114
Paper No. 01- 2195
Pedestrian Visibility Under Automobile
Low-Beam Headlight Illumination
With and Without Headlight Covers
Thomas Schnell, Fuat Aktan, Daniel V. McGehee, Mike Dvorak, Jill Hunt,
Abimael Reyes, and Deanna Sorak
Pedestrians and bicyclists are the most vulnerable of all participants in
traffic. Their safety at night should be a priority for headlamp designers,
rule-making agencies, and consumers alike. A disturbing trend—the use
of very dark aftermarket headlamp covers on vehicle headlamps—is
emerging. This trend is observed primarily in sports cars owned by young
drivers. These dark headlamp covers, often referred to as blackouts, serve
no real purpose other than that of supposedly enhancing vehicle appear-
ance. For a driver using such headlamp covers at night, it may appear as
though the overall visibility is not much affected. However, this perception
is misleading and wrong, as will be clearly demonstrated. The objective
was to quantify the detrimental effects dark headlamp covers have on
pedestrian visibility. To do so, detection distances were obtained in the
field using 15 observers who were approaching stationary pedestrian
mockups. The independent variables were pedestrian size (child, adult),
diffuse clothing reflectance (dark, light), and illumination (with and
without headlamp covers). Clothing reflectance turned out to have the
strongest effect on the detection distance, closely followed by the fac-
tor of illumination. The conclusions that can be drawn from the work pre-
sented are simple. Nighttime pedestrians should not wear dark clothing,
instead they should wear white or reflective clothing, and motorists should
not drive with dark headlamp covers at night.
Automobile headlamp requirements are governed by the Federal
Motor Vehicle Safety Standard (FMVSS) 108 (1). This standard
regulates the required luminous output of headlamps at specified test
points to ensure adequate visibility at night. A disturbing trend—the
use of very dark aftermarket headlamp covers on vehicle headlamps—
is emerging. This trend is primarily observed in sports cars owned by
young drivers. The dark headlamp covers serve no real purpose other
than that of a supposed enhancement of vehicle appearance. Most
manufacturers of such aftermarket headlamp covers have printed
disclaimers (in very small print at the bottom of the installation
instructions) warning users that these headlamp covers are unsafe
for use on public roads at night. For a driver using such headlamp
covers at night, it may appear as though the overall visibility is not
much affected. That perception is misleading and wrong, as typical
dark headlamp covers remove up to 88 percent of the light pro-
T. Schnell, Operator Performance Laboratory, Department of Industrial Engi-
neering, 4135 Seamans Center, University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa 52242-2527.
F. Aktan, Operator Performance Laboratory, University of Iowa, 234 Engineering
Research Facility, Iowa City, Iowa 52242-2527. D. V. McGehee, Public Policy
Center, 227 South Quadrangle, University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa 52242-2527.
M. Dvorak, J. Hunt, A. Reyes, and D. Sorak, Department of Industrial Engineering,
University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa 52242-1527.
■ Transportation Research Record 1773
duced by the headlamps. Unfortunately, there appears to be no fed-
eral law explicitly banning the use of these covers. Because they
remove such a large percentage of the light produced by the head-
lights, however, it is very likely that in most cases, the FMVSS
would be violated when the covers are in place. It appears that explicit
rulemaking may be needed to curb the use of these dangerous dark
aftermarket headlight covers. Pedestrians and bicyclists are the most
vulnerable of all participants in traffic. Their safety at night should
be a priority for headlamp designers, rule-making agencies, and con-
sumers alike.
Our hypothesis was that dark headlight covers [transmittance
(T ) = 0.12] significantly reduce the nighttime detection distance of
pedestrians, and that the use of such covers may prevent drivers
from seeing pedestrians in time to avoid a collision, especially at
highway speeds.
REVIEW OF THE TECHNICAL LITERATURE
In the United States during 1995, there were about 84,000 pedestrian
injuries and 5,585 pedestrian fatalities (2), for an overall ratio of
15.0 injured pedestrians for every fatality. This ratio varied sub-
stantially as a function of posted speed limits, from 57.1 injuries per
fatality on roadways with posted limits of 40 km/h (25 mph) or less
to just 0.3 injuries per fatality for posted speed limits of 100 km/h
(rounded, 60 mph) or higher (3).
Roper conducted a nighttime detection distance experiment to
assess the effects of tinted windshields on detection distance (4 ).
Tinted windshields with a transmittance T = 0.73 resulted in a loss
of detection distance of about 5 percent. Baltes (5) stressed the
importance of pedestrian safety by citing pedestrian crash data from
NHTSA (2) and by compiling similar data for the state of Florida.
Baltes stated that 47.1 percent of all crashes involving pedestrians
occur after 4:00 p.m. Pedestrian boys around the age of 5 were found
to be at the highest risk of being involved in a traffic crash (Figure 1a).
Lord et al. (6 ) reported that close to 20 percent of fatalities in road
crashes in the United States are pedestrian fatalities. Turner et al. (7)
described the visibility benefits of ultraviolet (UV) headlamp tech-
nology from Sweden. These UV headlamps emit invisible UV radi-
ation in the spectral range of 320 to 380 nm. This forward emitted
UV radiation is intended to react with special fluorescent pigments
present in specially designed pavement markings, sheeting materi-
als, or some laundered garments. UV headlamps may have some
merit in enhancing pedestrian visibility without increasing glare to
oncoming traffic. According to Leibowitz and Owens (8), more than