The US Department of Transportation has just finalized a new vehicle safety standard that will require all light-duty vehicles to be equipped with a more advanced form of automatic emergency braking (AEB) by 2029. (Light-duty vehicle = pretty much all passenger vehicles, including SUVs and trucks.)
Now, most light-duty vehicles on the road today already have some form of emergency braking. What's noteworthy about this ruling is that it requires a more robust version. Some might say one that works. Specifically, it will need to work at much higher speeds and at night.
Most of the AEB systems in operation today don't really work at night -- basically at all -- and many have shown to be ineffective when it comes to stopping for humans.
This new standard will require vehicles to automatically brake at up to 90 mph when a possible collision with a car is detected and up to 45 mph when a possible collision with a pedestrian is detected.
This seems like a very good thing, especially given the
The US Department of Transportation has just finalized a new vehicle safety standard that will require all light-duty vehicles to be equipped with a more advanced form of automatic emergency braking (AEB) by 2029. (Light-duty vehicle = pretty much all passenger vehicles, including SUVs and trucks.)
Now, most light-duty vehicles on the road today already have some form of emergency braking. What's noteworthy about this ruling is that it requires a more robust version. Some might say one that works. Specifically, it will need to work at much higher speeds and at night.
Most of the AEB systems in operation today don't really work at night -- basically at all -- and many have shown to be ineffective when it comes to stopping for humans.
This new standard will require vehicles to automatically brake at up to 90 mph when a possible collision with a car is detected and up to 45 mph when a possible collision with a pedestrian is detected.
This seems like a very good thing, especially given the
persistent problem
we are having with cars killing too many people. But how do we do it?
From what I have read, this new standard will be pretty challenging to meet without the use of long-range LiDAR, especially since night vision is a requirement. I find this interesting because, even though autonomy is taking a lot longer to arrive than most people anticipated, there's still meaningful progress being made.
Last week we spoke about parking space dimensions. And my point was that these dimensions can dramatically change parking designs in new developments. In the comment section of this post, you'll now find a number of examples of how these dimensions vary by city.
But the reality is that cars do keep getting bigger -- at least in this part of the world. In the 1970s, SUVs and trucks made up less than a quarter of new car sales in the US. Today, this number is greater than 80%. It has become the standard kind of car.
So this week, let's touch on why this has happened.
Sometimes I'll hear people in Toronto talk pejoratively about all of the development that's been happening at Yonge & Eglinton (in midtown). They'll say it's too much density.
But then you come across charts like the ones above (source previously shared here) and you realize that this location is the only section along the new Eglinton Crosstown LRT line that is actually starting to have enough people.
Based on 2021 Census data, there were about 40k people within 800m of the future Eglinton and Mount Pleasant stations. In contrast, there are many downtown stations along the Ontario Line (also under construction) with around 80k people.
Why this is important is because if the objective is to get people to ride this new transit and collect a lot of fares, then the single most important factor is going to be the amount of people that live, work, and play adjacent to each station.
Now, I'm not a transportation planner, but in my mind there are three simple ways to think and go about optimizing for this:
You can look at where population densities are already high and then add new transit to service these densities. This is what is happening with the Ontario Line and it was long overdue. We know that ridership is going to be relatively high because of the chart at the top of this post.
You can look at where there's existing transit and then work to optimize the land uses around it. This is what we should be doing a better job of along the Bloor-Danforth line, where certain station areas have actually lost people over the last few decades. This is the opposite of what you want next to transit investments.
Lastly, you can also proactively plan new transit while simultaneously encouraging more density. An example of this would be the Vaughan Metropolitan Centre (just north of Toronto). Extend the line and encourage growth. This is good. The only thing with this approach is that it can seem a bit misaligned if you're currently failing at #1 and #2.
persistent problem
we are having with cars killing too many people. But how do we do it?
From what I have read, this new standard will be pretty challenging to meet without the use of long-range LiDAR, especially since night vision is a requirement. I find this interesting because, even though autonomy is taking a lot longer to arrive than most people anticipated, there's still meaningful progress being made.
Last week we spoke about parking space dimensions. And my point was that these dimensions can dramatically change parking designs in new developments. In the comment section of this post, you'll now find a number of examples of how these dimensions vary by city.
But the reality is that cars do keep getting bigger -- at least in this part of the world. In the 1970s, SUVs and trucks made up less than a quarter of new car sales in the US. Today, this number is greater than 80%. It has become the standard kind of car.
So this week, let's touch on why this has happened.
Sometimes I'll hear people in Toronto talk pejoratively about all of the development that's been happening at Yonge & Eglinton (in midtown). They'll say it's too much density.
But then you come across charts like the ones above (source previously shared here) and you realize that this location is the only section along the new Eglinton Crosstown LRT line that is actually starting to have enough people.
Based on 2021 Census data, there were about 40k people within 800m of the future Eglinton and Mount Pleasant stations. In contrast, there are many downtown stations along the Ontario Line (also under construction) with around 80k people.
Why this is important is because if the objective is to get people to ride this new transit and collect a lot of fares, then the single most important factor is going to be the amount of people that live, work, and play adjacent to each station.
Now, I'm not a transportation planner, but in my mind there are three simple ways to think and go about optimizing for this:
You can look at where population densities are already high and then add new transit to service these densities. This is what is happening with the Ontario Line and it was long overdue. We know that ridership is going to be relatively high because of the chart at the top of this post.
You can look at where there's existing transit and then work to optimize the land uses around it. This is what we should be doing a better job of along the Bloor-Danforth line, where certain station areas have actually lost people over the last few decades. This is the opposite of what you want next to transit investments.
Lastly, you can also proactively plan new transit while simultaneously encouraging more density. An example of this would be the Vaughan Metropolitan Centre (just north of Toronto). Extend the line and encourage growth. This is good. The only thing with this approach is that it can seem a bit misaligned if you're currently failing at #1 and #2.
One argument might be that this was just what consumers inherently wanted. But there's lots of evidence to suggest that this wasn't really the case; it was instead encouraged by government policy.
One specific example is the creation of Corporate Average Fuel Economy standards (also known as CAFE). This was first introduced in the 1970s, but importantly, it was done with two different fuel economy standards: one for cars and one for light trucks.
Since the light truck standard was less onerous (see above chart), this created a strong incentive for car makers to just make and sell more light trucks. And curiously enough, that's exactly what they did.
One argument might be that this was just what consumers inherently wanted. But there's lots of evidence to suggest that this wasn't really the case; it was instead encouraged by government policy.
One specific example is the creation of Corporate Average Fuel Economy standards (also known as CAFE). This was first introduced in the 1970s, but importantly, it was done with two different fuel economy standards: one for cars and one for light trucks.
Since the light truck standard was less onerous (see above chart), this created a strong incentive for car makers to just make and sell more light trucks. And curiously enough, that's exactly what they did.
