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Killed by a Traffic Engineer: Shattering the Delusion that Science Underlies Our Transportation System
In the US we are nearing four million road deaths since we began counting them in 1899. The numbers are getting worse in recent years, yet we continue to accept these deaths as part of doing business. There has been no examination of why we engineer roads that are literally killing us.
Fixing the carnage on our roadways requires a change in mindset and a dramatic transformation of transportation. This goes for traffic engineers in particular because they are still the ones in charge of our streets.
In Killed by a Traffic Engineer, civil engineering professor Wes Marshall shines a spotlight on how little science there is behind the way that our streets are engineered, which leaves safety as an afterthought. While traffic engineers are not trying to cause deliberate harm to anyone, he explains, they are guilty of creating a transportation system whose designs remain largely based on plausible, but unproven, conjecture.
Thoroughly researched and compellingly written, Killed by a Traffic Engineer shows how traffic engineering “research” is outdated and unexamined (at its best) and often steered by an industry and culture considering only how to get from point A to B the fastest way possible, to the detriment of safety, quality of life, equality, and planetary health. Marshall examines our need for speed and how traffic engineers disconnected it from safety, the focus on capacity and how it influences design, blaming human error, relying on faulty data, how liability drives reporting, measuring road safety outcomes, and the education (and reeducation) of traffic engineers.
Killed by a Traffic Engineer is ultimately hopeful about what is possible once we shift our thinking and demand streets engineered for the safety of people, both outside and inside of cars. It will make you look at your city and streets—and traffic engineers— in a new light and inspire you to take action.
Fixing the carnage on our roadways requires a change in mindset and a dramatic transformation of transportation. This goes for traffic engineers in particular because they are still the ones in charge of our streets.
In Killed by a Traffic Engineer, civil engineering professor Wes Marshall shines a spotlight on how little science there is behind the way that our streets are engineered, which leaves safety as an afterthought. While traffic engineers are not trying to cause deliberate harm to anyone, he explains, they are guilty of creating a transportation system whose designs remain largely based on plausible, but unproven, conjecture.
Thoroughly researched and compellingly written, Killed by a Traffic Engineer shows how traffic engineering “research” is outdated and unexamined (at its best) and often steered by an industry and culture considering only how to get from point A to B the fastest way possible, to the detriment of safety, quality of life, equality, and planetary health. Marshall examines our need for speed and how traffic engineers disconnected it from safety, the focus on capacity and how it influences design, blaming human error, relying on faulty data, how liability drives reporting, measuring road safety outcomes, and the education (and reeducation) of traffic engineers.
Killed by a Traffic Engineer is ultimately hopeful about what is possible once we shift our thinking and demand streets engineered for the safety of people, both outside and inside of cars. It will make you look at your city and streets—and traffic engineers— in a new light and inspire you to take action.
412 pages, Paperback
First published June 4, 2024
275 people are currently reading
3778 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 142 reviews
October 18, 2024
Four stars for the material. Two stars for the writing — and I’m being generous. This thing needs an aggressive editor willing to cut the dated pop culture references and irrelevant footnotes. The author writes about a study that was never completed and, so, has no results to share. Cut it. Case studies are repeated to make the exact same point in several chapters. Words are displayed in bold italics for no reason. This book irritated me more than any I’ve read in recent memory despite finding it agreeable and illuminating. Please, someone edit this into a readable document.
The last couple of sections are dynamite, though.
The last couple of sections are dynamite, though.
April 26, 2024
got this advanced reader copy at the national planning conference! I found it really comprehensible, even with the more technical topics, and it was especially inspiring as I work towards a career in transportation safety myself. even if that doesn’t pan out, I now have the tools and knowledge to be an advocate.
September 17, 2024
Full review to come, but this was excellent and approachable*
*except for random footnotes that added nothing, like this one.
*except for random footnotes that added nothing, like this one.
July 14, 2024
This book is a very accessible and persuasive introduction to the problems created by the past hundred years of traffic "engineering", which has focused exclusively on making it easy and fast for cars to move through places, to the detriment of all other uses of land in the area.
I am already deeply immersed in this topic (and I imagine many readers are as well), and for me the general arguments the author uses are powerful but well-worn and (while extremely important) add little new. The most interesting parts of the book were the places where he quotes and critiques traffic engineering articles and manuals from the 20's - 60's (and today), and shows how they're based on absolutely nothing but guesses (shocking if you haven't heard this before). However, this book is totally nontechnical and avoids getting very deep into the weeds on any particular aspect of street design. Personally, I would really love to see a book that chases down the history of various common design elements (e.g. slip lanes) and picks apart their history, "design standards", and analyzes the real impact they have on the built environment. Short of that, this book has a lot of original source references to chase down for doing such an analysis.
