SUV drivers in London could face additional charges as part of efforts to address safety risks to pedestrians, according to a new study. Researchers at Swansea University found that warnings about the dangers posed by large vehicles have little effect on buyer behaviour, with 95% of prospective SUV owners sticking with their decision despite being informed of the risks.
The study, reported by The Guardian, revealed that drivers were only 3.7 percentage points less likely to switch to a safer vehicle after seeing safety warnings. This suggests that voluntary measures may be insufficient, and stronger interventions, such as financial penalties, could be necessary.
Previous research from the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine and Imperial College London analysed over 680,000 real-world collisions from the past 35 years. It found that being hit by an SUV or light truck increases the odds of fatal injury by 44% for all ages. For children, the risk is even higher: they are 82% more likely to die in such crashes compared to being struck by a passenger car, and for those under 10, the likelihood rises by 130%.
Professor Ian Walker, an environmental psychologist at Swansea University and co-author of the study, said: “Buying whatever vehicle we like, and driving it wherever and whenever we please without having to think about the consequences for other people, has become normalised and ingrained across our society over decades. This almost certainly includes having a more honest conversation about how driving, no matter how useful to the person doing it, imposes harms on to other people.”
Elsa Robinson, an MSc Public Health student at LSHTM, highlighted the particular danger to children: “These larger vehicles are particularly dangerous for children, especially young children. Children are shorter in height and more vulnerable to being hit in critical areas such as the head or chest by a tall car’s front end.”
