Working Papers, Swedish National Road & Transport Research Institute (VTI)
No 2009:12:
Accident externality and vehicle size
Lina Jonsson ()
and Gunnar Lindberg ()
Abstract: Vehicle mass is a crucial factor for the distribution of
injuries between occupants in involved vehicles in a two-vehicle crash. A
larger vehicle mass protects the occupants in the vehicle while on the same
time inflicts a higher injury risk on the occupants in the collision
partner. This mass externality can be internalized to reach a situation
where the drivers choose vehicle mass based on the social optimum instead
of a private optimum that ignores the negative effects that a large vehicle
mass has on the injury risk in presumptive collision partners.
Using a
database including collision accidents in Sweden involving two passenger
cars during five years, the influence of vehicle mass on the injuries and
thereby the accident cost in both vehicles is explored. The database
contains information on road infrastructure, vehicle characteristics
including vehicle mass and characteristics of the occupants in the vehicles
including their injuries. To get a measure of the accident cost the Swedish
official economic valuation of slight injuries, severe injuries and
fatalities are applied.
In each accident the two involved vehicles are
divided into the lighter vehicle and the heavier vehicle and the effect of
weight is examined separately for the two groups. The accident cost that
falls on the lighter vehicle increases with the mass of the heavier vehicle
and decreases with own mass. Given that a vehicle is the heavier one in the
crash, neither the own mass nor the mass of the lighter vehicle
significantly affect the accident cost.
The expected external accident
cost is calculated and it is shown to increase rapidly with vehicle mass.
The paper discusses different solutions to internalize this external
accident cost and calculates a mass dependent multiplicative tax on the
insurance premium in a no-fault insurance system.
Keywords: Accident Externality; Accident Cost; Vehicle Mass; Traffic Safety; (follow links to similar papers)
JEL-Codes: D62; H23; I18; R41; (follow links to similar papers)
17 pages, October 26, 2009
Presented at the European Transport Conference, Leiden 2009.
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