"Bell the Hybrid" ... it begins

Bob Wilson

 

Source: Study examines rising pedestrian deaths

. . .
Pedestrian deaths have jumped 46 percent since reaching their lowest point in 2009, as pedestrian crashes have become both deadlier and more frequent. The increase has been mostly in urban or suburban areas, at nonintersections, on arterials — busy roads designed mainly to funnel vehicle traffic toward freeways — and in the dark, a new IIHS study shows. Crashes were increasingly likely to involve SUVs and high-horsepower vehicles.
. . .
Although pedestrian crashes most frequently involved cars, fatal single-vehicle crashes involving SUVs increased 81 percent, more than any other type of vehicle. The power of passenger vehicles involved in fatal single-vehicle pedestrian crashes, as measured by the ratio of horsepower to weight, also increased, with larger increases at the top of the scale.
. . .​

The only thing missing are pickup trucks: Prius Fatalities 2001-2007

Another problem is only similarly sized hybrid and ICE vehicles were compared, which is fair if trying to find out if the hybrid power system had a different risk compared to a compatible sized ICE power system. But the relative risks of SUVs and pickups, "the Elephant in the Room," were ignored. In Docket No. NHTSA-2009-0041, the NHTSA reported:

"While all passenger vehicle types (cars, sport utility vehicles, pickups, and vans) are involved in backover fatalities and injuries, the data indicate that backover fatality numbers show pickup trucks (72 of 288) and utility vehicles (68 of 228) to be overrepresented when compared to all non-backing traffic injury crashes and to their proportion to the passenger vehicle fleet." (pp. 6)​

We can only imagine the results if both HEV and ICE vehicles were compared to SUV and pickups.​

We knew this in 2009 from 2001-06 data.

Bob Wilson