Auto Accident Statistics confirm that on conventional streets and highways, ACCIDENTS cause great suffering, disabling injuries and horrendous losses of life. The economic losses are unbelievable. We also squander fuel, create pollution, spend our precious time in traffic jams, and pay outrageous amounts of money to support a road transportation system that is essentially obsolete. Here, we’ll share some brief statistics and help you understand their impact.

The deadly toll of auto accidents

• 6,328,000 auto accidents (USA, 2003) [1]
• 42,643 fatal auto accident deaths (USA, 2003) [1]
• 2.9 million injuries (USA, 2003) [1]
• 230 billion dollars in economic losses (2003) [1]
• #1 cause of death for ages 3 to 33 (USA, 2003) [2]
• 750,000 to 880,000 est. annual deaths worldwide (1999) [3]
• 23 to 34 million est. annual injuries worldwide (1999) [3]

These numbers may be hard to comprehend–but it is worthwhile to consider their true impact. The first illustration at right is a one-square-foot cube made up of 50,00 pennies. Now consider that 42,643 people killed in car accidents in 2003. Look at the cube of pennies and imagine that each penny represents a person who died suddenly in a car wreck. Then consider also the suffering of the family and friends of each one of those 42,643 people.
Reading "2.9 million injuries" may not twist your guts. But it’s a different matter knowing that injuries include disfigurement, amputation, loss of sight, brain damage and paralysis.

The next illustration below represents 100 billion stacked pennies. The football field provides size perspective. Now consider the 230 billion dollars in annual economic losses from car accidents. Visualize the huge cube of pennies enlarged 2.3 times. Now imagine that each penny is a crisp dollar bill. All that money absolutely wasted each year–a consequence car accidents.

In the ATS system, the causes of all this suffering – mistakes in judgment, reckless or impaired driving, mechanical failures, poor driving conditions, etc.– are addressed directly and individually with safety mechanisms with backup safety measures and, finally, with catastrophic failure backup provisions. Certainly nothing made by humans can be absolutely fail-safe. However, it is possible to reduce these sad statistics to nearly zero.

Waste in our current road system
It would take a very large book to enumerate all the waste, problems, misguided actions and malfeasance associated with our current road system. Here we will give you a sampling:

• Urban drivers spend some 46 hours a year sitting in traffic [4]
• Traffic jams waste 3.5 billion hours of work productivity [4]
• Traffic jams waste 5.7 billion gallons of gasoline annually [4]
• Fuel is wasted by solo commuting and errand driving in large, heavy cars
• Washington spends $4 on highways for every $1 spent on mass transit [4]]
• The US government is pressing for drilling for oil and gas in biological gems -i.e., Otero Mesa in New Mexico, and the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska. The projected energy yield from these areas could easily be matched by modest increases in fuel economy at home. [4]
• An increase in automobile fuel efficiency standards of 5 miles per gallon would save more than 1.5 million barrels a day. [4] (PS - This has not happened… )
• Taxpayers carry a huge additional burden – the continually escalating cost of automobile Insurance, emergency services, emergency medical care, and traffic law enforcement

Are you upset and scared about rising fuel costs?
Because the Automated Transport System corrects 14 key inefficiencies that exist now, it will cut the amount of energy consumed on the road by 40 to 50 percent. That is an incredible claim. In our presentation, you’ll learn how this will be achieved.

Sources:
[1] National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
www.nhtsa.dot.gov/stsi/State_Info.cfm?Year=2003&State=CO&Accessible=0
Economic losses computed by NHTSA are lost workplace productivity, lost household productivity, property damage, medical costs and travel delay costs.
[2] driver.com
[3] Global Road Safety Partnership
http://www.factbook.net/EGRF_Exec_Summary.htm
[4] Texas Transportation Institute
[5] Tracking the environmental misdeeds of the Bush administration
http://www.bushgreenwatch.org May 17, 2005
[6] "Wasted Energy," New Yorker, Apr. 18, 2005,
http://ga3.org/ct/-pq37741yXx_/
[7] Florida Dept. of Transportation