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The scenario looks like this: You are in a car and are stopped at an intersection, but cross traffic does not have to stop. Whether you drive straight through an intersection or turn around, you want to look over the side of the car and see a car approaching from one side, then pull out. Is that driver slowing down? The turn signal is on, but what is its purpose? See you stopping there? It’s all pretty much a mystery, since you can only see what’s ahead of the approaching car. Because the brake lights that give you more information are on the opposite side of the car.
It seems like you have time to stop and complete the maneuver, but do you want to risk a possible collision assuming the approaching vehicle is slowing down (so you have more time to act)? This is an almost daily occurrence for most American drivers, and many of them end up taking that risk and causing a new collision. Research suggests there may be an easy and quick solution to this vehicle roulette guessing game. That means brake lights are visible from the front and sides of new vehicles.
As the story goes, it’s not a totally crazy or unworkable idea. ZME Science points out. It can be difficult to discern if the nose is down, especially from a distance, because other vehicles are slowing down. Many modern vehicles boast body controls that almost completely obliterate their behavior compared to, say, the large land yachts of the 1970s. In other words, the most obvious way to determine what other vehicles are doing, if the vehicle is only visible from the front, is to utilize some kind of indicator on the front and sides of the vehicle to let other vehicle drivers and pedestrians know if you are slowing down. Again, such information is very important when crossing traffic, especially for pedestrians.
While this idea might lead to bright red lights being installed on the front and sides of the vehicle, which is illegal under the FMVSS and even illegal under many state laws regarding forward and side lighting, research by the University of Graz in Austria, Comenius University in Slovakia, and the Bonn Law Institute for Traffic Psychology in Germany suggests that these front brake lights should be green in color. It’s a logical idea, considering that a green light in front of you is automatically associated with a sign saying you can proceed, just like a standard traffic light. This study suggests that forward brake indicator lights, which do not include side brake lights, could reduce intersection crashes by 17% and reduce injuries from these types of crashes by 25%.
The study simulated potential real-world outcomes by recreating an actual crash. For each scenario, three different reaction times were tested between 0.5 and 1.5 seconds. The faster two of the three reaction times indicated that nearly 8% to 17% of the simulated accidents could have all been avoided. In almost 26% of these same accidents, the severity of injuries decreased because the average crash speed decreased from an initial maximum speed of nearly 28 mph to about 18 mph. Sixteen miles per hour may not seem like much, but for an average American car that weighs 4,400 pounds, it equates to a difference in kinetic energy of just over 44 percent.
we are skeptical of the conclusions drawn by ZME Science The authors suggest that it is easy to implement new lighting on modern CAN buses or zone communication vehicles and are optimistic about the speed with which NHTSA will implement such changes. Presumably, any changes would only apply to new vehicles going forward and would not necessarily be retroactively added to existing vehicles on U.S. roads. Older vehicles may simply not support additional lamp settings for various technical reasons.
Additionally, there is the challenge of legalizing the use of green front lights through NHTSA regulations, not to mention local lighting laws. NHTSA and FMVSS Section 108 only allow white or clear lenses or lights for forward lighting and white or amber lenses or lights for side and signal lighting. Auxiliary lighting such as daytime running lights, driving lights, and fog lights can also be white or amber. It is illegal to use any other color on the front or side of the vehicle.
Mercedes-Benz has said it’s OK in some states for SAE Level 3 prototype vehicles to turn on turquoise lights to indicate the vehicle is in true fully autonomous driving mode, but this isn’t strictly legal in other parts of the U.S. and is an exception. Introducing something like this as a supposedly necessary safety feature across the country would literally require approval from Congress, but it was only recently under the Biden administration that the regulations for true adaptive lighting, such as those provided overseas for years, were allowed as part of HR 3684 (also known as the Infrastructure Act of 2022).
This means that FMVSS has the final say. Considering that that same regulatory framework now makes it illegal to install LED replacement bulbs in headlight housings originally designed for HID, halogen, or incandescent bulbs, and that they have just been updated to accommodate high-tech adaptive lighting technology that has been available elsewhere in the world for years, there’s no need to hold your breath that your next car might have flashy new signal lights.
Photo courtesy of Volkswagen, MotorTrend staff
