of the trucks. Translation = Save More Lives
Studies have been done which show that trucks, even if they are equipped with rear underride guards, do not pass all of the crash tests. In fact, out of 8 truck companies tested, only one, Manac, passed all of the tests: http://www.iihs.org/news/rss/pr031413.html .
So, it may be a true statement, according to The American Trucking Association, “that many manufacturers are producing trucks with better than required safety underride guards.”http://myfox8.com/2013/08/13/families-push-for-tractor-trailer-regulations/ Nonetheless, the bottomline is that there are many trucks which are NOT equipped with the best possible protection, which means that someone somewhere sometime might crash with one of those trucks and not live to know it.
Why would there be resistance to providing the best possible protection? Is it money? Quite possibly… Yet, according to Manac President Charles Dutil, the Manac underride guard “doesn’t weigh 200 pounds more than anybody else’s; it doesn’t cost $200 more,” estimating the difference to be at most 20 pounds and $20.
“If trailer manufacturers can make guards that do a better job of protecting passenger vehicle occupants while also promising lower repair costs for their customers, that’s a win-win,” says David Zuby, the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety’s chief research officer. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OhQdYSSEJO8
What I want most of all, in this situation, is to help reduce the number of families who open their mail to find a death certificate for a family member because of a preventable death.
NOTE: I wrote the above as a facebook post just a few months (August 14, 2013) after the crash which took AnnaLeah and Mary from us. Since then, almost three years later, three more trailer manufacturers have voluntarily improved their rear underride protection.
But there are four major manufacturers who have not and federal underride standards have not yet been improved. And then there are side guards and exempt single unit (straight, box) trucks which still need to be addressed. Not to mention the 12 million existing trucks on the road which probably won’t be required to be retrofitted with improvements.
If we can take away anything immediately (while waiting for an in-depth investigative report) from Joshua Brown’s fatal crash with his Tesla, I hope it is the understanding that preventing Death by Underride cannot depend solely on crash avoidance technology. What we should be going for is not either/or but both/and.
The Tesla did not prevent the crash because the side of the truck was too high up to engage/connect with any of the safety technology. Had a side guard — which is not a federal requirement — been on the truck, there might have been no crash or at least no underride. Joshua Brown might still be alive.
This is a clear case where even the most-advanced crash avoidance technology was not able to prevent a tragic underride death. If side guards had been mandated and installed, perhaps the outcome would have been quite different.
There are too many factors and conditions which can result in a collision between a large truck and a smaller passenger vehicle. And without adequate underride protection, the smaller vehicle is going to end up under the larger, too-high truck so that the crashworthy features of the car do not function as intended. The truck then comes into the occupant space [Passenger Compartment Intrusion = PCI] — causing horrific death or serious injuries.
My goodness, it makes me mad just to re-read the posts which I have written over the last three years since our deadly (for those who experienced underride) crash and recall the ongoing attitude of non-responsibility of some parts of the trucking industry to do their part in helping to solve this solvable problem!
I have included the links to those posts along with the beginning paragraphs:
Clarifying the ATA Position on Underride Guards After last week’s announcement by NHTSA of their initiation of the rulemaking process for underride guards, I have had four interviews. So far, I have seen two of the articles and both of them included a statement, obtained from the American Trucking Associations (ATA), which disturbed me when I read them. I posted about it and you can read my thoughts here. . .
The Passion of This Safety Advocate It gets really tiresome to hear the trucking industry come up with the same statements time after time after time. Nearly every time I read an article written about our crash, there are the obligatory responses from the trucking industry. Invariably, they try to shift the responsibility off of themselves to make the changes sought after and, instead, bring up some alternative solution to the “problem.” . . .
Truck Underride Roundtable is one week away! May it be sehr gut! On June 25, 2014, after a tour of the research & design center of a truck trailer manufacturer in Georgia, I wrote down these perplexing thoughts about the too-long unresolved underride problem: Now, it is understandable, amid the multitude of demands and the tyranny of the urgent, that—without a ready solution, in fact, one which would require time and money to develop—this problem has not been given much attention. But, if those who bear responsibility for making sure that this problem gets solved (one way or another) had lost two of their beloved children—or any other loved one—I can guarantee you that they would have moved heaven and earth to find a way to prevent underride. . .
UMTRI Reviews Opposition to Proposed & Proven Truck Underride Prevention Measures Back in 1989, the University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute examined features proposed for improving truck safety. In other words, they reviewed NHTSA underride rulemaking from years past. What they discovered was that a proposed underride rule in 1977 was opposed by practically “the entire trucking industry – both manufacturers and haulers.” The authors of this study noted “that failure to implement a rule on underride guards took place despite extensive research indicating their expected effectiveness.” . .
When we met with DOT in March 2016 to deliver our 20,000+ Vision Zero Petition signatures, Blair Anderson (NHTSA Deputy Administrator at the time, now US DOT Undersecretary for Policy) smiled when I made the point about not either/or but both/and. He indicated that the Director had just been talking with staff about that very thing.
Let’s hope that this logical line of reasoning is widely understood and serves the purpose of moving both rulemaking and voluntary industry safety advancement full steam ahead.
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