[paddleon]

Hey, I hear you. And I'm sad. Because I'd like to say that the right way is to:

build infrastructure that promotes safe driving, and

train drivers to show respect for other people on the road

However, those are both non-starters in the US. So your answer, which comes down to "at least self-driving is better than those damn people" might be the one that actually works.

[citrin_ru]

I've spend some time driving in both the US and the UK and while infrastructure in the US could be improved I don't think that's the main issue.

What's different is driver training and attitude. Passing a driving test in the US is too easy to encourage new drivers to learn to drive. And an average American driver shows less respect to pedestrians, cyclists and other drivers, aggressive driving is relatively common. Bad drivers can be encountered in the UK of course but on average British drive better.

Huge SUV and pickup trucks are also part of the problem - they are more dangerous for everyone except people in such vehicle.

[fragmede]

San Francisco has done a ton of that recently. They've added protected bike lanes and even experimented with a center bike lane on Valencia Street which must have cost a shit ton of money. I give them credit for trying (and a lot of my tax dollars). There are a lot of no right on red situations and a lot of flights that are specific to bicycles and not cars. The city is trying and it has the will and the money to do it. We just have to hope that it doesn't all disappear into corruption and political nonsense.

[pastel8739]

Yes, this is really it for me. Self-driving isn’t the best solution, but the real solution requires lots of politics and lots of time to build. Tech is the one thing we are pretty good at in this country, and feels like the one thing that makes it possible to have change quickly and without endless politicking.

[ACCount37]

Your "right way" is to try to fix human nature. A complete nonstarter.

If we could do anything like "train drivers to show respect for other people on the road" at scale, then we'd live in a different world by now.

[forshaper]

I currently live in a place where, when walking on the street, I routinely almost get hit by vehicles while crossing crosswalks with the cross light on.

However, I used to live in a place where every local driver did an 'after you' that included pedestrians, regardless of road rules, and generally drove the speed limit (and usually less).

Both of these places in the United States!

The latter is not impossible, just rare.