Call me dimwitted but this has been bothering me for a while.
Along the side of Irish roads there are these signs that say how many people were killed in car crashes in that particular county. Worrying many usually, but that’s a different story. Now, before this number there is a different number which is crossed out and this number is usually lower than the previous one. How does that work? Are people coming back from the dead? I’m guessing that it must be the previous year’s figures and that situation is improving somewhat, but can someone confirm this to me? It looks odd, doesn’t it?
It’s a psychological device used to demonstrate that the total number of deaths is actively going up, it’s happening so quickly we have to keep correcting this sign and you may be the next addition if you don’t take care.
Is your problem that the sequence of the numbers is listed the wrong way around?
Hmmm, now I’m re-reading my post and I realised I’ve put it the wrong way round. :smack:
But honestly, they have a higher number crossed out. That’s why it’s not making sense. If it was the other way around, your explanation would make perfect sense.
I’ve never seen that in Ireland, though I don’t venture much outside Dublin in a Car, so that’s probably why.
However, on a much more disturbing note, I was in the South of France last summer for a few weeks driving around. On the side of the roads (around Bezier and Toulouse) they have 1 ply-wood cut-out standing on the grass verge for each person that has died. These cut-outs are painted black and have a splash of red paint (presumably for the blood) on the head…
Really, really fucking weird.
But it did make me slow down… so I suppose, job done…
I suppose it looks a bit off. And they’re going to run out of space pretty soon, as well.
All the ones I’ve seen have
“In the last **4 years ** XX people were killed on the roads of County Whereveritis”
So my thinking is that if 20 people died 4 years ago and 21 the year after, then 25 then 19, the sign would read 85 people in four years. So, if you consider that since these signs have been put up and probably, more significantly, since the points system came in, fewer people have been killed on the roads in Ireland.
So when it comes time to update the signs, the new cumulative number for four years is lower because the most recent year’s figure is smaller.
The sign that really cracks me up though is the one when you are going into Longford. Most of the signs inother counties say in the last 4 years, blah, blah, blah, …Speed Kills or Heed your Speed or THINK! or Slow Down
But in Longford it says
“In the last 4 years XX number of people were killed on the roads in County Longford
Who Cares?”
It always makes me giggle.
Standard SDMB disclaimer - I do not think it is funny that people die in accidents on the roads, anywhere. What I do think is funny is that Longford County Council were trying for big emotional pull on your heartstrings type pathos and they missed it by about a squillion miles.
I puzzled over this until saw a thing on the TV about it.
It’s this year’s total of the previous 5 (or 4 or whatever) years.
The figure with the X through it is last year’s figure based on the previous 5 years.
It’s a crock.
It fails on so many counts: it isn’t clear what the figures are; sometimes the body count goes down so the figures appear that driving’s getting safer, and therefore the impact is lost; it distracts people trying to work out WTF it’s on about, and makes them crash, thus increasing the body count.*
*One of these facts is made up.
