Tailgaters are the UK’s most irritating road users and more needs to be done to tackle the menace of ‘close following’ according to a new campaign, launched today to improve the standard of driving.

The habit of driving too close to the car in front was voted as the most irritating behaviour of other drivers by 36 per cent of road users in an AA/Populus survey of over 14,500 AA members, conducted to launch the Autocar/AA Drive Better Campaign.

And not only is tailgating extremely annoying, it’s also very dangerous.

Edmund King, AA president reveals that: “Survey respondents were spot on to highlight their irritation with tailgaters. Data reveals that leaving pure human error aside tailgaters fall just behind ‘loss of control’ as the major cause of crashes. It’s a problem not only on motorways but also on dual carriageways, country lanes and in road works. Some tailgate to bully drivers out of the way, others because they just don’t think of the potentially tragic consequences of their actions.”

However, the dangers of tailgating have been lost in the war on speed, which has seen a much greater emphasis placed on catching speeding drivers than teaching better, safer driving techniques. And with more Brits taking a staycation this summer, the roads are going to be busier than ever with more accidents, many of which will be caused by the dreaded tailgater.

The AA says that ‘detailed analysis of police accident causation figures has shown that close following is a particular problem, contributing to 16 per cent of motorway accidents.’ However, the AA says that it’s difficult to judge the scale of close following accidents on lesser roads, ‘mainly because many more of the collisions will not involve injury and therefore not be recorded in studies.’

It’s clear, then, that tailgating is one of the most serious aspects of the poor driving evident on the UK’s roads. The problem lies in trying to educate drivers – some with decades of experience – to not only take tailgating seriously, but also to be able to judge safe braking distances at various speeds.

Heavyweight motoring brands Autocar and the AA have joined forces to make motoring a better experience for road users frustrated by the lack of ability or care of many drivers. The Autocar/AA Drive Better Campaign believes the route to better, safer roads is education. Autocar and the AA will be lobbying the government for a re-think of the driving test process.

“For more than a decade the road safety message has been speed kills,” said Chas Hallett, editor of Autocar. “But the truth is a little different – just five per cent of all accidents (and 12 per cent of fatalities) were wholly or partly caused by a driver breaking the speed limit. Poor driving causes the vast majority of accidents and tailgating is the cause of many collisions. Tailgaters need to remember the danger they put other road users in.”

Survey results
Populus interviewed 14,743 AA members online. Populus is a member of the British Polling Council and abides by its rules.

Which, if any, of the following behaviours of other drivers irritate you most when you are driving?

Tailgating regional data % selecting tailgating as most irritating action. Drivers in Wales and N Ireland were most likely to select tailgating. Females (40%) were more likely to dislike tailgating than males (33%). Younger drivers aged 18-24% were more likely to select tailgating probably as fewer saw mobile phone use as a problem compared to older drivers.

The following copy will be published in the July 22 issue of Autocar, and provides more information on tailgating

For more than a decade, the government’s preferred road safety message has been simple: speed kills. The message has been backed up by an ever-rising number of speed cameras and – more ominously – an ever-decreasing number of traffic police.

However, when the police themselves are involved in investigating road accidents, the results reveal a very different story.

In 2006, a survey was released detailing over 200,000 accidents attended by the police. Accident investigators allotted up to six different reasons for each accident, from breaking the local speed limit to simply ‘failing to look’.

The police figures showed that just 5 percent of all accidents (and 12 percent of fatalities) they attended were wholly or partly caused by a driver breaking the local speed limit.
Poor driving caused the vast majority of accidents, according to the police. Overwhelmingly, inattention was to blame for collisions, particularly ‘failing to look’ and misjudging another car’s approaching speed or trajectory. And tailgating is the cause of many of these collisions.

So it’s little wonder, perhaps, that of the many examples of irritating driving behaviour identified by this week’s AA/Populus survey, the most hated is tailgating. Of the nearly 15,000 AA members asked, tailgating came out as the number one, with 36 per cent of those questioned naming it as the most irritating action of other drivers.

And it seems that these drivers were quite right to single out tailgating, because the figure shows it is one of the cause of a great many accidents.

