Fitting Safety as Standard: Night Time Visibility for Lorries
Lunch debate, Tuesday 12 January 2016, 11:00 – 13:00
Renaissance Brussels Hotel
Inés Ayala Sender MEP and the European Transport Safety Council hosted a lunch debate on improving the night time visibility of lorries.
In 2011 around 4200 people died on EU roads in collisions involving Heavy Goods Vehicles (HGVs) and 75% of these road deaths were occupants of other vehicles. Road collisions involving HGVs tend to be more serious than other collisions because of the great size and mass of these vehicles. Part of these collisions are due to lateral and rear-end collisions at dusk or in the dark.
Directive 2007/35/EC required, from July 2008, that HGVs with a minimum weight of 7.5 tonnes and trailers from a maximum mass of 3.5 tonnes, must be fitted with retroflecting contour marking. This is a reflective sticky tape which marks the boundary of the rear and side of the goods transport vehicles. Thus, conspicuity is improved in conditions of poor visibility, at night or in adverse weather. These markings are mandatory for vehicles which have been registered after July 2011.
Building on recent research carried out by SWOV, this debate discussed the social and safety benefits of retrofitting contour markings, gathering representatives of road safety organisations, academic experts, police forces, vehicle manufacturers and vehicle technology manufacturers.
Download the agenda.
Presentations:
Towards safer transport of goods in the EU – ETSC
Retroflective Contour Markings – the Italian experience – Autmobile Club d’Italia
ETSC is grateful to 3M for financial support for this event.