Car bonnets becoming half centimetre higher every year, driving road safety fears – study

The bonnet height of new cars in Europe is increasing by half a centimetre a year, on average, driven by the growth in SUV sales, new research finds. The trend is part of the recent phenomenon of ‘carspreading’ where supersized SUVs crowd out space in towns and cities and are more dangerous in a crash. In tests conducted for the report by T&E, drivers in the highest fronted vehicles could not see children as old as nine standing in front.

New car bonnets were 83.8 cm high, on average, in 2024 – up from 76.9 cm in 2010, according to the report which covers the EU, the UK and Norway and is the first to analyse bonnet heights at European level. The rise coincides with the steady increase of SUV sales from 12% of the European market in 2010 to 56% last year. European and national laws do not limit bonnet height.

Click here for data for EU countries, the UK and Norway.

In crashes, high-fronted cars typically strike adult pedestrians above the centre of gravity, often first hitting vital organs. The higher the vehicle front the more likely a person will be knocked under the car, rather than pushed to the side, at speeds of up to 50 km/h. One study, based on crashes involving 300,000 road users in Belgium, suggests that a 10 cm increase in bonnet height (from 80 cm to 90 cm) raises the risk of death by 27% for pedestrians, cyclists and other vulnerable road users.

High bonnets also reduce drivers’ vision of other road users. Tests commissioned by T&E find a driver of the highest fronted model on EU and UK roads, the Ram TRX, is unable to see children aged up to nine standing directly in front. A Land Rover Defender driver cannot see children aged up to four and a half.

James Nix, vehicles policy manager at T&E, said: “Higher bonnets are a danger to pedestrians, cyclists and people in regular cars. It’s impossible to see children standing in front of some of the highest fronts. The growing trend towards SUVs means this problem will only get worse unless we set limits.”

More than 30 civil society organisations have called on the EU to cap bonnet height by 2035 as part of a reform package to limit ever-expanding car dimensions. For bonnets, the study recommends a maximum height of 85 cm for further study. The long lead time to 2035 would help minimise disruption to existing production and designs.

T&E and the Clean Cities Campaign said national and city authorities should also make taxes and parking charges fairer by linking them to the weight and size of vehicles. Across most of Europe, weight is the best available proxy until law-makers make size data more accessible.

Barbara Stoll, Senior Director of Clean Cities Campaign, said: “A child is killed every day on our roads, yet cars are being made so large that children are invisible from the driver’s seat. How is that acceptable? Thankfully, more and more city leaders are pushing back against carspreading, standing up for what citizens actually want - safe, green streets without monster vehicles. Cities must go further and faster to restrict oversized SUVs, reclaim public space, and put safety and people first.”

Notes to editors:

• Click here for royalty-free photos of the ‘carspreading’ trend.

• Running in parallel to bonnet height rise, the width of new cars is also increasing by 0.5 cm a year, as shown by T&E’s 2024 study.

• Paris and Lyon in France, and Aachen in Germany, are among the cities that have linked parking charges to car weight or size.