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Is there such a thing as being too safe? Jeff Kaufman writes that buses are much safer than cars, by about a factor of 67 but buses are not very popular and one of the main reasons is that if you look at situations where people who can afford private transit take mass transit instead, speed is the main factor. According to Kauffman, we should look at ways to make buses faster so more people will ride them, even if this means making them somewhat more dangerous. Kauffman presents some ideas, roughly in order from "we should definitely do this" to "this is crazy, but it would probably still reduce deaths overall when you take into account that more people would ride the bus": Suggestions include not to require buses to stop and open their doors at railroad crossings, allow the driver to start while someone is still at the front paying, allow buses to drive 25mph on the shoulder of the highway in traffic jams where the main lanes are averaging below 10mph, and leave (city) bus doors open, allowing people to get on and off any time at their own risk. "If we made buses more dangerous by the same percentage that motorcycles are more dangerous than cars," concludes Kauffman, "they would still be more than twice as safe as cars."
(Score: 3, Insightful) by iwoloschin on Saturday March 19 2016, @12:05PM
Yes, busses *must* stop by railroad crossings. I live near an active commuter rail crossing with working gates, busses always stop. This adds a total of about 15 seconds to the bus route. I'd focus on signal timing before changing this.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Nerdfest on Saturday March 19 2016, @01:40PM
It also causes big traffic delays.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 19 2016, @07:22PM
By 'big traffic delays', do you mean the accumulated 15 seconds of everyone tailgating?