Being taught as a child the rule “if you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all”, means I’m reluctant to talk about the NRMA. There are many ethical issues to be had with the insurance company. However they do invest quite a large chunk of that which they stole from Australian citizens, in research into creating safer vehicles and safer roads for Australian road users. Often they release in the form of various publications good quality stuff on motor cars currently on the market (sometimes it’s pure drivel)
One such release is this youtube video that we saw recently. Whilst the article released from NRMA was one sentence long the video makes you think, and raises a few valid points, some of which we have discussed in previous blog posts. This video made us go about with some more research. Here is the video released by NRMA.
The Monash University Accident Research Centre (MUARC) carried out some in depth research into the relationship between a vehicles colour and the statistics surrounding car accidents. They have found a direct link between a vehicles colour and the chances of it being involved in a collision.
Obviously there is and always will be a human factor involved here as eighty percent of road users are useless and would fail the P plate test every day of the week. Buying a bright colour car or sticking high vis reflector tape down the door moulds will not save you from your own inability to reverse park out the front of a shopping centre.
Using crash data from Victoria and Western Australia, MUARC used the colours black, blue, brown, cream, fawn (because vehicle manufactures list fawn as a factory colour option??????), gold, green, grey, maroon, white mauve, orange, pink, purple, red, silver and yellow with all variables considered under the nearest category. Also included in the study, consideration was made for contributors such as light at the time of the crash, vehicle type, crash severity and state.
The result compared white vehicles with all other coloured vehicles. MUARC’s research showed there were a number of colours related to high risk, including: Black, Blue-Grey and Green.
None of the colours tested were statistically safer than white, though some had equal relative crash risk.
The link between colours and crash risk was highest during daylight hours, the risk associated with the above colours during this period up by 10%. The link was reduced during darker driving hours due to colour being less distinguishable and headlights
furrther reducing colour’s effects. Results also showed that environmental factors had an impact on the relationship between colour and crash risk.
Of the study, Dr Soames Job of the RTA’s NSW Centre for Road Safety said the results were useful but also dropped in the obvious things
that have to be said out of fear of being sued by some twit who can’t think for himself.
“Driving a darker coloured car can increase your crash risk,” Dr Job said, “but that is nowhere near as influential a factor as your driving behaviour. By driving within the speed limit, not driving after drinking and avoiding driving when tired, you increase your safety on the road.”
The NRMA video also got us thinking about the auto headlights and how well they actually work, though that’s probably a post for another day.
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