No matter motion is taken on daylight saving time, policymakers ought to promote options which might be confirmed to guard pedestrians and bicyclists at the hours of darkness, IIHS President David Harkey testified earlier than a U.S. Senate committee.
By
April 10, 2025
The twice-yearly time change is just not a significant component in America’s ongoing highway security emergency, David Harkey, president of the Insurance coverage Institute for Freeway Security, mentioned at a congressional listening to on April 10.
“No matter you resolve to do in regards to the clock, I hope additionally, you will think about actions to maintain pedestrians and bicyclists secure, particularly after sunset,” Harkey mentioned in written testimony submitted to the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, which convened the listening to on whether or not to proceed switching backwards and forwards between daylight saving time and commonplace time yearly.
In his remarks, Harkey put the difficulty within the context of rising crash deaths, which exceeded 42,000 in 2022, up greater than 30% since 2014. IIHS is looking for to reverse this development with its just lately launched 30×30 initiative, a imaginative and prescient to scale back crash deaths 30% by 2030.
A recent IIHS study of morning and night crashes within the weeks surrounding the time change confirmed that pedestrian fatalities fall whereas automobile occupant fatalities rise with the conversion to sunlight saving time. When commonplace time resumes, automobile occupant deaths drop and pedestrian deaths rise.
Taking each durations into consideration, the online affect is an annual lower of 26 crashes with pedestrian or bicyclist fatalities and an annual improve of 29 crashes with automobile occupant fatalities.
Notably, the fluctuation in pedestrian crash deaths was tied to will increase or decreases within the quantity of daylight, whereas there was no clear connection for automobile occupant fatalities.
“In case you are in search of concrete steering on whether or not to maintain the present twice-yearly time modifications, … the proof doesn’t level definitively a technique or one other,” Harkey mentioned. “What our examine does reinforce is that pedestrians and bicyclists are at larger danger in low gentle situations.”
Harkey urged the committee members to concentrate on options identified to be efficient in combatting that downside.
These options embody infrastructure enhancements like crosswalk lighting, rectangular speedy flashing beacons and pedestrian hybrid beacons. Decrease velocity limits and different measures to scale back automobile speeds, akin to velocity security cameras and highway options that drive drivers to decelerate, might additionally play a key position.