On the unfortunate side, the writing style leaves quite a bit to be desired. The book consists of 88 very short chapters (2-5 pages), each of which consists of a stream of very short paragraphs (often just 1 sentence). This gives a sort of "staccato" rhythm to the writing that at times almost feels like a series of tweets. Also, nearly every page contains some kind of gratuitous reference to a movie or TV show, frequently taking time to quote some joke from the script in its full context. This is really distracting and (for me) falls totally flat. I'm reading this book because the author is an expert in traffic engineering and I want to hear his perspective, not to be reminded of some skit from The Simpsons. I understand traffic violence is a heavy topic, but this is not an effective way to lighten the mood.
I am already deeply immersed in this topic (and I imagine many readers are as well), and for me the general arguments the author uses are powerful but well-worn and (while extremely important) add little new. The most interesting parts of the book were the places where he quotes and critiques traffic engineering articles and manuals from the 20's - 60's (and today), and shows how they're based on absolutely nothing but guesses (shocking if you haven't heard this before). However, this book is totally nontechnical and avoids getting very deep into the weeds on any particular aspect of street design. Personally, I would really love to see a book that chases down the history of various common design elements (e.g. slip lanes) and picks apart their history, "design standards", and analyzes the real impact they have on the built environment. Short of that, this book has a lot of original source references to chase down for doing such an analysis.
On the unfortunate side, the writing style leaves quite a bit to be desired. The book consists of 88 very short chapters (2-5 pages), each of which consists of a stream of very short paragraphs (often just 1 sentence). This gives a sort of "staccato" rhythm to the writing that at times almost feels like a series of tweets. Also, nearly every page contains some kind of gratuitous reference to a movie or TV show, frequently taking time to quote some joke from the script in its full context. This is really distracting and (for me) falls totally flat. I'm reading this book because the author is an expert in traffic engineering and I want to hear his perspective, not to be reminded of some skit from The Simpsons. I understand traffic violence is a heavy topic, but this is not an effective way to lighten the mood.
May 5, 2025
"Insightful yet frustrating" captures my experience with this book about automobile transit in the United States. The author delivers some thought-provoking ideas and innovative solutions, but the reading experience is marred by verbosity, distracting footnotes, and esoteric pop culture references. Additionally, the lack of an index made it difficult to navigate through its contents. Despite these issues, I still found value in certain parts of the book hence giving it 3 out of 5 stars.
The book shines when it introduces innovative ideas to improve safety for pedestrians and cyclists. One concept that stood out was the proposal to install brake lights on the front of vehicles, which could significantly enhance the safety of non-motorists. Another insightful point was the idea of measuring safety per capita rather than per passenger mile traveled—an approach that offers a more comparative measure of road safety for the average commuter.
Recognizing the vulnerability of pedestrians and cyclists, the author suggested special permissions for these road users to enhance their safety. For example, allowing them to advance through a red light early to establish lane presence is a pragmatic solution.
One of the more sobering arguments presented is the notion that autonomous cars are not a catch-all solution to crashes and traffic congestion. The author's observation that the perpetual push for technological limits in cars (speed, efficiency) comes with inherent tradeoffs between safety and efficiency is compelling. This underscores the importance of engineering safer roads and prioritizing pedestrian and cyclist access as we move towards an increasingly autonomous future.
However, several aspects detract from the overall reading experience. The discussions around the actuarial value of life and road design optimization were extensive, but I was surprised by the omission of any analysis on reducing lost Quality-Adjusted Life Years in engineering decisions. Moreover, there are actionable solutions provided for being safer on and around roads, but they are somewhat buried under repetitive content and less effective organization. The chapter titles lack descriptiveness, making it harder for the reader to navigate the book's contents effectively.
In a future edition, a more concise writing style and better-organized chapters would greatly benefit readers. Additionally, reducing redundancy and fixing the distracting footnotes would make the book more engaging.
All in all, while this book presents some thought-provoking arguments and ideas, the execution leaves much to be desired. Though I walked away with new insights, the reading experience was hampered by the book's structure and verbosity. If you're looking for immediate actionable steps to be a safer road user, you might find yourself a bit frustrated. However, the innovative ideas proposed may still warrant a read for those deeply interested in transportation safety and policy.
