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How American Fire Departments are Getting People Killed

Not Just Bikes · explainer · Watch on YouTube

Transit, cities & urban planning

What it is

Not Just Bikes argues that oversized American fire trucks and fire department requirements push cities toward wide roads and dangerous street design. He compares this with the Dutch approach to emergency response.

Why Hacker News recommends it

HN people link it in threads on big vehicles and road safety as a comparison of US and Dutch fire department approaches.

  • 3 people recommended it
  • 3 different months
  • 0 strong recommendations
  • first 2024, last 2025

What HN commenters said

  1. “forcing bad road design to accommodate giant fire trucks cause more car collisions”

    Oversized fire trucks force bad road design causing collisions

    CHB0403085482, 2024-09 · Recommendation · in “Americans' love affair with big cars is killing them”

  2. “There's a good video from Not Just Bikes about it”

    Relevant look at fire department requirements

    viraptor, 2024-12 · Recommendation · in “Fire risk assessment of battery home storage compared to general house fires”

  3. “shows quite well the major difference in approach between fire departments in the USA vs the Netherlands”

    Compares US and Dutch fire department approaches

    piva00, 2025-07 · Recommendation · in “Why does a fire truck cost $2m”

Excerpts from Hacker News comments, linked to the originals. Summaries and labels were written by a language model from those comments.

Topics: fire trucks, street design, road safety, netherlands, urbanism

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