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Let’s assume you came across the following police report: “AV Plows Into Restaurant” …
AV Plows Into Restaurant
Police report: “As previously reported, officers responded to a major injury collision involving an autonomous vehicle (AV) and pedestrians in front of a restaurant. Two children were struck by the AV sedan while on the sidewalk in front of the business. The investigation has determined that the AV was slowly entering the roadway of Donnelly Avenue from the driveway of Municipal Parking Lot D when it was struck by an eastbound e-bike, taken out of its intended trajectory, propelled onto the sidewalk and into a restaurant adding significant damage to the structure.”
Your first thought would probably be, this sounds fishy. You would read again and recognize that the AV violated the right-of-way, and the bicycle obviously couldn’t stop in time and was colliding with the AV. Then you would wonder how fast and heavy an e-Bike has to be to change the intended trajectory of a sedan, and what would that do to the bicycle and the bicyclists. The propelling part sounds like acceleration, and that must have come from the AV itself. But then you would be wondering why on Earth programmers tell their AV to accelerate when in doubt or danger.
Industry insiders would be wondering the same and would ask for the brand of AV to be released. They would guess this wasn’t a Waymo since their policy is to stop and wait for further instructions. Tesla’s Autopilot, on the other hand, has been known to violate speed limits and kill people. Maybe it was Zoox, Cruise, GM, Ford; people and the media would want to see that kind of stuff. The media would love the clickbait headlines about Tesla or Waymo and self-driving AI, and would keep digging.
A few more thoughts would be creeping in
- The pictures didn’t show a sedan, but an SUV.
- SUVs are more deadly than sedans, so why would the police change the story?
- You hear rumors that “the e-bike” was just two children riding legally in the roadway.
- On top of that, the two children are uninjured, and their bicycle looks OK.
- You conclude that the collision must have been low-impact and couldn’t have pushed an SUV out of the trajectory it was already taking.
- You would keep wondering how on earth two small children on a slow e-bike could force an AV to accelerate.
- And why wouldn’t the police name the AV’s brand, but release names of the victims so quickly?
You would take all of this into consideration, and you would be wondering, what else is the Burlingame Police hiding?
… and that, my friends, is the power of critical thinking.
The media would see right through that and be all over this frame job. They would mention the methodical blaming of victims. Two slow-riding children in legal control of the roadway shouldn’t be blamed for this preventable tragedy caused by a self-driving vehicle. And you would assume the AV company paid off people in leadership positions to get that favorable reporting.
And you would probably be correct.
We can stop now before ‘critical thinking’ turns into ‘conspiracy theory’. But you get the point.
If this were a Tesla or Waymo
What else would happen if this were a Waymo? Waymo so far has an outstanding safety record and is regarded as 80-90% safer than the average human driver and One Gazillion times safer than the average US teenager.
And yet there are plenty of people who don’t like this relatively new technology that started as a California desert race.
Just by mentioning those two companies, you would immediately have:
- Social Media would explode, decrying the danger to children.
- Media would constantly reach out to get updates for new headlines.
- Injury lawyers would try to sue for millions.
- The DA would see if he could get some money for the city out of this.
- The AG might ask for stronger regulation.
And politicians from the city and the county would come out of the woodwork, crying foul and promising safety.
The public expects full compliance with the law from all AVs and a 100% safety record.
That changes quickly if the driver is human and the victims are on foot or bicycle. These kinds of cases are often swept under the rug. Plenty of studies have shown that over the years.
But this wasn’t a TESLA – it was a human driver
On August 8th, a young woman in a Mazda SUV drives out of a parking lot, violates the right-of-way of two children on a bicycle, there is a low-impact collision, she changes direction, hits two more children playing on a sidewalk, and plows into the restaurant. One child dead, one child injured, two children got the scare of a lifetime.
In case of a human driver police and media will call it an ‘accident’. And no DA will pursue this case. The AG will not help to rein in reckless human drivers. There will be no Burlingame politician taking responsibility and promising to do better. All will stay quiet in this case of a reckless human driver. CalMatters currently has a series called License to Kill on how California, in general, lets motorized killers get off the hook. This most likely will be one of those cases.