The book shines when it introduces innovative ideas to improve safety for pedestrians and cyclists. One concept that stood out was the proposal to install brake lights on the front of vehicles, which could significantly enhance the safety of non-motorists. Another insightful point was the idea of measuring safety per capita rather than per passenger mile traveled—an approach that offers a more comparative measure of road safety for the average commuter.
Recognizing the vulnerability of pedestrians and cyclists, the author suggested special permissions for these road users to enhance their safety. For example, allowing them to advance through a red light early to establish lane presence is a pragmatic solution.
One of the more sobering arguments presented is the notion that autonomous cars are not a catch-all solution to crashes and traffic congestion. The author's observation that the perpetual push for technological limits in cars (speed, efficiency) comes with inherent tradeoffs between safety and efficiency is compelling. This underscores the importance of engineering safer roads and prioritizing pedestrian and cyclist access as we move towards an increasingly autonomous future.
However, several aspects detract from the overall reading experience. The discussions around the actuarial value of life and road design optimization were extensive, but I was surprised by the omission of any analysis on reducing lost Quality-Adjusted Life Years in engineering decisions. Moreover, there are actionable solutions provided for being safer on and around roads, but they are somewhat buried under repetitive content and less effective organization. The chapter titles lack descriptiveness, making it harder for the reader to navigate the book's contents effectively.
In a future edition, a more concise writing style and better-organized chapters would greatly benefit readers. Additionally, reducing redundancy and fixing the distracting footnotes would make the book more engaging.
All in all, while this book presents some thought-provoking arguments and ideas, the execution leaves much to be desired. Though I walked away with new insights, the reading experience was hampered by the book's structure and verbosity. If you're looking for immediate actionable steps to be a safer road user, you might find yourself a bit frustrated. However, the innovative ideas proposed may still warrant a read for those deeply interested in transportation safety and policy.
November 9, 2025
not sure if I find all the pop culture references hilarious or cringe, but very eye opening regardless
November 17, 2025
This book was okay but desperately needed better editing. I think the material is likely more engaging in a taught format. I am a huge nerd about road design and still encountered some surprising information - that's good! But ultimately the book's structure (very short chapters particularly) made the polemic call to action at the end less impactful; a stronger sense of narrative is needed to make things flow better.
Having said that, wow, pseudoscience is the word for it.
Having said that, wow, pseudoscience is the word for it.
November 9, 2025
Everything is a lie and the house always wins
July 23, 2024
If you are a transportation & community revitalization nerd like me, this is a great book. As a former & recovering traffic engineer, this hits hard. Over the course of my 30+ year career, with the past 27 at a local government agency, I had gradually come to see the error of my ways. This book articulated what I had been feeling for years quite well. We must prioritize safety over LOS if we want to save our cities. Sadly the old mentality is so ingrained into traffic engineering culture that I wonder if we will be able to turn the tide.
November 6, 2025
I hate cars
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
November 19, 2024
apologies to all my friends I’ve gone on long rants about traffic engineering and walkable cities to in the past week because I’ve been so hooked on this book, it was really good and he gets so many points for referencing both ratatouille and old enough in the span of like three pages. I do think that this book could have been organized better / the points would have been punchier if it were restructured slightly but still loved it and will be thinking about it for a while!
July 4, 2024
Rightfully should be the sort of exposé that does for urban planning what Silent Spring did for chemical manufacturers and The Jungle did for the meat industry.
August 12, 2024
U.S. traffic fatalities are higher than those in other rich countries, and have risen in recent years (especially for pedestrians). In Killed by A Traffic Engineer, engineering professor Wes Marshall explains that this problem is at least partially rooted in American traffic engineering: engineers design streets that accommodate fast vehicle traffic at the expense of safety. Why is this?
Marshall suggests several root causes: 1) First of all, American engineers receive almost no academic training about traffic, and even less about safety. A student can graduate college with a civil engineering degree and pass a licensure exam while having taken no courses related to transportation. Even universities with transportation courses rarely learn anything about road safety.
