Wheels: The Rich Drive Differently, a Study Suggests

Wheels: Ford F-250 Replaces Cadillac Escalade as Thieves’ Favorite Target, Study Says

Sam Varnhagen/Ford Motor, via Associated Press Ford F-250 pickups, like this 2011 model, have supplanted the Cadillac Escalade as the vehicle most likely to be stolen.

Being toppled from the number one spot on a list isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Case in point: The Ford F-250 has replaced the Cadillac Escalade as the vehicle most likely to be stolen, according to the Highway Loss Data Institute.

“This list gives consumers an indication of the relative risk of their vehicle being stolen,” said Matt Moore, vice president of the organization.

The Highway Loss Data Institute is an affiliate of the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety and both are financd by the insurance industry. This is the first year since 2003 that an Escalade variant has not been the vehicle with the highest theft claim rates. The Escalade is now sixth on the list. Possible reasons for the drop include new and improved antitheft technology as well as declining Escalade sales, according to a statement from the Highway Loss Data Institute.

According to National Highway Safety Administration statistics, a motor vehicle is stolen every 44 seconds. The agency also reported that only 52 percent of those vehicles are recovered and nearly half of those thefts resulted from driver error, like leaving keys in the ignition.

The report lists vehicles from the 2010-12 model years, and the top 10 vehicles on the list are all large pickups and S.U.V.’s. The Ford F-250 4-wheel-drive crew cab has a claim frequency of seven per 1,000 insured vehicle years. That means that for every 1,000 insured F-250 crew cabs on the road, seven – nearly six times the average for all passenger vehicles – are stolen each year. The average for all passenger vehicles is 1.2. The high number for trucks and S.U.V.’s could be partly explained by the fact that many pickup truck theft claims are filed because equipment has been stolen from the bed of the truck and the data does not differentiate between that and the theft of the entire vehicle.

Following the F-250 as vehicles most likely to be stolen are the Chevrolet Silverado 1500 crew cab (6.7 per 1,000), the Chevrolet Avalanche 1500 (6.1), the GMC Sierra 1500 crew cab (6.0), the Ford F-350 crew 4WD (5.6), the Cadillac Escalade 4WD (5.5), the Chevrolet Suburban 1500 (5.4), the GMC Sierra 1500 extended cab (4.7), the GMC Yukon (4.5) and the Chevrolet Tahoe (4.4).

Conversely, the vehicles least likely to be stolen are small and midsize vehicles. The vehicles on the bottom of the list, which is good in this case, are all tied with a claim frequency of 0.4 per 1,000, which means that fewer than 1 per 1,000 are being stolen annually. They are the Dodge Journey 4WD, the Volkswagen Tiguan 4WD, the Audi A4 sedan, the Acura RDX, the Toyota Matrix, the Lexus HS 250 hybrid 4-door, the Honda CR-V and the Hyundai Tucson 4WD.

This post has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: July 10, 2013

An earlier version of this post misstated the role of driver error in causing theft. Thefts resulted from driver error, not in driver error.

Study Details Injuries to Pedestrians and Cyclists in New York City

Taxicabs pose a disproportionate threat to cyclists, who often compete for the same sliver of curbside roadway.

And as New Yorkers brace for contact, an unexpected factor may protect against serious injury: being overweight.

These are among the findings of a medical study of injured pedestrians and cyclists in the city, conducted by a team of trauma surgeons, emergency physicians and researchers from NYU Langone Medical Center.

From December 2008 to June 2011, the group studied more than 1,400 pedestrians and cyclists treated at Bellevue Hospital Center after collisions. Most occurred in Manhattan and western Brooklyn, stretching along the busiest corridors of a city where street safety and traffic engineering have been trumpeted as defining legacies of Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s tenure.

The study could help inform transportation planning in the city, as administration officials — with whom the authors corresponded throughout their research — evaluate how best to engineer the streets to reduce the types of injuries sustained in these cases.

Many of the results, published in the Journal of Trauma and Acute Care Surgery, reinforce common intuitions about the city’s traffic flow. Others seem to defy conventional wisdom. But all combine to sketch a portrait of a New York where personal habits and choices — like listening to music, wearing a bicycle helmet or hailing a cab — can change a life.

“Undoubtedly, behaviors can be improved across the three major parties: pedestrians, cyclists and drivers,” Dr. Spiros G. Frangos, the study’s senior author, said in a telephone interview. “The bottom line is: What else can we do as we go down this path of pushing a bicycling agenda, which should be good for the city?”

While some studies, including a 2010 city Transportation Department report on pedestrian safety, have focused on the frequency, location and timing of accidents, the Bellevue report has focused on the patients. Data was obtained through victim self-reporting shortly after a collision, combined with medical records and accounts from witnesses and first responders.

Perhaps the most surprising finding was that excessive weight may prove a boon for pedestrians in a collision. Victims with an above-normal body mass index were found to have less severe injuries than their counterparts. “It is not implausible that a greater proportion of torso and extremity fat may protect against injury,” the report said.

