🚀 go-pugleaf

> I have included some information from Safecarguide.com at the bottom of
> this post it demonstrates a gradual increase in road fatalities from
> 1994 to 1998., in addition I have included a link to the 2003 traffic
> fatality report from the National Center of Statistics and Analysis
> which demonstrates a continuation of the trend in an increase in road
> fatalities per year over the last ten years(42,643 deaths in 2003)
> (http://www-nrd.nhtsa.dot.gov/pdf/nr...2003/809767.pdf) 
> The increase correponds directly to the increase of light trucks as a
> percentage of passenger vehicles in the United states. 
> 
> In addition, if you look at the rollover statistics posted recently by
> the feds (http://www.suvrollovernews.com/html/article7.html) you will
> find that 53% of all traffic fatalities are due to SUV rollovers and
> that SUV's have a 25% higher fatality rate per accident than
> passenger vehicles. (http://www.stats.org/record.jsp?type=news&ID=388)
> 
> Imprisonment for driving dangerous SUV's would probably have no effect
> especially considering that the rollover rate and corresponding deaths
> would make few of the defendants available for trial. However, there
> is much to support that SUV's considerably more dangerous to their
> occupants and to the occupants of passenger cars that are struck by
> them than other vehicles. It is clear that from a fuel consumption
> standpoint that SUV's are supremely wasteful when it comes to natural
> resources.
> 
> I find it shocking that in an age where safety features in automobiles
> are advancing at a record rate, the irrational and selfish vehicle
> choices of a nation actually increase the number of road fatalities. 
> Imagine the numbers if EAS, side airbags, and anti lock brakes weren't
> around to soften the blow.
> 
> Is that enough documentation? 
> 
> It took about 10 minutes of googling to find thousands of pages, I can
> include more links if you would like.
> 
> 
> 
> "United States - The death toll on our highways makes driving the
> number one cause of death and injury for young people ages 5 to 27.
> Highway crashes cause 94 percent of all transportation fatalities and
> 99 percent of all transportation injuries, yet traffic safety programs
> receive only one percent of the funding of the U.S. DOT budget. The
> staggering loss of life and the incidence of life-threatening injuries
> occurring each year is best described as a public health crisis. 
> According to a WHO report, "The Injury Pyramid," for every motor
> vehicle injury resulting in death in the US, 13 people sustain injuries
> severe enough to require hospitalization.
> 
> In the US DOT publication "The Economic Costs Of Motor Vehicle
> Crashes," NHTSA investigator Lawrence J. Blincoe reports that in 1994,
> motor vehicle crashes accounted for 40,676 fatalites, and 4,100,000
> injuries (of which 533,000 or 13% were serious). The total lifetime
> cost to the US economy for automobile accidents that occured in 1994
> was $150.5 billion. The 1996 NHTSA report "1996 Traffic Safety Facts"
> (pdf) came up with similar though somewhat improved statistics: 41,907
> fatalities and 3,511,000 injuries, 456,430 of them serious. The 1997
> NHTSA report "Traffic Safety Facts 1997" reports 41,967 fatalities and
> 3,399,000 injuries, 441,870 of them serious. The 1998 NHTSA report
> "Traffic Safety Facts 1998 Annual Report" reports 41,471 fatalities and
> 3,192,000 injuries, 414,960 of them serious. "

Very dramatic information, but since SUVs generate so much business,
nobody will do a thing about it.

SUVs are a sign of how much "armor" we need on American roads.
Ironically, along with posing a much greater risk to others, the armor
exposes their own Achilles' heel. We are the victims of our own
success...

If we measure "success" in terms of the junk we own.