Vias advocates breaking the trend towards ever heavier vehicles. After all, research by the traffic institute shows that for every 300 kilograms that a car becomes heavier, the risk of fatal injuries for vulnerable road users increases by 30 percent.
Vias studied accidents between 2017 and 2021 involving 300,000 occupants and vulnerable road users. The aim was to determine the impact of the weight of the vehicles on the severity of injuries to occupants and pedestrians or cyclists.
The study shows that the evolution towards increasingly heavier, more powerful and taller vehicles leads to “a two-speed road safety”. On the one hand, the occupants of the heavier vehicles are better protected in the event of an accident. Occupants of lighter vehicles and vulnerable road users, on the other hand, run a higher risk of serious or fatal injuries in a collision with those heavier cars.
“When a small city car weighing about 1,000 kilograms collides with a large family car weighing 2,000 kilograms, the occupants of the light vehicle are about three times more likely to suffer a serious injury than if the two vehicles had comparable masses,” said the statement. vias.
Pickups
With the pick-ups – large and high trucks with a flatbed – Vias found that the risk of serious injury is 65 percent lower for the occupants. For the counterparty, however, that risk is 50 percent higher. If a cyclist or pedestrian is hit by a pick-up, the risk of serious injury increases by 90 percent and of fatality by as much as 200 percent.
Cars have become almost 30 percent heavier in the last 20 years, according to Vias, the power increased by 60 percent and the hood height by 15 percent. Although vehicles more often have driver assistance systems, Vias still concludes that it is necessary to break the trend towards heavier vehicles. The more homogeneous the vehicle fleet is in terms of weight, the better protected cyclists, pedestrians and car passengers are.
Breaking the trend is not that easy, admits Vias spokesman Stef Willems. “Managing can be done in various ways, but we do not comment on that. That is the job of politicians.” It also depends on the offer, he says. “Lighter electric cars will come onto the market in the coming years.”
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