SUV Drivers 44% More Dangerous to Cyclists and Pedestrians

Drivers of SUVs who hit cyclists or pedestrians are 44% more likely to kill them than if they were driving a normal-sized car.

The increased risk is even greater for children, at 82%. The facts are reported by Ross Lydall in the Standard.

Real-World Collision Data from 680,000 Crashes

The Standard’s report is based on research by the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medecine and Imperial College London.

They looked at real-world collision data from 680,000 crashes around the world over the last 35 years, and compared the severity of injuries suffered by cyclists and pedestrians hit by SUVs with those caused by cars.

Why Do SUVs Present a Greater Risk?

SUVs present a greater risk to people because the front ends of these vehicles are tall and blunt.

This means that cyclists and pedestrians are struck higher up on their bodies:

• the pelvis not the knees for adults and
• the head for children

People hit by SUVs are more likely to be thrown forward onto the road, and be hit a second time by the vehicle, or be run over by it.

62% of new vehicle sales in the UK are SUVs, according to Clean Cities.

Anna Goodman

Anna Goodman is the senior author of the study. She said:

‘Around the world, we have seen a huge increase in the sale of ever-larger cars.

Previous research has found that this trend is substantially undermining progress towards net zero goals.

Similarly, our findings indicate that this proliferation of larger vehicles threatens to undermine all the road safety gains being made on other fronts.

Cities and countries around the world are starting to introduce measures to discourage the use of these large vehicles, and our study strengthens the road safety rationale for this’.

If all SUVs were replaced with normal cars, the number of cyclists and pedestrians killed in road crashes would decrease by:

• 17% in the US and 8% in Europe (adults) and
• 27% in the US and 14% in Europe (children)

Elsa Robinson, who worked on the study, said:

‘Analysing over half a million crashes from countries across the world tells us that SUVs and other similarly large vehicles are much more likely than traditional passenger cars to cause serious harm if they strike a pedestrian or cyclist.

Our findings also highlight that these larger vehicles are particularly dangerous for children, especially young children. This could be because children are shorter in height, and are therefore more vulnerable to the risks of being hit by vehicles with a tall front end’.