Spoiler alert: not an outlier in a good way.

This is an Forbes interview about an updated periodic international/global report on traffic safety, it appears to be based on up thru 2022 data

Carnage On World’s Roads Drops Slightly, But U.S. Is An Outlier

You said the U.S. is an outlier among high income countries. Why?

Road deaths in the United States are very high, particularly for a country that has all the financial resources and knowledge to tackle the problem. In fact, in terms of deaths per 100,000 population, the rates of deaths in the U.S are seven times higher than in Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom, for example.

I think there is a lack of political attention and political will. There’s probably also the fact that road safety is decentralized and every state has its own legislation and ways of enforcing it or not enforcing it. But it’s really something that deserves much more attention because this problem can be successfully addressed, as many high-income countries have shown. The new WHO report shows countries such as Denmark, Japan, Norway and the United Arab Emirates had at least a 50% reduction during the previous decade, as did upper-middle-income countries like Belarus and the Russian Federation. Countries that have had considerable reductions in road deaths can even do much more provided there is continuous effort, political will and the right strategies.

This updates and reinforces the same observations made here by Leonard Evans (Traffic fatality reductions: United States compared with 25 other countries. ) in 2014 and echoed and reinforced in 2017 America Is Now an Outlier on Driving Deaths.

Arizona?

Arizona has had a significant increase in traffic deaths over the past 10 years or so… where deaths were around 800/yr in the period 2010-2014; they had increased to nearly 1,000 pre-pandemic (2019). Deaths spiked in 2020 and again 2021 with various pandemic-related excuses. Deaths in 2023 stand at 1307. So a 60% increase. Details at [1]

Relative increases were highest for bicyclists and pedestrians, but most of the deaths continue to be motorists. All the while vehicles themselves got dramatically safer for their occupants. (these figures are not adjusted, but there hasn’t been a pop increase of anywhere near 60%).

Arizona Republicans believe they have found the answer to the United States’ lagging safety performance, enter  SCM1002 “Urging the president and congress of the United States to eliminate the Vision Zero approach to transportation planning”… though the SCM does not explain how Sweden (and every other developed country in the world) has significantly better traffic stats.

Might VZ be responsible for Arizona’s dramatic increase in fatalities? Well, they don’t exactly say one way or the other. One thing I can tell you is that little-to-no VZ projects have ever been completed in Arizona; and the deaths keep going up.

an SCM is a “senate concurring memorial”; it is wholly symbolic, but it does go to show where their political minds are at.

UPDATE: it, unsurprisingly, passed both the Republican controlled House and the Republican-controlled Senate. The Governor has nothing to do with it (it’s not a law), it’s just symbolic. Over at the UPP, it was pointed out that “What We’re Laughing At– In an attempt to mischaracterize Vision Zero, the bill’s sponsor, Senator Werner (Carrie Werner, R-Scottsdale) also made an unrelated claim, stating that ‘Vision Zero is also trying to take your gas stove away.’ (2:29:24 almost the very end of the hearing) This assertion is entirely unfounded”.

OMG — if you care about traffic safety — that’s what you’re up against.

References

[1] See this google sheet for Arizona’s traffic stat since 2009; figures from ADOT Traffic Crash Stats.