- A new study predicts that green front brake lights would prevent many car accidents
- Using them would require changing U.S. law
A new study suggests that we’d all be safer if cars had brake lights in the front as well as the back. To avoid confusion, the study’s authors suggest that front brake lights be green instead of red.
A joint project of Graz University of Austria, Comenius University of Slovakia, and the Bonn Institute for Legal and Traffic Psychology of Germany found that observers watching the front of a car couldn’t reliably determine whether it was braking. Modern cars have such good body control that many no longer visibly dip as they slow.
Researchers fitted 3,072 vehicles with green front brake lights for six to eleven months. They interviewed drivers before and after using the lights, as well as pedestrians who encountered them. “The vast majority reported positive experiences,” and more than 75% said they would support the idea of wide-scale use of the lights.
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Researchers also studied data from 210 Austrian crashes and used computer simulations to predict how drivers’ reaction times might have improved had the vehicles had front brake lights. They predict that “between 7.5% and 17.0% of the accidents” could have been prevented, with the remainder made less severe, by front brake lights.
The idea is purely theoretical for now – no country has required front brake lights.
Adding them would require changing U.S. law. Motor Trend notes that current American laws “only allow for white or clear lenses or lighting for forward illumination and white or amber color or lighting for side and signal lighting. Auxiliary lighting, like daytime running, driving lights, or fog lights, can be white or amber in color, too. Any other color is not legal on the front or sides of a vehicle.”