Edit: to clarify: the message in the ad is actually ironic/satirical, mocking the advice for cyclists to wear high-viz at night.
It uses the same logic but inverts the parts and responsabilities, by suggesting to motorists (not cyclists) to apply bright paint on their cars.
So this ad is not pro or against high-viz, it’s against victim blaming
Cross-posted from: https://mastodon.uno/users/rivoluzioneurbanamobilita/statuses/113544508246569296
Cars have lights on them?
Bikes have lights on them too.
When I’m on the road, I want to be visible. On my red motorcycle I wear a bright yellow helmet and a jacket with hi-viz strips. The problem is that car manufacturers only offer boring colors and charge an exorbitant fee for a cool color if they offer them at all.
Cars should be bright as fuck. A bright red, orange, green, or yellow car stands out way more than the black, white, beige and gray shit that dominates the road.
It’s funny, but as a driver and a cyclist, the amount of times I barely saw the person on the bike, because they had no hi viz, no lights and no reflectors (and black/dark clothing), even in moderately good visibility conditions is too damn high.
It’s not that big of a deal in cities, but I’d be really pushing it to ride my bike out on a 70+ kmph road, and you’d have to hold me at gunpoint to do it without any lights, because I’d be as good as dead anyway.
Of course black cars are kinda the same, except here in Poland every car is required by law to have at least position lights on at all times (yes, sunny daylight too), and it makes a world of a difference no matter the paint color.
We have daylight running laws here as well, but those lights are different than the regular headlights and weaker.
In driving school they taught me to just put on my regular lights all the time.
They’re a lot stronger than the daylight ones and make you more visible
I think any bike intended for road use should be equipped with lights
I prefer when all people occupying the road, whether its a pedestrian, cyclist, motorcyclist, car, or horse rider be as visible as possible.
Its why I refuse to drive a gray or silver car. They blend in with the pavement at certain times in the am and pm and if it’s raining really hard they disappear. In a lot of ways they are worse than black cars.
What’s wrong with making sure you are visible? Why is that something to make fun of? (I’m not asking you directly, I just don’t get the joke in the ad.)
also grey and silver are boring as fuck
I’d even argue (this is what the Internet is for) that gray cars in rain are the absolute worst. They just disappear without any kind of lights on. I don’t know why we don’t just have headlights and taillights on all the time. It’s how I’ve driven for the past 15 years, to me it just makes sense. I’m never caught forgetting to put them on when it’s raining or when it’s dark, because they are always on. I like people to see me, I do not want to be involved in a collision.
The satire misses the mark since cars already have strict mandatory visibility requirements by law. In the EU, you must have working headlights, brake lights, turn signals, daytime running lights (since 2011), fog lights, reverse lights, and reflectors. Driving without any of these gets you fined, points on your license, and fails vehicle inspection (TÜV/MOT). These aren’t optional safety suggestions like cyclist hi-viz - they’re legal requirements with real penalties.
I don’t know about yankee laws…
You can’t make stupid people safe. I drive home in the dark now and I typically see at least one person driving with their lights turned completely off.
I also knew one guy who had a light that didn’t work but his highbeams did, so he just used his highbeams 100% of the time. When I told him he was being dangerous he said something to the effect of “I’m not going to jeopardize my safety for some rando on the road”. And was legitimately confused why I would want to put him in danger. Some people have absolutely no desire to be a functioning member of society.
State dependent. Maryland for example legally requires a front headlamp and a rear reflector in low visibility conditions. Also must have a bell or horn but can’t have a siren (?).
It’s less state dependent than you think. The feds have the last say in the safety equipment that comes on your car from the factory. They write the regulations on safety equipment for all highway vehicles.
What is interesting is that the NFPA, (the US National Fire Prevention Association), which writes the guidance for US public safety departments, has learned that you can have too much flashy-flashies and woo-woos and sparkles hanging on your vehicle. We used to hang as much as that stuff as we could on fire trucks and ambulances. Now, new rigs are toning it down to reflective chevrons and marker lights on the back end to prevent dazzling and confusing traffic as they approach a scene. The NFPA national tracking has shown a marked decline in tertiary accidents.
Reflectives and markers are important, but you can do too much can have worse outcomes because of it.
I wish those laws were enforceable. I passed someone the other day whose car was completely covered in Christmas lights. I don’t mean, “they had a lot of lights”, I mean every square inch of the exterior was covered in blinky flashy lights.