2) engineers often rely on research that is outdated or irrelevant. For example, 1930s research on industrial worker accidents found that for every accident that caused a major injury, there are 29 that caused minor accidents and 300 that caused no accidents. Traffic engineers noticed this research and assumed that in the traffic context, it was also true that places that have very few small accidents also have very few major accidents. But this point of view is incorrect in the context of auto traffic- a fast-moving highway might have very few minor accidents, but far more severe injuries because if you are hit by a car going 60 miles per hour, you will be more severely injured than if you are hit by a car going 20 miles per hour. Because midcentury traffic engineers did not notice this difference between highways and factories, they thought streets with fast-moving traffic would be safer than they turned out to be. Similarly, the American custom of 12-foot travel lanes is based on research that shows nothing about road safety outcomes, but instead on a 1945 study showing only that trucks “shift slightly more to the right” on narrower roads.
3) traffic engineers try to avoid blame for crashes by blaming human error but overlook the fact that some street design rules are more likely to produce human error than others. For example, Marshall notes that many signalized intersections “give pedestrians the walk signal while we simultaneously allow drivers to turn directly into where we just told pedestrians they could safely walk.” But if both drivers and pedestrians have the right of way at the same time, human error leading to crashes is more likely.
4) traffic engineers treat roads like buildings. When engineers design buildings, they may add larger-than-necessary materials to prevent structures from collapsing. When engineers reason by analogy, they favor bigger roads with higher design speeds. This may be a fine strategy for a limited-access highway, but creates a high risk of death or serious injury on streets that are used by slow-moving road users such as pedestrians and slow-turning vehicles.
Marshall suggests several root causes: 1) First of all, American engineers receive almost no academic training about traffic, and even less about safety. A student can graduate college with a civil engineering degree and pass a licensure exam while having taken no courses related to transportation. Even universities with transportation courses rarely learn anything about road safety.
2) engineers often rely on research that is outdated or irrelevant. For example, 1930s research on industrial worker accidents found that for every accident that caused a major injury, there are 29 that caused minor accidents and 300 that caused no accidents. Traffic engineers noticed this research and assumed that in the traffic context, it was also true that places that have very few small accidents also have very few major accidents. But this point of view is incorrect in the context of auto traffic- a fast-moving highway might have very few minor accidents, but far more severe injuries because if you are hit by a car going 60 miles per hour, you will be more severely injured than if you are hit by a car going 20 miles per hour. Because midcentury traffic engineers did not notice this difference between highways and factories, they thought streets with fast-moving traffic would be safer than they turned out to be. Similarly, the American custom of 12-foot travel lanes is based on research that shows nothing about road safety outcomes, but instead on a 1945 study showing only that trucks “shift slightly more to the right” on narrower roads.
3) traffic engineers try to avoid blame for crashes by blaming human error but overlook the fact that some street design rules are more likely to produce human error than others. For example, Marshall notes that many signalized intersections “give pedestrians the walk signal while we simultaneously allow drivers to turn directly into where we just told pedestrians they could safely walk.” But if both drivers and pedestrians have the right of way at the same time, human error leading to crashes is more likely.
4) traffic engineers treat roads like buildings. When engineers design buildings, they may add larger-than-necessary materials to prevent structures from collapsing. When engineers reason by analogy, they favor bigger roads with higher design speeds. This may be a fine strategy for a limited-access highway, but creates a high risk of death or serious injury on streets that are used by slow-moving road users such as pedestrians and slow-turning vehicles.
September 15, 2025
...I did not enjoy reading this, and not because all of the anecdotes about pedestrian deaths. Marshall jokes in the dedication (to his family) that "88 chapters on road safety seems like a bit much" and the unfortunate thing is that it's 100% right. This book is 88 disconnected chapters that read like 88 separate essays that someone tried unsuccessfully to corral into related sections. In one of the last sections Marshall tries to use the KonMari Method as a metaphor for what to prioritize when designing roads, but forgets to mention the method right in the middle of that series of chapters/essays. If you dropped me into an essay, I could not tell you what the point of the section was.
I was left with a lot of anecdotes, a bunch of information I feel like I've seen summarized better on Tumblr, and, unfortunately, feeling still unprepared to argue with pro-car activists, which Marshall promises you'll be able to do in his introduction. (At least not beyond the usual, "I don't know how to explain that you should care about other people.")
I was left with a lot of anecdotes, a bunch of information I feel like I've seen summarized better on Tumblr, and, unfortunately, feeling still unprepared to argue with pro-car activists, which Marshall promises you'll be able to do in his introduction. (At least not beyond the usual, "I don't know how to explain that you should care about other people.")
