A new report by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety indicates that collision avoidance systems are making the roadways safer throughout New York and the rest of the U.S. However, the technology is still not standard in the vast majority of new vehicles.
The goal of the IIHS is to reduce injuries and deaths that result from motor vehicle crashes. Many auto insurance carriers and auto insurance organizations support the IIHS, and that’s one reason why the recent findings could get the attention of car manufacturers.
The organization found evidence that collision avoidance systems are useful technologies capable of reducing injury-inducing car crashes. According to the vice president for research at IIHS, collision avoidance systems are saving lives and anti-crash technology warning systems work. Data shows that single-vehicle, side-swipe, and head-on car crashes get reduced by 11 percent when drivers operate vehicles equipped with anti-collision systems.
Nonetheless, the IIHS found that only 6 percent of vehicles currently sold have lane-departure warning systems as a standard feature on basic models. Furthermore, only 9 percent of vehicles at this time sold have blind-spot alert systems as a standard feature on basic models.
The IIHS also found that it appears many drivers are disabling the technology. The car crash and injury reduction numbers were low in the IIHS study when compared to findings in another study, which tracked U.S. fleet vehicles and Volvo cars in Sweden. Researchers in those studies found a 50 percent reduction in crash rates when collision avoidance systems were included as a feature in a vehicle and utilized.
Despite the benefits of crash avoidance technology, negligent drivers can still cause accidents. Victims of such crashes may files personal injury claims to obtain compensation for damages.