An Australian study found that during the day black cars are 12% more likely than white cars to be involved in an accident. At dusk the risk increases by a whopping 47%.
An Australian study found that during the day black cars are 12% more likely than white cars to be involved in an accident. At dusk the risk increases by a whopping 47%.
I am curious if that data changes at all if headlights are on. I’d think that with headlights raising visibility of the black cars the incidence of accidents would start to get closer to the same for both colors of cars, but that’s just my uneducated opinion.
I had the same thought. Australia doesn’t require daytime running lights, so it’s be interesting to see if there’s data from Canada (where we require drl) to compare against.
My first car was tan. I used to have people pulling out in front of me all the time and I would get so mad about it. Then I started turning my headlights on all the time, even in the middle of the day. Suddenly people stopped pulling out in front of me and the amount of near misses I had from other drivers doing “stupid” things went to near zero. Apparently even tan cars can look like the road in the right conditions. DRL should be mandatory everywhere.
They’re not mandatory but I think it would be pretty tough to find a car less than 15 years old that doesn’t have them.
They’re relevant to safety ratings and so on, and all the cars sold here are sold in other jurisdictions where they’re mandatory.
Also relevant to safety ratings. It would be daft to sell cars without them.
The study does call that out.
The study was authored in 2007. Since 2011 almost all new cars have had DRLs even though they’re not mandatory.
It might also be coincidental. Maybe reckless drivers prefer black cars for some weird reason.
I think I read something about that but with red cars and tickets. The question though was are red car drivers more likely to speed/drive wrecklessly, or just more likely to get noticed doing it and ticketed?