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The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration was started in 1970 by Richard Nixon’s Administration. They were tasked with tracking statistics, researching new safety technology, and making recommendations for policy around vehicle safety. In 1969 the US had 5.04 fatalities per 100 million miles driven and since the NHTSA started that number has steadily declined to around 1.15 fatalities per 100 million miles driven on average over the last decade and a half. Since the pandemic, the deaths in relation to miles driven is up 20% to 1.34 fatalities per 100 million miles driven. This is much closer to the numbers from 2005-2007 before all of this great driver alert and safety technology was even thought up. Do you remember 2005? George W Bush was in his second term as President, Aaron Rodgers was the second pick in the NFL draft and Hurricane Katrina rocked the Gulf Coast. Now, do you remember your company trucks in 2005 and their long list of safety features? They included things like frontal-only airbags, and antilock brakes at a cost about $25,000. According to statistics, your team is just about as likely to have a fatal accident in a vehicle produced today with a list of safety features that takes up half of the windows sticker at a cost of over $10,000 more.
I am having a hard time believing the numbers of miles driven in the last couple of years and in 2020 especially. The NHTSA reports that in 2019, pre-pandemic, the average us citizen drove 9,895 miles. In 2020 when the whole world shut down and everyone stayed home for months the average went down about 10% to 8,761 miles and in 2021 with record unemployment and lockdowns still affecting much of the country, we bounced right back to 9,702 miles per year per person on average. These are the numbers I am having trouble believing. Based on nothing by my personal experience, roadways in 2020 after lockdowns were announced were almost completely vacant and remained that way for most of the year. If I were to guess, I would think the decrease in miles driven would be much more drastic in 2020, maybe 20%-30% and the fact that people were working from home and the record unemployment, I would expect the number of miles driven to be down in 2021 as well, at least 10%. That is not what the statistics show.
Even with some numbers not making sense to me, the trend is clear that the number of fatal crashes is on the rise. I have not seen any convincing argument as to why. Assuming that the vehicles are getting safer each year this rise seems even more alarming as it stands to reason that the culprit of the issue is the human control. Does it have to do with the record-high drug and alcohol use? Record low mental health? Or something else? I would be interested to see what your thoughts are. Please leave them in the comments below.
All that being said, What is my advice to someone who operates a company vehicle or a fleet of company vehicles in this time of increased risk? CYA, cover your assets. Your biggest assets are your employees or you if you are the driver. We recommend providing defensive driving training to anyone who operates your vehicles, also we have found making a no cell phone policy while driving with NO EXCEPTIONS cuts down on accidents drastically. Most vehicles come with a very robust airbag and safety feature set but most do not have a dashcam or GPS. These are the 2 items we recommend on every company vehicle. A forward and driver-facing dashcam not only protects you and your driver from fraudulent claims of fault in the case of an accident, but we have found that people tend to drive better when there is a dashcam present. GPS tracking is available from several vendors and it is mostly to monitor speed, harsh braking and acceleration, and location of the vehicle in the case of a crash or theft. This again not only helps after an accident to prove speed and fault but acts as a deterant for bad driving. Nothing will make your fleet 100% safe and it is mostly the responsibility of the person driving the vehicle to operate it in an appropriate manner. If you know one of your employees drives recklessly take immediate action. Vehicle accidents have shut down many businesses. Driving a 10,000lb machine needs to be treated with the respect it deserves and I recommend not having anyone operate your vehicles that does not agree 100% of the time.
Getting off of the NHTSA and safety, Jim Farley the CEO of Ford has started to say the quiet parts out loud. We have been predicting this transition coming for years and Ford’s CEO came right out and said that he believes there will be a consolidation of dealerships in the transition to EVs. This consolidation we believe will completely change the way Americans buy vehicles and how “dealerships” operate. I am not even sure that when this is over they will still be called dealerships and not service centers. Ford, along with many other manufacturers, seems to want to move away from inventory on the ground at dealerships and customers being able to go home with a new vehicle the day they start shopping. Manufacturers are looking to decrease overhead internal costs by making consumers order the vehicle they want and then wait for it to be produced and delivered. Keep in mind that this process usually takes several months and is a big change from instant buying ability. We have been coordinating sales this way for many years for our customers knowing that the change was coming. Please let us know if you have any questions on how to access your fleet and plan vehicle orders to be available when you will need them. The days of going to a dealership and grabbing a new work truck for your new hire will be a thing of the past soon and some companies will be sitting on their hands waiting for equipment to be built at the factory. Get ahead of the obstacles coming down the road before they becoming a major problem.
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