Dr. Frangos noted that generally, overweight and obese patients fared worse once admitted to a hospital, but that perhaps “that extra layer offers some protection at the time of the injury.”

In some cases, it seemed, the awareness level of the pedestrian or cyclist may have been compromised. Among patients 18 and older, 15 percent of pedestrians and 11 percent of cyclists were found to have consumed alcohol before the collision — a figure that stood out to transportation officials whose focus is often reckless driving.

“Obviously it’s better for people to be walking than driving,” Matthew Roe, the senior planning and research manager for the Transportation Department’s Division of Traffic and Planning, said of the city’s intoxicated travelers. “But it’s something probably worth thinking about in the future.”

About 8 percent of both pedestrians and cyclists said they were injured while using an electronic device, including a cellphone or music player. For victims ages 7 to 17, the numbers climbed to more than 10 percent of pedestrians and nearly 30 percent of cyclists.

In a finding unlikely to surprise the city’s cyclists, about 40 percent of injured riders were hit by taxis, compared with 25 percent of the pedestrians. More than 80 percent of cyclists rode with traffic flow, but less than a third wore helmets.

Wheels Blog: Drivers Are Still Distracted, Study Finds

At any moment during daylight hours, according to a new government study, 660,000 Americans are using cellphones or other electronic devices while driving.

The study, by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, was released Friday. It revealed that, after years of coverage and campaigns, most drivers “know that texting while driving is a dangerous behavior.” But many see “distracted driving as risky when other drivers do it, but do not recognize how their own driving deteriorates.”

Almost half of those surveyed, 48 percent, said they answered their cellphones while driving at least some of the time, and 58 percent said they continued to drive after picking up the phone. Fourteen percent said they still text or e-mail while driving.

Last year’s survey said that 40 percent made or accepted phone calls while driving and about 10 percent would read or send e-mails or text messages.

Most drivers, the survey said, support a ban on cellphone use and texting while driving, and 76 percent said they would likely say something if they were a passenger alongside a driver who was sending a text.

Wheels: No Silver Bullet for Reaching Fuel and Emissions Goals, Study Says

Rebecca Cook/Reuters “Limited range and long recharge times are likely to limit the use of all-electric vehicles mainly to local driving,” a report from the National Research Council says.

The United States could possibly achieve the goal of an 80 percent reduction in oil use and greenhouse gas emissions from cars and small trucks by 2050, but it will not be easy, a National Research Council report said.

Simply making conventional vehicles more fuel efficient cannot by itself bring the target within reach, the report, which was released on Monday, says. Average fleet fuel economy “would have to exceed 180 m.p.g.,” which “is extremely unlikely, at least with current identifiable technologies,” says the report from the council, which is an arm of the National Academy of Sciences.

The committee preparing the report focused on vehicles running on electricity, biofuels or hydrogen, as well as conventional cars and trucks with high-efficiency gasoline technology. The committee concluded that the wide deployment of at least two of them would have to be combined with strong federal policy if the goal were to be met. Natural gas vehicles were given credit for their ability to reduce oil consumption, but were faulted for their limited impact on carbon dioxide emissions.

“There’s no single pathway, no silver bullet adequate by itself to meet the goals,” Douglas M. Chapin, chairman of the committee, said in a conference call. “The goals are difficult but not impossible to meet if supported by strong national policies.” He added that even partial success “will yield valuable benefits.”

Government initiatives, the report says, could include fuel economy standards tougher than the federal goal for 2025 of 54.5 miles per gallon; support for research and development; rebate incentives for buyers of efficient cars and surcharges for inefficient purchases; and campaigns to familiarize consumers with the new options.

The report is somewhat pessimistic about electric car progress. Although battery costs may drop, the report said that “limited range and long recharge times are likely to limit the use of all-electric vehicles mainly to local driving.” Advanced battery technologies are being developed, it said, “but all face serious technical challenges.”

John M. German, senior fellow at the International Council on Clean Transportation, said in the conference call that the committee projected that the energy density of lithium-ion batteries could be two to three times greater than it was today and that the cost of a battery pack a quarter as much.

By 2050, vehicles with 100-mile-range batteries and hydrogen power could become cheaper than cars and trucks with advanced internal-combustion drivetrains, the report says. But there are other challenges. Fuel-cell vehicles avoid the range and recharging limitations of electric vehicles, the report says, but building a network of expensive hydrogen stations will be “difficult and expensive.”

Cellulosic biofuels show some promise and could lead to big reductions in oil use and greenhouse gas emissions, but “achievable production levels are uncertain,” the report says. It also envisions a possible future for biofuels that can be refined into a product that is chemically similar to gasoline.

The report also looked beyond the tailpipe. “To really impact automotive greenhouse emissions, you have to control energy sector emissions, starting with the oil and gas sector today and from power plants as electric cars enter the market,” John DeCicco, a committee member and research professor at the University of Michigan Energy Institute, said in a telephone interview.