The Hidden Costs Of Golf Cart Mobility
May 27th, 2010
As a blogger for Insurance School Florida I see Low Speed Vehicles all over retirement communities in the state . LSVs include golf carts and mini-trucks . In retirement-communities it makes sense to have golf carts to transport you to your neighbor’s place, the clubhouse or mail-box . These vehicles use little electricity and are eco-friendly . However, these vehicles are now permitted outside their communities on public streets (usually under 35 MPH streets ). This result is they are now crashing into two-ton vehicles .
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A insurance safety group wants LSVs banned fromd public roads. They argue that these golf-carts are ignoring 40 years of highway safety laws that have been in place to protect drivers . Carts do not have airbags, some don’t have turning signals , and those in the cart don’t even have to wear a protective-helmet like a child on a bicycle must do .
This makes no sense . We created all these laws for decades to make sure that lives are saved and then they are chucked out the window because it’s convenient . Just imagine if Toyota created a car and said that they weren’t going to run any crash-test , or put in any safety devices in their cars ? We’d destroy that plan right away .
Little impact crashes that would normally have had minor injuries in a regular car , become major injuries for those in an LSV. That means that the medical bills for a claim would increase dramatically . It could only result in higher premiums that would impact everyone .
The Smart Car is the smallest crash-worthy vehicle on out there . Crash-tests between Smart Cars and mini-trucks reveal that there is no comparison. The mini-trucks are unsafe in serious accidents .
The trend for LSVs continues to be opening them to more and more streets . I’m not against them in communities, but allowing on streets to shopping centers just is not safety smart or good for insurance rates .
You state “This result is they are now crashing into two-ton vehicles .” There is no proof of this and in the NYTimes coverage of the story, officials at the IIHS could not provide any statistics to back this claim either. In fact the only study I am aware of that looked at LSV usage in a California city, where LSVs are being used extensively on public roads, indicated that if anything the vehicles had a “traffic calming” effect.
In addition, an LSV has to have turn signals to be certified by the government as an LSV. If you see a vehicle on public roads without these turn signals then it is not a LSV. Furthermore, Tomberlin, a recent entrant into the LSV market, now has airbags based on designs from the aircraft industry in some of their vehicles.
Instead of advocating banning these vehicles perhaps you should work towards incorporating them more effectively into the overall transportation scheme. For a segment of the market they can replace a second fully-functioning vehicle, which would seem to be a win for the insurance industry, as these are less costly vehicles to repair and replace.