Astraist wrote: Horse wrote:I only use dipped beam if I think there's a benefit, so that's not the trigger.
There's ample evidence to support the advantage in conspiciousness provided by such practice in all vehicle types and driving environments. If it works in Israel, surely it will work in the U.K.
Sadly, it's not that simple.
https://msac.org.nz/assets/Uploads/pdf/ ... port-w.pdf (by highly respected authors
) is a good summary of the situation.
3.2 What does ‘looked but failed to see’ actually mean?The term ‘looked but failed to see’ has come to be used to describe collisions (typically at junctions) in which drivers claim not to have seen an oncoming motorcycle that they have then collided with through violation of its forward path2. Despite its widespread use, the term does not adequately describe all the potential failures of perception or cognition by a driver who has been involved in such an accident with a motorcycle.
Figure 3-1 illustrates that there are at least three of these failures.
The first potential failure is that a driver simply does not look before emerging from a junction, either through negligence or deliberate risk taking. This type of collision clearly cannot be influenced by aids to motorcycle conspicuity, and is therefore outside of the scope of this review.
The second potential failure is that a driver has at least looked in the direction of oncoming traffic, but had failed to look adequately; examples of this could be looking for too short a time to allow coverage of all relevant stimuli, or failing to look in the places where motorcycles may be located. In this case, measures that increase the attention conspicuity (or cognitive conspicuity) of a motorcycle that is present in the scene may help detection (by helping the motorcycle to ‘grab attention’).
The third potential failure is that a driver looks in the direction of oncoming traffic, for an adequate amount of time and in the correct locations, but still fails to detect a motorcycle that is present. In this case the chance of a driver detecting an oncoming motorcycle may be improved by measures that aim to improve its visibility or search conspicuity (if the driver is looking directly at the motorcycle, or for the motorcycle, respectively)
3.The fourth failure is not technically a conspicuity issue as defined above, as it assumes that a driver has already detected the motorcycle. However it is potentially highly relevant to LBFTS crashes (see contributory factors data in DfT, 2010). Because of the
small size of motorcycles it is difficult for drivers to assess their approach speed and the time which is available for a driver to execute a manoeuvre crossing the motorcyclist’s path (see Horswill, Helman, Ardiles & Wann, 2005 for a discussion of the size-arrival
illusion and lack of ‘looming cues’ for smaller approaching objects and how these apply to motorcyclists approaching junctions). This may be a particular issue in night-time collisions (see Pai et al., 2009; Plainis et al., 2006) since bikes tend only to have a single
headlamp, which further reduces the information available to driver by which to judge their approach speed (see Gould et al., 2012).
3 Of course sometimes the lack of detection will be due to the line of sight between the driver and approaching
motorcycle being obstructed by roadside objects or other vehicles. Again this is outside of the scope of the
current review, and is probably best dealt with through the engineering of junctions to avoid such obscuration,
and possibly the training of motorcyclists to avoid such blind-spots (see US Motorcycle Safety Foundation,
1991) or use lane positioning to move through the driver’s field of view (see MacKillop, 2006 as cited in
Motorcycle Action Group, 2006; Palmer, 2008).
5.5 SummaryIn earlier years the focus of research was on fairly basic assessments of daytime headlamp use and of brightly coloured clothing. When considering the weight of evidence overall, both seem to be capable of improving conspicuity, when this is measured in terms of detection (under search and attention conspicuity conditions), and when measured in terms of a behavioural response. The majority of studies covered in this review support this conclusion. However there are limitations and caveats. In terms of lighting, although it appears that dedicated daytime lighting on motorcycles is effective in increasing conspicuity, this effect may be smaller when other vehicles have their lights on (although more research may be needed on this specific issue, especially in terms of understanding its impact on other accident types).
...
Although most studies reviewed show benefits of bright clothing, dark clothing may be better if the background is also brightly coloured. In line with the underlying mechanisms proposed, higher contrast with background surroundings to enable better visibility, search conspicuity, and attention conspicuity is what is needed. Given that environments may differ over even fairly small changes in time or location, there is not likely to be a one-size-fits-all solution, meaning that motorcyclists need to be aware of the limitations of whichever interventions they use. In terms of understanding what the literature review means for the NZ context, an understanding of the visual background typically present in NZ at crucial interaction points between motorcycles and cars will be required.
It ends . . .
Acknowledgements
Special thanks are due to Cris Burgess for reviewing an earlier draft of this report. During the period of time when reviewing the draft, Cris was riding his motorcycle to work and was struck from behind by a bus. Thankfully, Cris sustained only minor injuries in the collision. The irony of the fact that at the time of the collision he was wearing a bright orange high-visibility jacket, and riding a motorcycle with daytime running lights, is not lost on the authors.
Your 'standard' is how you drive alone, not how you drive during a test.