Vehicles of the future also have pros and cons. And we're not just talking about batteries, which are still expensive, polluting and slow to recharge. In fact, electric cars also seem to have another problem: they are involved more often than traditional cars in accidents with pedestrians. An aspect to keep in mind for producers and legislators, certified by a study just published in the pages of the Journal of Epidemiology & Community Health.
Silent, even too quiet
The issue is obviously not new. We have been accustomed to the noisy petrol engines of traditional cars for almost a century, and therefore it is easy to imagine that very silent electric cars could take us by surprise when we find ourselves crossing the road, especially in the noisy city environment. With the risk that, in the event of driver distraction, the risk of being hit increases, not receiving the usual sound signals that indicate the presence of an approaching vehicle.
Even the most plausible suspicion needs evidence to be confirmed. And that's what researchers at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine in London decided to do. Using road accident data collected by the UK government, researchers estimated the number of pedestrians who were killed in accidents involving electric cars between 2013 and 2017, and compared this to accidents involving petrol-powered cars. and diesel.
I study
In total, over 96,000 UK pedestrians were victims of accidents with cars or taxis in the period studied. Of these, the vast majority were struck by fossil fuel vehicles, while just 2% of the total accidents analyzed involved electric or hybrid cars. At the same time, the number of traditional cars circulating on English roads is vastly greater than that of electric or hybrid vehicles. And therefore, proportionately, the risk represented by silent electric cars was much greater than that of petrol cars: for every 100 million miles (160 million kilometres) traveled by electric or hybrid cars in a year, in the period studied there were 5.16 accidents with pedestrian victims were recorded, compared to 2.40 for traditional cars.
Double danger
In short, electric and hybrid cars seem to be almost twice as likely to hit a pedestrian as petrol or diesel cars. The limitations of the study are not lacking: the available data is limited to 2017, and therefore it is not possible to establish whether in recent years, with the greater diffusion of electric vehicles, the situation has improved; Furthermore, owners of electric cars tend to be younger, and as the authors of the research themselves point out, drivers with fewer years of experience behind the wheel tend to have a greater probability of being involved in road accidents.
Net of these considerations, the authors of the study believe that their results still demonstrate a greater risk for pedestrians linked to the circulation of silent cars such as electric ones. A fact which, even if confirmed, should not discourage the use of these vehicles, which are essential for improving air quality in cities and reducing emissions from the transport sector. Rather – write the authors of the study – the additional risk should be mitigated by legislators, studying regulations that allow safer coexistence between pedestrians and electric cars.