January 29, 2025
This book is riveting, and also makes me so angry that we could do just little things to make our roads safer, but people in power are just preoccupied with moving cars fast, which shouldn't be the way a city is designed. I see so many flaws in the streets of Toronto from reading this book.
I wish I was a traffic engineer so that I could fix these problems!
I wish I was a traffic engineer so that I could fix these problems!
August 29, 2024
5 stars for the content -- terrific examination and expose of the "science" of traffic engineering.
2.5 stars for the writing, organization, repetitiveness, and structure.
2.5 stars for the writing, organization, repetitiveness, and structure.
December 19, 2025
Finished my # transit tome on the bus on the way to work and now alas I have nothing to read on the return journey .. but learned lots from this book about things that affect my life (ie. Roads, Stroads, Pedestrianism, Biking, Possible Death, Urban Planning Writ Large). Also, the author clearly loves movies. Also, now my bus is not moving. But at least I know that (statistically) taking public transit is 20x safer than driving 😌 stay safe and stay urbanist my friends
May 15, 2025
Really interesting subject matter and summary of current issues and trends in transportation engineering. However this book desperately needs a better editor. Like this book could have been half the length it is if all the repetition of topics or arguments were removed. I don’t need a whole paragraph every time to explain the history of acronym changes that a governmental agency has gone through each time that agency gets mentioned.
September 29, 2025
2.5/5⭐
Another reviewer said the content was 4/5⭐ but the writing was 2/5⭐ and I couldn't agree more. This was hard to get through and I am glad I'm done but kinda regret sticking with it....
The writing was too informal and just all over the place? Too many random stories and articles and laws and stuff to make a concise argument rather than a watered down one.
I learned a few things so that's good. 😎
Another reviewer said the content was 4/5⭐ but the writing was 2/5⭐ and I couldn't agree more. This was hard to get through and I am glad I'm done but kinda regret sticking with it....
The writing was too informal and just all over the place? Too many random stories and articles and laws and stuff to make a concise argument rather than a watered down one.
I learned a few things so that's good. 😎
November 29, 2025
I really wanted to like this more, but this was unfortunately one of the worst written books I've ever read. It's almost impressive how badly it flows, given that substance alone can usually carry a nonfiction. There is mostly surface level analysis here, a hint of deeper insight, but all are difficult to glean out of the complete mess that is this text.
At some point in the beginning the author humblebrags about having written more than 80 chapters on this subject, but that is very easy to do when each "chapter" is barely 2 pages long. There is no structure whatsoever - the entire book just feels like a long stream of consciousness dumped into a Word document. About half the chapters are the same setup repeated over and over again. Various subtopics are constantly teased throughout the book but only a handful get any meaningful analysis. Random words are bolded for no clear reason. Fellow kids- style pop culture references that come out of nowhere and have nothing to do with anything also invade most chapters.
Most annoyingly, a good quarter of the real estate of almost every page is taken up by inane and pointless footnotes, like this particularly ridiculous one attached to the text "...I was lucky enough to work with him"*. At a certain point I just stopped reading them and missed nothing.
The author invokes the "spark joy" minimalist ethos of Marie Kondo to suggest a new framework for analyzing road safety, in which a city can pick a few goals (safe journeys for schoolchildren, more miles biked, etc) and aggressively add or remove elements from the environment as needed. It's ironic that he did not follow his own advice one bit. Plenty of reviews correctly identify the need for an editor; I suggest that editor be Kondo herself.
(*"Very, very lucky.")
At some point in the beginning the author humblebrags about having written more than 80 chapters on this subject, but that is very easy to do when each "chapter" is barely 2 pages long. There is no structure whatsoever - the entire book just feels like a long stream of consciousness dumped into a Word document. About half the chapters are the same setup repeated over and over again. Various subtopics are constantly teased throughout the book but only a handful get any meaningful analysis. Random words are bolded for no clear reason. Fellow kids- style pop culture references that come out of nowhere and have nothing to do with anything also invade most chapters.
Most annoyingly, a good quarter of the real estate of almost every page is taken up by inane and pointless footnotes, like this particularly ridiculous one attached to the text "...I was lucky enough to work with him"*. At a certain point I just stopped reading them and missed nothing.
The author invokes the "spark joy" minimalist ethos of Marie Kondo to suggest a new framework for analyzing road safety, in which a city can pick a few goals (safe journeys for schoolchildren, more miles biked, etc) and aggressively add or remove elements from the environment as needed. It's ironic that he did not follow his own advice one bit. Plenty of reviews correctly identify the need for an editor; I suggest that editor be Kondo herself.
