Car accident

What’s do you think the riskiest transportation, airplanes, trains, bicycles? You may first hit on cars. Cars are the very vehicles that we can feel close. When we go out for commuting, shopping, or just driving, cars are very convenient. Even in the case that you don’t or can’t use cars, the vehicle are quite familiar seeing them always on the streets, but at the same time dangerous. We have become so accustomed to cars in both of driving and seeing on roads that we may lose a sense of risk about them.

Actually the number of traffic accidents in Japan has been increasing. Especially the year 2000 hit a record high. Followed by the incremental trends, the number of injuries has also been on the rise. The figure of those people who died in traffic accidents, however, has slightly decreased in the past five years although the year 2000 the number rose 0.6% breaking a four-year declining trend.

Shortly after closing a year, there is an announcement of worst 5 prefectures in the number of traffic death by the National Police Agency. In 2001 the highest was Hokkaido with 516, followed by Aichi with 403, Chiba with 390, Saitama with 378 and Tokyo with 359.

To analyze the data furthermore, the highest prefecture in the death rates per accidents was also Hokkaido, and the next is Chiba. But in the accidental rates per vehicle number (on a registration base), Tokyo was the highest. On the other side of the coin, Hokkaido was the lowest among the worst 5 in the number of traffic deaths. What it means is once an accident occurs, it becomes serious in Hokkaido.

In Tokyo, however, accidents are relatively small compared with other prefectures. This is partly because the land of Hokkaido is so huge and the roads are so long that drivers can drive speedily, partly because the prefecture is geographically snowy enough to trigger accidents. Contrarily Tokyo is so overcrowded on the roads and has so many traffic lights that drivers can't speed up cars. Namely the Tokyo cars are always in stop-and-go situations. Therefore the road situations may deter big accidents.

Although there are many big accidents in motor bicycles in Tokyo, the number of those accidents has decreased thanks to the regulation efforts of the police. Particularly in 2001, the total of death toll including all types of vehicles fell 54 people from the previous year attributable to the decrease of motor bicycle accidents.

Stupidly I counted the number of intersections from my apartment to the center of Tokyo or Shinzyuku by driving my car on a holiday. I lived in Chiba prefecture which is next to Tokyo for the West. It took almost one hour in the distance of 30 km. You can easily find the average speed 30 km although the speed limit in Tokyo is up to 40 to 50 km( it depends on road width or traffic volumes). This low speed was attributable to the number of the intersections. The number I counted was 126. Among them I stopped 37 times. So almost one out of three intersections stopped me. If I did that in the weekday, it would take more than double time and the average speed would be much lower because of heavier traffic volumes mainly for commuting and commercial use. Fortunately I didn't cause any accidents in the experiment. Under the circumstances even though you caused an accident, you'd easily guess how much damage you give or get.

But! Don't relax your guard. Slow speed brings about serious accidents. As you may know Japan is entering an aging country. Followed by it, the number of elderly people(over 65) who die in traffic accidents is increasing. The data released by the NPA, the elderly accounted for 34% of all traffic deaths despite the elderly population is still less than 20% in 2000. It's mainly because there are more elderly divers who cause or get involved in traffic accidents than before. As long as Tokyo is concerned, it has something to do with the road situation. When the roads are crowed, some drivers and bicycle riders use byroads for saving time. Narrow byroads are sometimes risky for those elderly people as pedestrians.

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