Car bonnet heights

@Chiseltip

as there’s only 4 pedestrian crossings in my town this could be very difficult! Countries with semi enforced jaywalking laws have many more crossing points but these points (look like zebra crossings) don’t insist cars stop, they are just where you can see properly to cross. I prefer our system of cars being compelled to stop

My gate goes straight out onto a road. I couldn't legally leave my house! My DM wouldn't be able to catch a bus from the bus stop right outside her house, or the next stop along.

Councils would be very busy putting crossings in everywhere!

If a driver is distracted, incapacitated or careless it may be deemed their fault and the law can hold them to account.

Your views are very far from the UK social/legal norms.

By your logic, construction workers needn’t bother wearing hard hats. They should take responsibility for themselves and avoid situations where something could fall on their heads.

Yes. I am literally saying that people should take responsibility for themselves rather than expect others to do it for them. Shock horror!

If a pedestrian walks out in front of a car, that pedestrian is to blame for the collision, they are not a victim. Same as if they drove out in front of another car, their action caused the collision.

Thats sort of the point. The Police usually enforce laws 🙄

Surely "if it saves even one life" we should invest in more places where pedestrians can cross the road safely.

There is so much wrong with this post.

Blaming pedestrians for being the victim of a RTA

If drivers weren't on their phones, or drunk, or on drugs, or lacking sleep, or listening to loud music, or speeding, or just shit at driving they might be less prone to smashing their oversized cars into people.

Because for some reason in this country the most vulnerable road users (pedestrians, especially children) come bottom of the priority list.

We have two cars, neither of which are SUVs because very few people actually need a car that size. When we needed a lot of space we got an estate car.

outside my dcs primary school every single day cars and vans are driving on the pavement, even as the children are coming out. Even Lorries do it.
The worst I saw was a massive grabber lorry trundling along the pavement towards a year 5 walking to school with her cello in hand. Fucking awful.

@Lifestooshort71 definitely agree! And getting fed up with drivers in these enormous cars pulling so far forward when in a turning right lane that I can't see round them to know if I can go left - meaning I have to wait until they have gone before I can pull out. It definitely feels like "get out of my way little person"

a Range Rover was parked next to me yesterday in a car park. Thankfully I’d reversed in. Basically my whole car was in the road section before I had any line of sight. Despite slowly creeping someone in an x5 started beeping and shouting at me for my creeping out to see. There could have been a whole school of children hidden by the car and I couldn’t have seen them.

it’s easy to see how they are infectious, if I’d had a taller car I may have had visibility sooner.

Why is the shape of the car irrelevant in these cases?

Every time I go out for a walk, there will be a car or van parked on a pavement somewhere. They have to get on and off the pavement and they don't tend to care if the pavement happens to be occupied by a pedestrian at the time.

Accidents are vanishingly rare, people using pavements as extensions of the road is not.

sitting slightly higher up than in a hatchback it feels like you hold your own on the road with other much larger vehicles.
And how do you think that makes those of us in hatchbacks feel? It's not a competition - 'my car's bigger than your car so I have right of way, toot toot'

Cars are dangerous if you get hit by one, so keep away from them. Stop walking out in front of them. Problem solved. The height of the bonnet is irrelevant, trucks and vans are bigger

It isn't that simple. A lot of drivers now think that it's fine to drive along, and park on, pavements. So you are not safe just walking along minding your own business.

And if a child does run out in front of you, it helps if cars are designed not to kill pedestrians.

Care to back this up with some statistics?

This is the worst idea ever

Jaywalking will give lots of power to the police

We have no where near enough pedestrian crossings

It's just bad on so many levels

It's ideas people come up with who don't live in the real world

Perhaps a career in politics could be for you?

💯 % agree with the touchscreen ban, they were the most stupid idea ever. Ruined the aesthetics of the car interior and made it impossible to use half the features while the car is moving.

Nonsense. Cases of vehicles mounting pavements are vanishingly rare and when they do happen the shape of the car is irrelevant.

The majority of collisions between vehicles and pedestrians are instigated by the pedestrian walking out in front of the car. People dawdling along, phone in hand, headphones on, absolutely oblivious to anything going on around them.

The rise matches booming sales of SUVs from 12% to 56% of all cars over the same period, with the increasing size of vehicles being described as “carspreading” or “autobesity”.

People are bigger so cars are hardly going to get smaller.

Also while there are still too many people killed or injured on the roads, road deaths have fallen by three quarters since the 1970s and the UK does quite well generally compared with other countries in terms of road safety.

I don't have to "justify" my choice of SUV, I just like that shape of car and sitting slightly higher up than in a hatchback it feels like you hold your own on the road with other much larger vehicles.

It's not a huge one and has great visibility all round, and I don't go around mowing down pedestrians in any event.

There are also good practical reasons that I won't bore you with as to why we bought that car.

I’ve got to be honest, I don’t really care what car people choose as long as they don’t drive like an arsehole. But I saw an enormous SUV yesterday and just had to park next to it to compare it to my tiny Smart ForTwo. The bonnet wasn’t far off the height of my roof. They could probably have driven over the top of me and barely registered it. No idea what car was as I didn’t recognise the badge but it was huge.

At least bull bars are no longer legal in the UK. They really were dangerous.

Unfortunately it’s next to impossible to not buy these cars anymore.

Cars should be marketed for needs and requirements rather than aesthetics. Lots of kids? People carrier. Space needed? Estate. Live in a city? Hatchback. Ease of getting in? One of those Ford B Maxes.

But people will do anything to justify their SUV rather than admitting they’ve been fooled by marketing.

Also, it’s now going to be impossible to get a 5* safety rating for any car with touch screens as it’s been proven they’re extremely dangerous.

I agree, OP. I think people who defend this have lost their moral compass.