I cant believe bicycles and scooters are perceived as more dangerous than cars. They're slower, offer better visibility, and kill way less people.
xkcd
A community for a webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language.
Less dangerous to others, but more dangerous to the users themselves, I suppose.
Because of cars
Not only. I live in Norway, where pedestrians have right of way and drivers are extremely careful. Discounting the risk from cars, there's still more personal danger to users of scooters as opposed to cars. If you have an accident on a scooter, you'll get scrapes, bruises, broken bones. As compared to a car, where unless you've really screwed up, you're unlikely to take any injuries at all.
Source: scooter user who HAS broken bones
Hit a pothole going 25mph in your car. Hit the same pothole going 25mph on your scooter. I'll come visit you in the hospital after the scooter one and we can talk about how cars are obviously safer.
I ride an electric scooter, all it takes is one crack in the road that I'm less than prepared for and I'm going down hard.
I wonder what kind of scooter most people pictured when reading the comic
That is a good point, mine is the second variety, electric one similar to the ones you see littering any major Urban area waiting to be rented. Although even the largest scooter is still far less safe over a pothole or around a rainy curve than a car, typical accident in the car you mess up the car and get a bruise from the airbag, but a typical scooter accident can be a lot more gnarly.
They are more dangerous exactly because of the existence of cars. Cars are a small fortress that makes others less safe while keeping its contents safer. Unless they hit another fortress.
Heeeeell no. I had I minor fall on a scooter last week. I slipped at medium speed because of an uneven wet floor. I'm still fucked up and can't walk properly
This is wildly dependent on infrastructure. Both for the convenience and danger axis.
motorcycles should 100% be in the zone of practicality, especially with modern sleek electric ones.
skateboards should be the bridge between practical and recreational, provided you have sensible infrastructure and short distances they have distinct benefits.
skis and sleds just need snow to make sense
I think the existence of car drivers increases their danger level massively
Apparently alcohol as well as it is involved in something like 50% of motorcycle fatalities.
it annoys me to no end how motorcycles and mopeds are viewed as dangerous, when every single time you hear about people being hurt on them it's because they're fucking idiots who tried to do a backflip infront of a semitruck
sure but that applies to everything, if you want to be safe then the only time you should ever be on a road is inside a bus.
The placement of „Skis“ in this will trigger every Scandinavian I know. Should definitely be in the top left.
Trust you on that but will ski across the pond to check and be sure
Technicalities:
Planes are safer per mile but not per trip. One could argue that if people spent the same amount of time in both then it would be far more fatalities on aircrafts.
Cars are technically the major source of danger for bikes and scooters.
also a fun fact, while commercial aviation is very safe, private planes are much more dangerous, being almost as dangerous per mile as a regular car (and you get a lot more miles per hour of travel)
That already fits with the chart - "commercial aviation" is "airlines" and "private planes" are "light aircraft".
private planes are much more dangerous, being almost as dangerous per mile as a regular car
that is because they are operated by semi-competent people who often have less practice then they have in car.
imagine how competent driver you are when you have your fresh license. it is the same with piloting license. and now imagine you are a hobby pilot and can afford to spend in the cockpit 3 hours per month. your skill is not really going to get significantly better. you are probably flying airplane that is at the end of its life, because that is only one you can afford, and there may be no one keeping an eye on you telling you "this is not how we do it, it is risky, dangerous, and you will get someone killed".
Someone else put it this way.
Sometimes I walk to work; sometimes I drive my car; other times i ride a bicycle. Whichever option I pick, I hate anyone who isn't doing the same thing.
That’s not true. When I drive I still hate drivers
A therapist once told me that who you are when you drive is who you really are.
Are hot air balloon not like super safe, last accident I think was a guy that made his own DIY hot air balloon but before that it has been relatively safe. I think America has only seen like less than 800 deaths total.
If the comic put in zeppelins...
You'd need to normalize the number to deaths per balloon ride.
Only three people died last year playing Russian Roulette, must be pretty safe! /s
Bicycles are only more dangerous than cars because of cars.
Not sure I'd put unicycles as being safer than bicycles.
I'd guess it's because unicycles are used in a much narrower range of circumstances. Few people are being hit by cars commuting to work on a unicycle, nor are there many mountain-unicyclists getting injured.
Which honestly just speaks for the insane amount of training mountain-unicyclists have done
You joke (I think?), but the people I know that do unicycling (including mountain-bike style unicycling, and unicycling Himalayan trails, and crazy stuff like that) do do an insane amount of training 😆
Bicycles more dangerous than cars? I guess I must have missed all the stories about people being run over by bikes.
I think it means more dangerous to use, not more dangerous to be around.
Randall is offically carpilled
Hot air balloons are a very useful mode of transportation if your goal is to take aerial photographs from them (although admittedly nowadays you could also use drones). It's always a question of what you want to achieve.
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Aerial_photographs_from_hot_air_balloons
and i suppose blimps and dirigibles are further to the right and lower than the graph displays u_u
where to put my 3 favorites? hovercraft, monorail and blimp
Those first two are incredibly fit for some niche that is so small that nobody even remembers it exists.
The last one is still more practical than hot air balloons.