NYC Releases “unprecedented” Report

Over 7,000 pedestrian crash reports studied.

NY Times has an article which highlights unexpected results.

Taxis, it turns out, are not a careering menace: cabs, along with buses and trucks, accounted for far fewer pedestrian accidents in Manhattan than did private automobiles. Jaywalkers were involved in fewer collisions than their law-abiding counterparts who waited for the “walk” sign, though they were likelier to be killed or seriously hurt by the collision.

And in 80 percent of city accidents that resulted in a pedestrian’s death or serious injury, a male driver was behind the wheel. (Fifty-seven percent of New York City vehicles are registered to men.)

. . .

Pedestrians would be well advised to favor sidewalks to the right of moving traffic — left-hand turns were three times as likely to cause a deadly crash as right-hand turns — and to stay particularly alert at intersections, where three-quarters of the crashes occurred.

Here are the official key findings of the report:

• 2009 was the safest year on record in New York City history.
• Traffic fatalities in 2009 were down by 35% from 2001.
• NYC’s traffic fatality rate is about a quarter of the national rate and less than half the rate in the next 10 largest U.S. cities.
• Traffic crashes cost the City’s economy $4.29 billion annually.
• Pedestrians are 10 times more likely to die than a motor vehicle occupant in the event of a crash.
• Pedestrians accounted for 52% of traffic fatalities from 2005-2009.
• Driver inattention was cited in nearly 36% of crashes resulting in pedestrians killed or seriously injured.
• 27% of fatal pedestrian crashes involved driver failure to yield.
• Pedestrian-vehicle crashes involving unsafe speeds are twice as deadly as other crashes.
• Serious pedestrian crashes are about two-thirds deadlier on major street corridors than on smaller local streets.
• Most New Yorkers do not know the city’s standard speed limit is 30 m.p.h.
• 80% of crashes that kill or seriously injure pedestrians involve male drivers.
• 79% of crashes that kill or seriously injure pedestrians involve private vehicles, not taxis, trucks and buses.
• Serious pedestrian crashes are about two-thirds deadlier on major street corridors than on smaller local streets.
• Manhattan has four times as many pedestrian killed or severely injured per mile of street compared to the other four boroughs.
• 43% of pedestrians killed in Manhattan lived in other boroughs or outside New York City.