The Consumer Council pointed out today (17th) that there are 9,508 to 10,943 accidents involving large vehicles in my country every year, with the death toll ranging from 366 to 405. Among them, there are about 2,000 left-right turning accidents related to blind spots and inner wheel discrepancies every year, with more than 2,000 casualties every year. The Consumer Council calls on the government to upgrade the assessment of high-risk large vehicles to a composite safety requirement of "image + active detection/warning" to maintain the safety of traffic users inside and outside the vehicle.
A few days ago, a man surnamed Zhou drove a bus to a stop at Jingzhong Street in Wenshan District, Taipei City. An old woman surnamed Xu got off the bus and walked around to the front of the bus to cross the road. She was hit by the bus and ran over and died on the spot. The police initially determined that the driver surnamed Zhou did not notice the woman surnamed Xu because he had a blind spot in his sight, which led to the fatal accident.
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The Consumer Foundation pointed out that the ex-wife of New Taipei City Councilor Zhou Shengkao was hit and run over by a turning bus on a zebra crossing while crossing the road in Banqiao District, New Taipei City on the morning of June 24 this year. She died in hospital; Zhou Jiazheng, an authoritative breast cancer doctor, was also run over by a turning bus while jogging across the street in Taipei City in July last year.
The Consumer Foundation stated that in recent years, the government has continued to promote driving vision assistance systems for large vehicles, and technologies such as side cameras, radar warnings, and 360-degree surround views have also been gradually introduced. However, the Consumer Council believes that what really needs to be examined is not just "whether the equipment is installed", but whether the minimum safety threshold of the current regulations is sufficient.
The Ministry of Transport has promoted a scientific research project on active warning and assistance systems for large vehicles since 2021, and eventually installed it on 800 large vehicles, including 231 trucks and 569 buses. The system integrates surround view display, blind spot warning, forward collision warning, lane departure warning and other functions.
The Consumer Foundation calls on the government to review the "three options" minimum safety threshold. For high-risk large vehicles, especially bus systems that carry a large number of passengers every day, priority should be given to evaluating the composite safety requirements that are upgraded to "image + active detection/warning".
In addition, the Consumer Council stated that the regulations should be revised, but if the installation before the revision was not safe enough or did not comply with the new regulations, they should be subsidized for installation to make people and vehicles safer. There should be a time limit for the subsidy and installation period, such as 6 months, 1 year, etc. If it exceeds the time limit, there will be no subsidies and the new law will be enforced and banned.
The Consumer Council believes that the next stage of the safety system for large vehicles should not just ask "whether it is installed", but should further ask "whether it can detect effectively", "whether it can proactively warn", "whether accidents have really been reduced", and whether the driver uses the safety assistance system correctly after it is installed and does not turn off the safety assistance system at will.
