America’s giant SUV addiction has become a global problem

Bigger is better or so the mantra goes. There’s an exception to be made though when it comes to the huge growth in SUVs. Expanding vehicle size is a part of a systematic push from auto manufacturers to sell their most profitable models — but the costs don’t end on the sales lot. Instead, the surge in both in size and quantity in pickup trucks and SUVs pose substantial risks to life, to the environment and to our wallets.

 As reported by Bloomberg’s CityLab, while road deaths across high-income countries have been significantly falling over the past few decades, the United States has become a road safety anomaly. From its position as a road safety leader in the 1970s, now, only Saudi Arabia and the Bahamas have less safe roadways in the high-income group — and a Swedish road user is around seven times safer than an American.

Pedestrian deaths in the U.S. have risen by 75% since 2009, according to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. A new analysis from the IISH and The New York Times found that pickup trucks and SUVs growing larger over that period are a significant contributor to that rise. Massive changes in vehicle shape, increases in weight and decreases in driver visibility are all also contributing factors to this worrying trend.

First, longer, higher hoods can extend blind spots to more than 14 feet, two to three times larger than the front blind zones of most sedans and compact cars. Stellantis’ Ram TRX pickup truck’s hood, for example, is taller than the average 9-year-old, compared to the now-discontinued VW Golf, which offers a clear line of sight to an average 4 1/2-year-old standing in front of the hood. A recent investigation from NBC News4 in Washington found that it took 10 sitting children lined up one after the other for the last one to be seen by a driver at the wheel of a typical SUV.

In a crash, the design of larger vehicles plays a massive role in whether a vulnerable road user, such as a pedestrian or cyclist, will survive. Higher-fronted cars typically strike adult pedestrians above the center of gravity, first hitting vital organs and are then more likely for the victim to be knocked under the car, rather than pushed to the side. According to one recent study, just a 4-inch increase in front-end height was associated with a 22% increase in the odds of fatality for pedestrians. The Times likewise recently estimated that up to 400 more pedestrians would have survived each year if vehicles had remained approximately the same size over the past quarter-century.

And where America leads, the rest of the world follows. The appetite for larger vehicles globally has increased, with SUVs accounting for more than half of new car sales. In Europe, there has been year-on-year growth in SUV’s popularity since 2000, with road deaths predicted to be 2,600 higher by 2040 due to increasing car sizes. This growth also poses a particular challenge for urban spaces with older cities struggling to deal with the space needed by these vehicles.