miscellany

The Real Terror of Halloween

Halloween is the deadliest day of the year for US child pedestrians, and it's not even a contest.

chorui halim

31 Oct 2025 — 5 min read

I live in what's considered a pretty "family-friendly" neighborhood. Nice, tree-lined streets. A few parks, rec centers, and schools within walking/biking distance. Decent sidewalks. You know what I rarely see? Kids walking around. I know there are a decent amount of kids in this neighborhood, though, because I see them on Halloween. For one night a year, they rule the streets.

Almost. Actually, on Halloween, just like every other day of the year, cars rule the streets. And like every other day of the year, they pose a massive risk to the kids walking around. Check out this chart by Vox journalists Muizz Akhtar and Youyou Zhou tallying the deaths of pedestrians aged 0-17 struck by motor vehicles.

Figure: Halloween is the deadliest day of the year for child pedestrians. Pedestrians ages 0-17 fatally struck by motor vehicles, total by the day of year for 2000 through 2020. Most days total between 10-40 deaths, but Halloween totals almost 75.

Kids are three times as likely to be killed by a vehicle on Halloween than they are any other day of the year. 4- to 8-year-olds specifically are over **ten times as likely.** But look at what else the chart shows: 10 to 40 kids being killed almost every single day of the year. If those numbers seem low to you somehow (considering the US youth population of ~70 million), then consider that it might be because children have been increasingly socially and legally barred from going outside by themselves at all.

Cars put kids in danger. Over the last decade, they're gotten taller and heavier, making it significantly more likely that a collision will cause serious injury or death. As I wrote in my article on designing accessible outdoor public spaces for kids:

Car-centric infrastructure is one of the biggest threats to young people in the US today. The massive danger that cars/roads pose to young children is the primary reason that they are largely prohibited from participating in public life. Over the last couple decades, cars and trucks have gotten huge. On average, pickup trucks grew 11% taller and 24% heavier between 2000-2018; now, they easily exceed 4,000 pounds. This Vox article explains the policy reasons behind the changes. As a result, pedestrian fatalities have been increasing, with children (especially those 12-23 months old) the most at risk. Heavier cars cause deadlier crashes, and tall cars also have massive front blind spots that contribute to the danger:NBC News examined that front visibility with a group of elementary school children, ages 6 to 10, and several adults of different heights in the driver’s seat of four tall, square-hooded vehicles: Ford F-150 and Toyota Tundra pickup trucks and Cadillac Escalade and Jeep Wagoneer SUVs. With the kids seated in a line stretching forward from the vehicle’s front bumper, it took nine to 11 of them before a 5-foot-2 driver could see a child’s head. Other demonstrations found similar results.

"America's cars and trucks are getting bigger, and so are their front blind zones. Children are paying the price," NBC News, Oct. 24 2022

In my opinion, moving away from car-centric infrastructure is the single biggest thing we can do to make public spaces safer and more accessible for children. Instead, we could massively expand public transit options with accessible guidance and signage designed to accommodate children. Prioritizing walkability, density, and mixed-use zoning in residential areas would also go a very long way in enabling the autonomy of young people.

Mitigating the risk of injury and death on Halloween doesn't inherently require huge changes to infrastructure - and it definitely doesn't require limiting kids' autonomy. (Looking at you, trunk-or-treats...) One relatively easy measure to advocate for locally is blocking off car traffic on residential streets where kids are trick-or-treating. It's a cheap, temporary measure that can go a long way; you can coordinate with your local government and/or organize with your neighbors to make it happen. It also forces cars/drivers to operate safely in order to accommodate kids, instead how it usually is: the other way around. What a backward society we live in.

I can't believe people (okay, cops and white moms) spent years freaking out about razor blades in candy and rainbow fentanyl while over 70 children have been killed by vehicles every Halloween for the last twenty years. Come on now. Halloween is such a great holiday. Kids deserve to have a fun, spooky time without having to worry about being run over and killed. We should be working harder to make that happen, right? It sounds pretty simple to me.

Resources