It’s unfortunately not uncommon for pedestrians to be killed by cars in the US. More than 7,300 pedestrians were killed in motor vehicle accidents in the US in 2023, around 18% of all motor vehicle deaths that year. Until around 2009, pedestrian deaths in the US had been falling, declining from 7,516 deaths in 1975 to just 4,109 in 2009 (in per capita terms, this decline would be even larger.) But since 2009, pedestrian deaths have surged.
Motor vehicle deaths overall are up, but not nearly to the same degree. From 2009 to 2023, non-pedestrian motor vehicle deaths in the US increased by around 13%, compared to a 78% increase in pedestrian deaths. (The low point in non-pedestrian motor vehicle deaths is actually 2014; deaths are up 20% since then.)
Other countries haven’t seen this increase in pedestrian deaths: in every other high-income country, rates are flat or declining. Whatever’s causing the problem seems to be limited to the US.
Via the CDC .
There are a variety of theories for what’s causing this increase in pedestrian deaths. Perhaps the most common theory is that as trucks and SUVs have become both more popular and larger (in height and overall size), pedestrian collisions have become more frequent and more deadly. Another theory (one that’s harder to square with the “US only” nature of the phenomenon) is that drivers are increasingly distracted by smartphones, leading to more accidents. And of course, it could be something else entirely, such as drivers becoming more reckless for some reason.
Looking at the data, the strongest evidence seems to be for the “big SUV” hypothesis: the fatality rate for pedestrian accidents has increased dramatically across a variety of states, pointing to “pedestrian accidents becoming more deadly” as a major cause of the increase. But the case for it isn’t open and shut, as pedestrian deaths involving sedans and compacts have also increased. And while there isn’t much evidence for the “distracted by phones” hypothesis, it’s also hard to rule it out completely.
Pedestrian deaths in the US
To investigate US pedestrian fatalities, we can use NHTSA Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) data, which collects information on motor vehicle fatalities going back to 1975. FARS data is very thorough (it includes vehicle identification numbers, or VINs, the time of accident down to the minute, and the exact coordinates of the crash), making it possible to investigate a variety of possible explanations for the fatality increase. To start, let’s get a sense of where these pedestrian deaths are happening. The map below shows every pedestrian death in the continental US in 2023: each dot is a pedestrian death.
This is one of those maps that’s also a population map — pedestrian deaths tend to be concentrated in major metro areas, where there’s the most people and the most driving. If we look at pedestrian deaths by state, we see the same pattern, though it’s also clear some states are punching above and below their weight. The three states with the most pedestrian deaths — California, Florida, and Texas — are the three most populous states. But New York, the 4th most populous state, has fewer pedestrian deaths than Georgia, the 8th most populous state.
If we look at pedestrian deaths per capita, we see that deaths are much more frequent in the West and the South, and less frequent in the Northeast and the Midwest. This does not appear to be due to larger amounts of driving in the South and the West. There’s little correlation between the number of vehicle miles traveled and the pedestrian death rate.
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