SUVs and huge utes have become the most popular vehicles in Australia.
Of the 1,220,607 new vehicles sold in 2024, most were SUVs, with about 57% market share. Light commercial vehicles – which includes utes – accounted for about 22% of sales.
Large cars accounted for nine of the top 10 most purchased vehicles of the year. The trend is a remarkable flip from Australians’ vehicle preferences over the past decade, with the small cars and family sedans dominating the top 10 list in 2014.
Hospitalisations each year from serious injuries caused by road incidents increased between 2012 and 2021 by 16.1%.
Road deaths have increased by almost 19%. The 1,300 road deaths in 2024 capped off a four-year period of surging fatalities, marking a trend not recorded since the 1960s, before seatbelts were compulsory.
Driver and passenger deaths slightly decreased on the previous year but roads became far more deadly for other users. Pedestrian deaths rose by 7.1%, cyclist deaths jumped 11.8% and motorcyclist deaths increased by 10.3%.
Senior road academics say there is one key trend flying in the face of efforts to improve road safety: car bloat.
The study of road trauma broadly focuses on two factors; changes in driver behaviour and exposure – in other words, how much driving is occurring.
“If you’re driving more dangerous cars more often, you have to expect more trauma,” Prof Stuart Newstead, the director of Monash University’s Accident Research Centre, said.
In the 2023-24 financial year, Australians drove just shy of 260bn (billion, or a thousand million) kilometres, up from about 245bn kilometres in 2013-14.
On the other side of the equation, the risk profile of driving has also worsened, in large part driven by vehicle choice, Newstead said.
For decades, as advancements in car technology made vehicles safer, the benefits were shared for all road users. “But vehicle choice in recent years has been counterproductive, it’s offsetting all those safety gains,” Newstead said.
While larger vehicles boast decent safety ratings and can better protect their occupants in many situations, they are broadly less safe – for society as well as their drivers and passengers – in a handful of collision scenarios, as well as for a number of behavioural reasons.
For each fatal crash that occupants of SUVs and pickup trucks avoid, at least 4.3 additional fatal crashes involving other road users occur, a 2004 University of California San Diego study found.
A key benefit in the eyes of consumers is how sturdy larger cars are and the added safety and comfort they can provide, says Assoc Prof Paul Roberts, the deputy director of the Western Australian Centre for Road Safety Research at the University of Western Australia.
“People driving these vehicles are more likely to be speeding because it feels like they go smoother over the road at higher speeds compared with smaller cars. It’s easy to feel like you’re not speeding at all,” Roberts said. “These vehicles are a bad idea on urban roads.”
Roberts said industry research has shown that driving 65km/h where a 60km/h speed limit is designated doubles the risk of a collision that will lead to an injury.
Studies have also found SUV drivers are more likely to drive with one hand instead of two hands on the top half of the steering wheel – meaning they’re not observing the recommended “10 and 2” fashion – due to a lower level of perceived risk.
“Research has absolutely found that people who drive these much larger vehicles drove very differently because they think they were invincible,” Newstead said.
Speed – and their proclivity to be driven faster – and overall height make larger vehicles far more likely to kill or cause serious injury when hitting pedestrians, cyclists, motorbikes and smaller cars.
In head-on collisions with pedestrians, cyclists and motorbikes, the front bumper and bonnet of these larger vehicles – which are higher off the ground – typically hit more vulnerable body parts.
Not only does this mean larger vehicles are more likely to collide with a pedestrian’s head or chest – and do so at a higher speed – it is more likely to force them under the car.
A study by the University of Hawaii of US data found that a 10cm increase in front-end height causes a 22% increase in pedestrian fatality risk, while another found that children involved in a fatal crash are eight times more likely to have been struck by an SUV than a standard car.
Taller cars impede visibility for their drivers as well as other road users.
In Australia, a vehicle’s Ancap score is calculated by several safety factors, including vulnerable road user (such as pedestrians) protection, as well as how drivers and occupants fare.
However, Newstead identifies two major shortcomings of Australia’s system –
Firstly, the different body parts of that test which dummies are thrown at align with the lower-off-the-ground cars, with the lower leg form coming up against the leading edge of the bonnet and head against the windscreen – which is not how pedestrians align with SUVs.
Additionally, the Ancap score is an overall one, whereby a poor result in pedestrian protection can be obscured by very good driver and occupant protection and safety assistance technology, which can boost the final rating.
In jurisdictions in Europe and Japan, a minimum safety score for pedestrian protection is required for a vehicle to be sold in market. No such minimums exist in Australia.