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Helsinki records zero traffic deaths for full year

(www.helsinkitimes.fi)
1163 points DaveZale | 2 comments | 30 Jul 25 16:08 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source
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SilverElfin ◴[30 Jul 25 16:55 UTC] No.44736599[source]▶
> More than half of Helsinki’s streets now have speed limits of 30 km/h. Fifty years ago, the majority were limited to 50 km/h.

So they hurt quality of life by making it more painful to get anywhere, taking time away from everyone’s lives. You can achieve no traffic deaths by slowing everyone to a crawl. That doesn’t make it useful or good. The goal should be fast travel times and easy driving while also still reducing injuries, which newer safety technologies in cars will achieve.

> Cooperation between city officials and police has increased, with more automated speed enforcement

Mass surveillance under the ever present and weak excuse of “safety”.

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moralestapia ◴[30 Jul 25 17:42 UTC] No.44737241[source]▶
50 km/h to 30 km/h on a city commute doesn't make a substantial difference.

If you're willing to risk people dying just to get to your preferred McDonald's three minutes earlier, then the problem is you.

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AnthonyMouse ◴[02 Aug 25 20:21 UTC] No.44771062[source]▶
> 50 km/h to 30 km/h on a city commute doesn't make a substantial difference.

This seems like a weird argument. If your commute is an hour at 50 km/h then it's an hour and 40 minutes at 30 km/h, every day, each way. That seems like... quite a lot?

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numpad0 ◴[02 Aug 25 20:44 UTC] No.44771281[source]▶
See, the real problem is that people cover too much distances daily. 50km is more than Luxembourg is wide where it's narrowest. They probably don't commute internationally every day there.
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1. AnthonyMouse ◴[02 Aug 25 22:24 UTC] No.44772157{3}[source]▶
> See, the real problem is that people cover too much distances daily.

Which is why most of this is really a housing problem. If you make it too difficult to add new housing in and around cities, people have to live farther away, and in turn show up to the city in cars.

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2. Earw0rm ◴[03 Aug 25 08:07 UTC] No.44774971[source]▶
That's true, but people will willingly sacrifice time for a rather small career step up; moving house is hard once you have a family in schools and so on; so in a conurbation you end up with 1hr+ commutes anyway.

I don't think most are math-minded enough to factor commute time and cost into any salary calculation, if there's a 10% pay bump they'll take it even if all the gains get eaten up travel.