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Human Factors articles:
Driver Response Time to Four Hazard Types
Driver perception-response time is one of the most argued variables among experts in human factors, driver behaviour, and crash reconstruction. Although several studies have been conducted to study drivers’ perception and response to certain roadway hazards, some...
Reconstructing Night-time Visibility
Pedestrian fatalities account for approximately 15% of all motor vehicle accident related deaths, and more than half occur at night when visibility is reduced. So, when we as accident reconstructionists are asked to determine whether a typical driver could have...
Headlight Technologies & Accident Reconstruction
Have you ever driven down a roadway at night and looked into your rear-view mirror, only to be blasted by the super bright headlights of the vehicle behind you? If you have, you already know first-hand of one of the downsides of advanced headlight technology: having...
Left or Right? How to Pass Safely
When we need to get somewhere, there is nothing more frustrating than being stuck behind a slower car ahead on the highway! Luckily, the transportation engineers who designed our roads were annoyed by that as well, so they have given us some options to get...
The Evolution of Automotive Safety Systems
Automotive safety systems have evolved tremendously considering that the humble seatbelt wasn't even mandatory in new North American vehicles until 1968, 13 years after it was first made available as an option (see "The Seatbelt Turns 60" for more on the history of...
Lane Change Collisions and Blind Spot Assessment
Changing lanes can be one of the riskiest driving manoeuvres that a driver performs; lane change collisions account for about 4 to 10 percent of all automotive crashes. Research suggests that most involved drivers were unaware of the presence of the other vehicle. ...
The Amber Signal Conundrum
As you approach an intersection facing a green traffic signal, you sometimes find yourself in an awkward position when the traffic signal changes to amber, and you need to make a choice about whether you should firmly apply your brakes and stop, or continue through...
Why the 2-second following rule?
Imagine you are driving down a highway and the driver in the vehicle ahead suddenly slams on their brakes. Your vehicle should be able to decelerate about as rapidly if you also slam on your brakes. However, when it comes to responding to a road hazard, it takes some...
Walking the Walk
Imagine yourself walking along a sidewalk by yourself on a nice sunny day. Now imagine yourself jaywalking across a busy wet street during a rainstorm. In each of these two scenarios, you most likely pictured yourself moving at different speeds. Pedestrian speed is a...
Filling in the Gaps in Pedestrian Speed Research
Even though most pedestrians struck by vehicles are mid-block jaywalking, the vast majority of research only measures pedestrian speeds within controlled environments such as sidewalks or crosswalks. Picking up on this serious disparity, KEI engineers conducted a...
Driver Acceleration Behaviour Research
Even though most intersection crashes involve two-way stop controlled intersections, most research investigated vehicle acceleration profiles within controlled environments such as traffic signal controlled intersections. A prerequisite for the determination of crash...