Mike Rutherford's column

23rd May 2007

	What causes more injury to a pedestrian who leaps into the road - a double-decker bus or a Suzuki Jimny 4x4?

I'm not prepared to make the mistake 4x4 haters do and lecture you on what vehicles you should and shouldn't be using. It's a free country... I think. So if it's legal to drive or ride in it or on it, be my guest. But I don't mind admitting that I now think of myself as a proudly unfashionable car nut who's wise enough to be unimpressed with meaningless 0-60mph figures and top speeds. Yet I'm becoming increasingly passionate about how safe different modes of transport are.

If it's a high-performance or race car for private circuits, fair enough. The faster the better, even if that leads to a driver painfully sticking his vehicle into a tyre barrier or wall. But who cares if a motor designed and used only on public roads is capable of propelling itself from 0-60mph in three seconds? It's about as relevant and impressive as the ability of that 1,000-watt sound system in your front room to perforate your eardrums.

Equally, it's irrelevant and unimpressive that your car can, on paper, do 160mph. Unless you're really pushing your luck (something I can't discourage strongly enough), it's unlikely you'll ever have the opportunity to find enough tarmac, nerve or talent to select top gear, floor the accelerator, then leave your foot in there for as long as it takes. A 160mph top speed on a road car! About as superfluous as a TV satellite system that receives hundreds of channels in languages you can't understand. Again, the decision has to be yours, but instead of obsessions with 0-60mph and maximum speeds, wouldn't your time be better spent thinking about crash avoidance and protection?

I'm not only talking about paying attention to crash test results from official and semi-official agencies. They tell only a tiny part of the story. Why is there so little knowledge on how well or badly cars stand up to the sort of rear end shunts I frequently see? Am I right to conclude that passengers sitting on the back seats of small city cars and superminis are terribly vulnerable to death or injury during rear end collisions? Passengers on the final row of people carriers are on dangerous upholstery, too, aren't they?

Isn't the middle seat in the second row of a large estate or 4x4 the most secure place for your loved one to be? And surely the most deadly seat on the road by some margin is astride a two-wheeled machine, no? Does that overpriced electric Reva G-Wiz that performed so abysmally in a recent crash test offer much more protection than a motorbike? I also think the enormous criticism 4x4s get for the potential damage they can do is fair enough... as long as buses, coaches, trams, lorries, vans, black taxis, JCBs and all other vehicles on the road have their lethal tendencies highlighted, too.

What causes more injury to a pedestrian who leaps into the road - a double-decker bus or a Suzuki Jimny 4x4? What would you rather be rear-ended by - a Land Rover Freelander 4x4 or a 40-tonne articulated lorry? If you must have a head-on impact, wouldn't you prefer to go nose-to-nose with a little Daihatsu Terios 4x4 than a 56-seater coach? How easy is it for a tram driver to do an emergency swerve in an effort to avoid an accident? Not very. But the person in control of a small, sporty, agile 4x4 such as a Nissan X-Trail doesn't have the same manoeuvrability problems.

Because it's so important, never forget this: avoid crashes in the first place, and it really doesn't matter what you drive or ride.

Agree or disagree? Comment here

Mike Rutherford writes for the Times, Daily Telegraph and Independent, presents ITV's Pulling Power and is founder member of the Motorists' Association

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