Are your high-visibility clothes making you invisible to car sensors? Find out now!
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High-visibility clothing has long been considered a lifesaver for pedestrians, cyclists, and road workers.
But recent findings have raised an alarming question: could the very gear designed to protect you actually be putting you at risk?
What experts discovered might change the way we view pedestrian safety in an increasingly tech-driven world.
High-visibility clothing, designed to keep pedestrians, cyclists, and road workers safe, might be doing more harm than good when it comes to advanced car safety technology.
A study by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) found that vehicles with crash avoidance systems struggled to detect pedestrians wearing high-visibility clothes with reflective strips.
David Harkey, president of the IIHS, expressed concern, stating: ‘it’s untenable that the clothes that pedestrians, cyclists and roadway workers wear to be safe may make them harder for crash avoidance technology to recognise.’
The study tested three cars – the Honda CR-V, Mazda CX-5, and Subaru Forester – to see how their pedestrian detection systems performed on people dressed in various types of clothing, including garments with reflective tape.
During the trials, the researchers used a pedestrian mannequin dressed in different clothes, ranging from white and black clothing to black clothing with reflective strips and a highly reflective jacket.
The cars were tested at 40 km/h under three different lighting conditions.
Results showed that the crash avoidance systems failed to detect pedestrians wearing high-visibility clothing with reflective strips in all of the tests.
In contrast, when the mannequin was dressed in black, the Mazda CX-5 and Honda CR-V had better results, slowing down significantly under high-beam lights with no road illumination.
The Subaru Forester, however, performed better in most tests, managing to stop for the pedestrian dummy in every trial, except when the reflective strips were used in low-light conditions at 10 lux.
Despite this, the study noted that the Mazda CX-5 and Honda CR-V had a hard time identifying pedestrians in high-visibility clothing.
The IIHS questioned why these systems failed to recognise reflective strips, a common feature of high-visibility workwear in Australia, adding that it posed a safety risk to road workers and emergency personnel.
The Subaru Forester outperformed the other vehicles, managing to slow by more than 80 per cent in tests with reflective strips in challenging lighting conditions.
The IIHS concluded that further research was needed to understand how crash avoidance systems respond to pedestrians wearing high-visibility clothing, calling the findings a ‘worrisome blind spot’.
David Harkey also stressed the need for car manufacturers to adjust their pedestrian detection systems, stating: ‘these results suggest that some automakers need to tweak their pedestrian automatic emergency braking systems.’
If high-visibility clothing could actually be making us harder to detect on the road, what other safety measures might be backfiring? We’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments.
But recent findings have raised an alarming question: could the very gear designed to protect you actually be putting you at risk?
What experts discovered might change the way we view pedestrian safety in an increasingly tech-driven world.
High-visibility clothing, designed to keep pedestrians, cyclists, and road workers safe, might be doing more harm than good when it comes to advanced car safety technology.
A study by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) found that vehicles with crash avoidance systems struggled to detect pedestrians wearing high-visibility clothes with reflective strips.
David Harkey, president of the IIHS, expressed concern, stating: ‘it’s untenable that the clothes that pedestrians, cyclists and roadway workers wear to be safe may make them harder for crash avoidance technology to recognise.’
The study tested three cars – the Honda CR-V, Mazda CX-5, and Subaru Forester – to see how their pedestrian detection systems performed on people dressed in various types of clothing, including garments with reflective tape.
During the trials, the researchers used a pedestrian mannequin dressed in different clothes, ranging from white and black clothing to black clothing with reflective strips and a highly reflective jacket.
The cars were tested at 40 km/h under three different lighting conditions.
Results showed that the crash avoidance systems failed to detect pedestrians wearing high-visibility clothing with reflective strips in all of the tests.
In contrast, when the mannequin was dressed in black, the Mazda CX-5 and Honda CR-V had better results, slowing down significantly under high-beam lights with no road illumination.
The Subaru Forester, however, performed better in most tests, managing to stop for the pedestrian dummy in every trial, except when the reflective strips were used in low-light conditions at 10 lux.
Despite this, the study noted that the Mazda CX-5 and Honda CR-V had a hard time identifying pedestrians in high-visibility clothing.
The IIHS questioned why these systems failed to recognise reflective strips, a common feature of high-visibility workwear in Australia, adding that it posed a safety risk to road workers and emergency personnel.
The Subaru Forester outperformed the other vehicles, managing to slow by more than 80 per cent in tests with reflective strips in challenging lighting conditions.
The IIHS concluded that further research was needed to understand how crash avoidance systems respond to pedestrians wearing high-visibility clothing, calling the findings a ‘worrisome blind spot’.
David Harkey also stressed the need for car manufacturers to adjust their pedestrian detection systems, stating: ‘these results suggest that some automakers need to tweak their pedestrian automatic emergency braking systems.’
If high-visibility clothing could actually be making us harder to detect on the road, what other safety measures might be backfiring? We’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments.
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