We are arguing about the burden. Right now, the burden of preventing accidents is placed on pedestrians and kids. Everyone on foot needs to look carefully, and only step on the road when it is safe
We could revert this burden. The cars need to drive in a way that, if a kid appears at a distance of X meters, they can fully stop without touching the kid. This would mean slower speeds and perhaps better breaks.
Instead of parents afraid for their kids, we could get drivers afraid of jail, losing cars, heavy fines.
There is no question that, when a car is allowed at absurd speeds (like 20 miles per hour -- see the graph in https://www.propublica.org/article/unsafe-at-many-speeds) then the motorist has no time to react and incurs a risk of killing people. If we manage to restrict the speed to 20 mph everywhere a pedestrian might be reasonably expected, then the driver can (physically) react.
What you are saying is basically: I want to drive in a monstrous speed so that it is impossible for me to prevent accidents, so you should prevent accidents. The problem is not the fact that the speed precludes your ability not to murder children (we agree it does!) but that you insist to be allowed to drive at those speeds anyway.
What "burden"? You might not even be alive today if it weren't for cars and all they've enabled.
You're basically saying we should make cars uselessly slow, because "think of the children!!!1"
It's trivial to look for cars when crossing the road. If you think otherwise, that's just your misguided ideology. Even animals know well enough to not put themselves in danger; and for the ones which don't, Darwin wins.
No. I've had enough of these insane ideological battles.
I am interested. You seem to be espousing a belief (that I hope I don't get wrong): "driving above 20mph in a city environment gives significant economic benefits, and should not be curtailed".
In roads, between cities, the benefits are obvious (or at least, I agree with you that they are substantial). So I expressed the belief you seem to hold with an added hypothesis of 'city environment'.
Do you agree with the belief as I quoted? Was I fair?
If so, why do you think so? I just tried some different paths in my city (currently with very low traffic) in google maps. The greatest average speed I was able to find was 26 mph. The city seems to work fine and have good economic development.
I used
>>> distance_in_km/((time_in_minutes)/60) * 0.62
(is this wrong? I don't think so)
Might be the case that I just lack intuition, but the advantages of much higher speeds inside the city limits do not seem obvious from an economic standpoint.
I would indeed hesitate if I believe that this would have any significant economic cost. A small reduction in productivity can be very costly in human suffering.
As to 'my side', I am not saying only that I want to reduce accidents. I am saying that I want to reduce accidents while increasing the amount of time people can safely spend outdoors and while increasing the activities that they can do outdoors.
The idea that a significant part of our cities must be (or simply is) high speed road is a choice, and I think it merits discussion.
Humans can change velocity and look in all directions much easier than cars.