The AA says that ‘detailed analysis of police accident causation figures has shown that close following is a particular problem, contributing to 16 per cent of motorway accidents.’ But it’s not just motorways where tailgating is serious problem.

‘Leaving pure human error aside’, says the AA, ‘this is second only to loss of control as a cause of accidents’. ‘This data also shows that “close following,” as tailgating is also know, is also an issue on A-roads, while other data shows that dual carriageway A roads have more accidents caused by close following than single carriageways.’

However, the AA says that it’s difficult to judge the scale of close following accidents on lesser roads, ‘mainly because many more of the collisions will not involve injury and therefore not be recorded in studies.’

It’s clear, then, that tailgating is one of the most serious aspects of the poor driving evident on the UK’s roads. The problem lies in trying to educate drivers – some with decades of experience – to not only take tailgating seriously, but also to be able to judge safe braking distances at various speeds.

The standard and breadth of driver training in the UK has long been called into question. Edmund King, president of the AA, points out that it’s possible a newly qualified driver could find themselves driving solo, at night and on a motorway – all situations which were not necessarily covered in their driver training.

The Centre for Automotive Safety Research at Adelaide University released a paper on the subject of Tailgating in June 2008, which wrapped together some of the best global research into this area.

The CASR begins by pointing out that ‘tailgating’ is not always ‘deliberately aggressive’ and could also occur because the driver ‘considers such as close distance safe and appropriate’.

Rear-end impacts, says CASR, are most likely to occur ‘at or near crossroads, during peak traffic times, in daylight and on level and straight roads’. They are less likely ‘to occur in country areas, at night, on weekends and on undivided roads’.

In busy traffic, according to CASR ‘gaps of less than 1 second are common and decision reaction times of 2 or 3 seconds are common. The problem is that a driver’s perception time varies from about 0.5 secs for ‘simple situations’ to ‘as much as 3 or 4 seconds for more complex situations’.

CASR research suggests that the typical ‘perception-reaction’ time is 2.5 seconds. In stark contrast to that, research from the UK suggests that the median gap on UK motorways is around 1 second. On some US and French motorways it was found to be even less.

Interestingly, Israeli police enforce a gap of 1 second between vehicles, which roughly equates to a gap of one car length per 10 miles per hour of speed.

However, traffic-engineering research suggests that a gap of two seconds between vehicles would not appreciably reduce the maximum hourly volume of traffic that a road could handle.

The problem for drivers and transport authorities is coming up with a way of drivers calculating a gap of two seconds between themselves and the car in front, even though more experienced and drivers could probably manage if only by mentally timing the passing of central reservation hardware.

Experiments using chevron road markings on the M6 and M4 have proved quite successful, but the difficulty and cost of painting the motorway in such an intensive manner has been ruled out for reasons of cost and inconvenience.

CASR points out that research down with distance warning systems have proved mixed as driver’s object to warnings about gaps, which they considered safe and normal. When gaps are extended to 2 seconds between vehicles, researchers found that nearby vehicles often cut into the newly opened space, instantly negating the safety margin.

And there are further potential hurdles in trying to reduce tailgating. US Psychologist, Steve Stosny [correct] also claims that ‘emotional pollution’ (such as family conflicts) add to the stress of driving and can, according to research in Maryland, make a driver more likely to indulge in aggressive behaviour such as tailgating and unsafe lane changing.

In truth, a combination of driver awareness, more rigorous driving tests and more intervention from a bolstered traffic police force is needed to drive home the dangers of following too close.

Hilton Holloway

About the AA

The AA is the UK’s leading breakdown service with more dedicated patrols than any other UK roadside assistance provider. The professionalism and high standards valued by its 15 million members in the event of a roadside breakdown are also the hallmark of many more AA products and services.

AA Public Affairs helps guide and shape motoring policy by analysing and researching issues, and campaigning on behalf of members and motorists.
For more information, visit www.theAA.com

About Autocar
Autocar magazine is published weekly by Haymarket Magazines Limited. Launched in November 1895, it’s the world’s original motoring title, and currently has an average readership in the UK of 337,000 per issue and over one million worldwide. Autocar is first with news, comment, scoops and motorsport, and is read by an exclusive audience of enthusiasts and car buyers. Visit www.autocar.co.uk