Abstract
Throughout the countries of the European Union nearly 40,000 human
fatalities and 1.7 million related injures occur in vehicle accidents, resulting in a cost of 160
billion euros a year. As European statistics show, roughly 6,000 of these deaths are a result of
pedestrian collisions with motor vehicles, most occurring in urban areas.
As a result of this concerning situation, public bodies and vehicle manufacturers have been
working to improve this situation for some years. The EC Directive protocol and Euro NCAP
assessments both advise the simulating of pedestrian impacts at 40 km/h, with Euro NCAP
being the sole European organisation to provide a testing programme with the aim of
improving pedestrian protection. Although Euro NCAP has prompted manufacturers to
improve the occupant protection of their vehicles in the event of an accident, the incentives
for improved pedestrian protection do not seem to be evolving quite so quickly, with few
vehicles receiving three out of a maximum of four stars. Through the in-depth study carried
out in this document, new improvements to the procedures are proposed, to offer more
incentives to manufacturers to improve the pedestrian protection of their vehicles.
The EuroNCAP protocol and the EC Directive (Phase I and II) for pedestrian protection are
based on the work carried out by the EEVC WG17 in this field. The EC Directive´s First
Phase has been introduced in 2005, with the Second, more stringent stage in 2010. The
purpose is to encourage manufacturers to expand their vehicles´ pedestrian protection
capabilities through the advancement of the testing regulations. The comparison of these two
approaches and analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of the current procedures are
detailed in this paper.
Current testing procedures are an accurate representation of real life situations, but not an
exact mirror. For example the kinematics of the anatomical test-forms used in pedestrian
impact testing is difficult to exactly replicate. It is for this reason that Applus + IDIADA has
carried out an in-depth investigation to evaluate the influence of speed and front-end shape on
resulting injuries with the aim of verifying the representability of the current testing
procedures, including speeds, area of impact and impact angles. From the results of the
investigation, modifications and suggestions are proposed.
The updating of testing methodologies will assist manufacturers in the field of pedestrian
protection. For example, changes to procedures could be made to include the influence of
different vehicle types, for example Off-Roaders or MPV´s, and recommendations for new
vehicle structural design should be proposed such as the increased use of plastics and energy
absorbing materials in frontal surfaces, for example headlights and bumpers.
Keywords - Accident, Pedestrian, Velocity, Safety, Testing