What makes this even worse is when everyone tries to blame the victims; in this case 4 children and their parents.
Even without much knowledge of what happened, US law, California’s Vehicle Code, the DMV Driver’s handbook is pretty clear on who is always in charge to provide safety and “duty of care” in these situations. In case people don’t know, read how a police chief lost her job, because she didn’t know basic rules either.
“Every owner of a motor vehicle is liable and responsible for death or injury to person or property resulting from a negligent or wrongful act or omission in the operation of the motor vehicle …” [CA Vehicle Code]
The ‘negligent or wrongful acts’ of the driver in this case were:
- killing one child, injuring another.
- violating the right-of-way of two children on bicycle.
- causing significant damage to a restaurant
- accelerating instead of braking
- jumping curb and driving on sidewalk
… but here is where this story becomes interesting.
The Burlingame Frame Job
Here is what the Police and Bay Area media did with those ‘negligent and wrongful acts’ and the facts. Their first instinct went with victim blaming:
Headline: Police: E-bike hit car before fatal Burlingame crash.
Headline: Deadly E-Bike Crash Investigation.
Headline: Boy, 4, dies in chain-reaction Bay Area crash between driver, e-bike rider, police say. – A young boy is dead after a chain-reaction crash caused by an e-bike rider and a sedan driver, Burlingame police said Saturday.
Headline: Car in Burlingame Crash Was Hit by E-Bike Before Striking, Killing 4-Year-Old Boy on Sidewalk.
Headline: Police: E-bike hit car before fatal Burlingame crash.
What critical thinking would tell us
It’s like no media reporter has ever driven a car out of a parking lot themselves.
If it’s a stick shift, the gear would be “1”, and the left foot would be on the clutch. In a case of emergency or panic, muscle memory would take over, hit the clutch, and therefore disengage the engine.
“In an Investigation, balance probabilities and choose the most likely.”
[Sheriff Longmire]
This, however, was an automatic. In that case, the gear is in “D” and the foot is on the brake. By releasing the brake, the car would inch forward. A driver would only move that foot from hovering over the brake to the gas pedal once the driver decides it is safe to accelerate. The most probable explanation here is that the driver did not see the road because the city forgot to ‘daylight’ this narrow and busy street. There should not have been on-street parking here.
Most likely the driver accelerated, saw the children on the e-Bike very late and thought she could avoid the collision by accelerating more. But she lost control of the vehicle and went straight in the restaurant across the street.
There is no responsible and knowledgeable driving instructor in the world who would blame the e-bike here. There is no driving instructor who would call a car going from a parking lot to a restaurant ‘good driving’. This would qualify as ‘reckless driving‘.
Conclusion
In case you haven’t noticed, we are starting to look into the bigger plan called “Victim Blaming“.
“For certain kinds of road users, such as bicyclists, pedestrians and motorcyclists, drivers owe a higher duty of care. This is because these individuals have fewer protections around their bodies if a crash were to occur.” [Injury Attorneys]
If this were an autonomous vehicle, there would be little mercy here. And it’s fine to feel bad for a human driver, but it’s a different story to blame innocent victims.
Anyone with inexperienced drivers at home should sit them down, use this story, and scare them out of speeding and distracted driving. What happened to the 19-year old driver is not something you wish on anyone, she is also somewhat a victim.
Somebody didn’t teach her safe driving techniques and the City of Burlingame didn’t provide safer streets.
Both the driver from San Mateo and the City of Burlingame violated their duty of care towards the children. And we don’t blame victims.
More Information
- Burlingame Police: Facebook Page
- SF Chronicle: Driver strikes, kills boy, 4, and injures girl, 6, on Burlingame sidewalk
- Mercury News: 4-year-old boy killed in Burlingame collision is identified
- NBC: Community members mourn 4-year-old boy killed in Burlingame collision
- SF Streetsblog: Driver Caused Burlingame Tragedy, Not an E-Bike Rider
… to be continued
Editor’s Note: The views and opinions expressed in all blog posts are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the Redwood City Pulse or its staff.
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