Japan traffic deaths fall to all time low

Traffic fatalities are going up in the US, while they keep going down in Japan:

The number of traffic deaths nationwide in 2018 fell by 162, or 4.4 percent, from the previous year to 3,532, hitting the lowest level since data became available in 1948, the National Police Agency said Friday.

The decrease reflected police efforts to step up traffic safety education programs and crack down on traffic offenses, the agency said.

On per-capita basis, Japan traffic deaths in 2018 was 2.79 per 100,000 population. By comparison, it is around 11.40 in the US (as of 2017). If the US were to achieve the same level of road safety as Japan, 28,000 lives would be saved per year.

 

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Japan releases traffic fatality data for 2015

Japan National Police have released traffic fatality and injury data for 2015:

The number of deaths caused by traffic accidents in 2015 rose by four from the previous year to 4,117, up for the first time in 15 years, the National Police Agency said Monday.

An NPA official attributed the rise to the growing population of elderly people, who have a higher mortality rate in the event of an accident.

The data mean that the government failed to achieve its target of reducing the annual traffic death toll to 3,000 or less by 2015, which was set under the basic plan for traffic safety covering fiscal 2011 to 2015.

Even though they did not reach their goal, the progress is still quite impressive. Imagine if the US had achieved this kind of reduction:

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Mega-Highways

In case you thought America had a monopoly on giant urban expressway interchanges, then see what the Japanese have been up to.

These surreal photos are by Ken Ohyama.

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