(*"Very, very lucky.")
June 10, 2024
As a traffic engineer, I find this book a good read. Written in somewhat witty language, it gives a good overview of the last 100 years of transportation and traffic research in the US, and it's heavily referenced. A bold critical view on transportation system that asks questions why we do things the certain way and how we got to this point where almost 40k people die each year on US roads (in comparison, 56k US troops were killed during Vietnam War that lasted almost 20 years).
June 10, 2025
Education. Enforcement. Engineering. When someone dies on the road, what do we blame? Spoiler: it’s usually not the road engineering!
Wes Marshall does an excellent and engaging job describing the flaws of traffic engineers, the common mistakes they make, and their refusal to use new information to make better choices. Some of the things I’ve learned from this book have been staggering. For example, it’s commonly believed that higher speeds mean more safety — so highways are safer than local roads. But actually, in reality, there are fewer fender benders but more severe and fatal crashes instead — high speeds in areas with pedestrians and bicyclists is a recipe for disaster. I was already aware of some of the engineering issues that induce speeding, but what I didn’t know is that it is all, and continues to be, by design — for more capacity, more vehicle miles travelled, and for “less”
Congestion. But our methods aren’t working, they aren’t making the streets safer, and people are still being killed every day by drivers. What can we do to make the roads, and our lives, safer? This book was great, and highly recommend it.
Wes Marshall does an excellent and engaging job describing the flaws of traffic engineers, the common mistakes they make, and their refusal to use new information to make better choices. Some of the things I’ve learned from this book have been staggering. For example, it’s commonly believed that higher speeds mean more safety — so highways are safer than local roads. But actually, in reality, there are fewer fender benders but more severe and fatal crashes instead — high speeds in areas with pedestrians and bicyclists is a recipe for disaster. I was already aware of some of the engineering issues that induce speeding, but what I didn’t know is that it is all, and continues to be, by design — for more capacity, more vehicle miles travelled, and for “less”
Congestion. But our methods aren’t working, they aren’t making the streets safer, and people are still being killed every day by drivers. What can we do to make the roads, and our lives, safer? This book was great, and highly recommend it.
September 23, 2025
A great book that touches on the very foundations of traffic engineering. The author clearly has learned a lot over his own career, and it shines a light on many genuinely new perspectives and criticisms of contemporary engineering, especially from a safety perspective (a lot of urbanist criticism comes from a perspective that the current environment is unpleasant or inefficient, not a laser-focus on safety). I was very satisfied with the book and very much enjoyed the reading experience. My only criticism is that it was a little too entry-level for my own taste, and did not go into as much technical detail as I would have preferred. The book consists of 88 "chapters", at most maybe 4-5 pages each, which shine a light on things like how we collect data, how we act on it, design, etc. This makes the book very easy to read, however does make it less efficient as a reference. Especially when the book prefers more simple prose to get its point across to a wide audience; you won't get lost in technical jargon here. I'd recommend the book to anyone who wants to get a deeper understanding of why and how traffic engineering is so flawed as a discipline.
November 6, 2025
I really liked this book, especially as it explains a lot about traffic engineering for the layperson. It's also depressing as heck, showing how much of what modern traffic engineers use in their standards and guidelines are based on ... nothing. No real studies, no science. One heavily cited source of information about bikes on the road is traced back to a 1970s paper about one engineer's personal biking anecdote--what?! I also rather enjoyed the last few parts talking about some ways to fix things.
However, I really wish the author had organized and written the book slightly differently, as wow, he makes a lot of pop cultural references, to a frankly annoying degree. I listened to this in audiobook, but I gather from the other reviews that it had annoying footnotes and typographical emphases in print. I kinda wanted a book I could buy for all my city councilors, but I may just pull out specific chapters instead.
I learned a lot, though, so I appreciate that. All in all, a good supplement to anyone interested in good livable cities with useful roads that won't encourage death.
However, I really wish the author had organized and written the book slightly differently, as wow, he makes a lot of pop cultural references, to a frankly annoying degree. I listened to this in audiobook, but I gather from the other reviews that it had annoying footnotes and typographical emphases in print. I kinda wanted a book I could buy for all my city councilors, but I may just pull out specific chapters instead.
