NHTSA Starts To Take The Safety Threat Of Comically Large Trucks More Seriously

The United States is already a global leader in traffic-related fatalities, with a thirty-percent jump in the last decade. That’s in contrast to every other developed country, which saw a decline. 40,000 Americans die every year in traffic fatalities. And while tech advancements have made life safer for drivers and passengers, the same can’t be true for those on the outside looking in.

There are a lot of reasons why; from poorly considered urban pedestrian and cyclist infrastructure, to the overall massive (and seemingly ever-ballooning) size of SUV and truck front ends.

This week the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) proposed new rules that would purportedly take aim at the latter. The new rule would establish a new Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard requiring new passenger vehicles be designed and tested to reduce the risk of serious-to-fatal injuries in child and adult pedestrian crashes. 

NHTSA notes that in 2022, 88% of pedestrian fatalities occurred via single vehicle crashes, and 49% of all pedestrian fatalities were caused by “multipurpose passenger vehicles” (trucks, vans, and other vehicles capable of seating more than 10 people). SUV and truck designers have been obsessed in recent years with comically large front grills and bumpers, which are more deadly and reduce visibility.

“We have a crisis of roadway deaths, and it’s even worse among vulnerable road users like pedestrians,” Sophie Shulman, NHTSA’s Deputy Administrator said in a statement. “Between 2013 and 2022, pedestrian fatalities increased 57% from 4,779 to 7,522. This proposed rule will ensure that vehicles will be designed to protect those inside and outside from serious injury or death.”

The NHTSA’s proposed changes would update Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards (FMVSS) to include requirements for vehicle head-to-hood impact testing, which the agency claims could save as many as 67 lives per year.

Of course, the NHTSA hasn’t always been a watchful steward of public automotive safety. The tepidness with which the agency has handled issues like the substantial body count caused by badly automated Teslas (and the company’s broad and obvious misrepresentation of the technology’s real-world capabilities) has been a particular point of public concern.

The NHTSA has never, in its fifty year history, issued rules requiring that automakers change vehicle design to better prevent pedestrian fatalities. Such rules would have to not only be crafted well, but survive lobbyist and legal onslaught in a country whose top court seems poised to all but lobotomize what remains of independent regulatory independence. Then they’d need consistent enforcement.

In addition to pedestrian-hostile SUV and truck design, the significant weight and acceleration of EV trucks and SUVs is something else global regulators have been tangling with.

The electric Ford Lightning, for example, is a whopping 6,500 pounds. The Hummer EV is even heavier, clocking in at 9,000 pounds. Its battery alone weighs more than a Honda Civic. Experts have pointed out the significant safety ramifications of this transition for a while, and while some countries (like Norway) have started taxing extremely heavy vehicle owners, the U.S. has so far lagged behind.

In 2022 the District of Columbia adopted a creative vehicle registration fee schedule charging owners of vehicles weighing more than 6,000 pounds $500 per year, seven times more than those registering light sedans. But federal efforts on this front have been muted due to lobbying concerns that such restrictions might impact product sales and policymaker worries about stunting the EV revolution.