As more people walk and bike in their communities, there is a corresponding increase in the number of crashes with motor vehicles. In 2018, approximately 5,977 pedestrians and 783 cyclists’ deaths were reported in the U.S. Safety interventions to decrease motor vehicle crashes have included: roadway design; safety programs; and laws. However, there is still much that is unknown about the factors that impact motor vehicle crashes with pedestrians and cyclists. This study, centered on the socioecological framework, aimed to describe the pedestrian and cyclist motor vehicle crashes occurring in Wichita, Kansas from 2008 through 2019. Specifically, to identify factors associated with fatalities/serious injuries of pedestrians and cyclists. From 2008 through 2019, 2,015 motor vehicle crashes involving a pedestrian (48.6%, n=979) or cyclist (51.4%, n=1,036) were reported. On average, 168 (SD = 25.300) motor vehicle crashes with pedestrian and cyclist were reported each year. Broadway street or intersections (31.7%, n=171) had the most pedestrian (n=86) and cyclist (n=85) crashes over the 12-year time period. Of the total motor vehicle crashes that included injury information (n=1,957), 26.3% (n=256) resulted in a severe or fatal injury for a pedestrian (n=177) or cyclist (n=79). There were significant associations between pedestrian serious/fatal injuries and: pedestrian age, driver age, time of day, road characteristics, vehicle maneuver, vehicle damage, pedestrian location before impact, pedestrian substance abuse, and driver substance abuse. Additionally, there were significant associations between cyclist serious or fatal injuries and: cyclist sex, driver sex, time of day, surface condition, zone, vehicle maneuver, vehicle damage, and cyclist location before impact. Study findings suggest that the frequency of pedestrian and cyclist crashes in the city of Wichita either remained consistent or increased over the course of 12 years, underscoring a need for action to increase safety and implement plans and policy efforts to decrease crash prevalence.

Over the last decade, demand for active transportation modes such as walking and cycling has increased. While it is desirable to provide high levels of safety for these eco-friendly modes of travel, unfortunately, the overall percentage of pedestrian and bicycle fatalities, increased from 13% to 18% of total road crash fatalities in the last decade. In San Diego County, although the total number of pedestrian and cyclist fatalities decreased over the same period of time, a similar trend with a more drastic change is observed; the overall percentage of pedestrian and bicycle fatalities increased from 19.5% to 31.8%. Technological advancement in transportation has been creating new opportunities to explore and investigate new sources of data for the purpose of improving safety planning. This study aims to identify signalized intersections with the highest risk for walking and cycling within the City of San Diego, California, USA. Multiple data sources such as permanent pedestrian and bicycle counters, video cameras, and crash data were utilized. Data mining techniques and a new sampling strategy were adopted to demonstrate a holistic approach that can be applied to identify facilities with the highest need for improvement. Cluster analysis coupled with stratification was employed to select a representative sample of intersections for data collection and estimate annual average daily pedestrian and bicyclist (AADP and AADB). Additionally, the study quantified risk incorporating injury severity levels, the frequency of victims, distance crossed, and exposure into a single equation. It was found that not all intersections with the highest number of pedestrian and bicyclist victims were identified as high-risk after exposure and other factors such as crash severity were taken into account.

A growing body of evidence from economic studies shows areas where appropriate policies can generate health and other benefits at an affordable cost, sometimes reducing health expenditure and helping to redress health inequalities at the same time.

Malcolm Gladwell, host of the podcast Revisionist History and author of the #1 New York Times bestseller Outliers, offers a powerful examination of our interactions with strangers and why they often go wrong—now with a new afterword by the author. A Best Book of the Year: The Financial Times, Bloomberg, Chicago Tribune, and Detroit Free Press How did Fidel Castro fool the CIA for a generation? Why did Neville Chamberlain think he could trust Adolf Hitler? Why are campus sexual assaults on the rise? Do television sitcoms teach us something about the way we relate to one another that isn’t true? Talking to Strangers is a classically Gladwellian intellectual adventure, a challenging and controversial excursion through history, psychology, and scandals taken straight from the news. He revisits the deceptions of Bernie Madoff, the trial of Amanda Knox, the suicide of Sylvia Plath, the Jerry Sandusky pedophilia scandal at Penn State University, and the death of Sandra Bland—throwing our understanding of these and other stories into doubt. Something is very wrong, Gladwell argues, with the tools and strategies we use to make sense of people we don’t know. And because we don’t know how to talk to strangers, we are inviting conflict and misunderstanding in ways that have a profound effect on our lives and our world. In his first book since his #1 bestseller David and Goliath, Malcolm Gladwell has written a gripping guidebook for troubled times.