I learned a lot, though, so I appreciate that. All in all, a good supplement to anyone interested in good livable cities with useful roads that won't encourage death.
November 10, 2024
Acho que nunca grifei/destaquei tanto um livro.
Wes Marshall vai atrás dos estudos e argumentos que formaram a base dos manuais de engenharia de tráfego responsáveis por definir como as ruas são utilizadas. E surpresa, surpresa, não há base científica para a grande maioria das regras e a segurança é um fator raramente considerado no planejamento urbano.
Claro que Marshall foca nos Estados Unidos, mas a lógica foi exportada pelas fabricantes de automóveis e aplicada pelo mundo afora. Essa lógica é responsável pela morte de mais de 1 milhão de pessoas todos os anos.
Embora seja um tema árido, Marshal escreve como se estivesse mandando um whatsapp para um amigo e acrescenta exemplos e referências culturais do cinema e das artes, o que retira o peso e torna a leitura até divertida. Ainda sim é um livro para quem se interessa pelo tema.
Wes Marshall vai atrás dos estudos e argumentos que formaram a base dos manuais de engenharia de tráfego responsáveis por definir como as ruas são utilizadas. E surpresa, surpresa, não há base científica para a grande maioria das regras e a segurança é um fator raramente considerado no planejamento urbano.
Claro que Marshall foca nos Estados Unidos, mas a lógica foi exportada pelas fabricantes de automóveis e aplicada pelo mundo afora. Essa lógica é responsável pela morte de mais de 1 milhão de pessoas todos os anos.
Embora seja um tema árido, Marshal escreve como se estivesse mandando um whatsapp para um amigo e acrescenta exemplos e referências culturais do cinema e das artes, o que retira o peso e torna a leitura até divertida. Ainda sim é um livro para quem se interessa pelo tema.
March 22, 2025
Everyone who works in the transportation field should read this book. It is so eye opening to see that the standards we use for everything are based on so little, and it is abundantly clear we are not doing enough to prioritize safety in this country.
Do I feel attacked as a traffic engineer myself? Maybe a little, but I mostly feel energized to apply what I've learned from this book to make my community safer.
This read was also very engaging, Wes Marshall found a way to make it compelling when it could have been a snooze fest. Maybe it was all the footnotes. It was a bit repetitive at times, but overall I appreciated how approachable this was.
Do I feel attacked as a traffic engineer myself? Maybe a little, but I mostly feel energized to apply what I've learned from this book to make my community safer.
This read was also very engaging, Wes Marshall found a way to make it compelling when it could have been a snooze fest. Maybe it was all the footnotes. It was a bit repetitive at times, but overall I appreciated how approachable this was.
December 27, 2025
4.25 ⭐
The facts given in this book are unbelievable. The fact that we have "professionals" designing our streets with no actual street and safety design classes and training is horrific. But you see it continually with most construction projects.
This book covers a wide range of topics. This is both good and bad. A lot of information is regularly repeated between each topic and a lot of that information leans more engineer focused. However there is a lot here for those not in the engineering profession but bouncing between the two audiences does drag down the experience. The end call to action is the same though, know you know, do something about it. What actually are our priorities.
The facts given in this book are unbelievable. The fact that we have "professionals" designing our streets with no actual street and safety design classes and training is horrific. But you see it continually with most construction projects.
This book covers a wide range of topics. This is both good and bad. A lot of information is regularly repeated between each topic and a lot of that information leans more engineer focused. However there is a lot here for those not in the engineering profession but bouncing between the two audiences does drag down the experience. The end call to action is the same though, know you know, do something about it. What actually are our priorities.
March 20, 2025
This book is written by a traffic engineer and is made up of dozens of short essays, each on a very specific sub-topic of traffic engineering. The writing isn't particularly compelling, which is not surprising for a traffic engineer. A number of essays seem redundant or bland. But taken altogether, it does paint a really enticing picture of traffic design as unsafe by design and offers a few but not enough action items to make things much better.
October 16, 2025
3.5 stars. Has some interesting concepts, but eventually seemed a little repetitive by the end. Demonstrates a lot of good data and stories to go along with how poorly our streets are designed in regards to safety pedestrian and traffic safety. Its no wonder the United States has the second-highest road fatality rate among OECD countries, behind only Colombia.
January 10, 2025
It's pretty terrifying to realize that the whole traffic infrastructure in this country is based on a bunch of envelope math and no real data. I hope the people who need to read this book get a copy handed to them!
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