It takes a special kind of stupid to think that is a good idea, and a special kind of police incompetence to allow it on the road.
I get the sentiment here but as I’ll always say the car wins.
You can’t call it a death machine and then act like it’s not one.
Cars have lights built in. Humans don’t. Wear the fucking highvis and save your life.
Either that or start wearing light strips all over yourself.
Okay but hear me out here, we design streets where bikes and cars don’t have to share a lane. Crazy idea i know.
We should design streets for the cyclists and drivers we have, not the ones we want.
Fair point that roads should be designed a lot better, but in the mean time, if you’re going to be driving on roads that got put down originally 50 years ago without cycling paths and no lights in the middle of farmland. Wear the high Viz gear or make sure you have working lights and reflectors.
I personally prefer the option of equipping a comically bright headlight to the bike to emulate a lifted truck.
Congratulations! I’m now blind and have a legitimate reason to run you over.
Cars used to have lots of reflectors on them in the 1980 and 90’s. Especially I’m the head and taillight clusters.
Cars should also be required to have high vis strips like commercial vehicles.
I drive a Smart 451 which was silver initially. I can‘t count the amount of times that trucks and cars on the highway cut me off. At first I thought they were just assholes, but now I think its partly because its such a small car that the silver blends in with the street.
Two years ago, I wrapped my car in bright neon orange as part of an ad campaign from my company and it feels like I‘m getting noticed much more often. It‘s literally like a high vis west for my car.
We can’t even make blacking out essential safety equipment like headlights and tail lights illegal, apparently a driver’s personality and style should come before functional lights.
What? Where is this? In Belgium you’d get pulled over for sure. Depending on if the car could get made road legal again it could get towed too.
North America. Very common on sports cars or with people who like to modify their cars. They do still light up when the bulb is on although not as bright. My bigger issue is that light won’t reflect off blacked out lights the same way it does off a regular tail light. It is a massive safety hazard but “my freedom” seems to be a valid reason for it.
I never understood people buying black cars. Not just because of visibility, but they turn into f-ing ovens in the summer.
I have a black car. I just like black. I haven’t noticed it to be much worse than any other car I’ve had during the summer. I had a white car of similar dimensions for a while before that and it felt just as hot. Or at least past the threshold of “too hot”.
It’s not like there’s always the choice. My previour car was red, and I wish I could have bought me current one in a bright color, like red or orange, but there was just black or grey, it’s so boring
There you are right. Anything but black, gray, and white has become nearly extinct.
To be fair, cars have headlight and taillights.
Here in Sweden cars are required to allways have their headlights on when the car is moving, making them far easier to see even during the day.
It us frankly one of the most annoying things about crossing the street when being abroad, cars having their headlights off during the day, it is much more difficult to see if a car is moving if it has the headlights turned off, than if they are on.
Right. You’re not going to see the car color at night.
Wait what? There are countries where you can drive without headlights?
Here in the U.S., (and I’m assuming it’s the same elsewhere, but just explaining for simplicity), cars used to have a simple headlight switch, which also lit up the instrument cluster on the dashboard. It was an easy heuristic: If you can’t see the gauges because it’s dark, turn on the headlights.
Now, every car has a marketing-gimmick dashboard lit up all the time with all sorts of multi-color lights. In the cars I’ve been in, the headlight indicator just a small, green light in the corner. Drivers accustomed to the old way think that their headlights are on because the dashboard is lit up. The Toyota Prius was notorious for this when it was new; I used to joke that they didn’t come with headlights as a way to save fuel.
It’s not as bad now, but people just forget o sometimes. It’s worse when cars have day-time running lights, because then the drivers see light coming from the front of the car and think all the marker lights are on.
Places I’ve lived in the US people keep them off as the default. Here in Seattle people don’t even turn them on at night half the time, I guess they think the street lighting is good enough. I try and signal people to turn on their lights if I’m biking at night and so far none that I know of have actually turned them on
ho, you are still using street ligths?
It’s been years that we cut them on a lot of major axis and after midnight in my town for all the classic roads.
It’s mainly to reduce the electricity bill, have less night pollution (more stars in the sky!) and reduce the speed of the cars when the road is empty (quite effective!).
Side note: since now few years, our cars are sold with front lights always active for visibility purpose (these small lights are cut only when we switching to the big ones)
Yes, here in Austria you are allowed to drive without headlights in bright conditions, only are required to turn them on when there is impaired visibility (night, rain, snow, fog, etc.).
E g. Germany
Only for motorcycles it is mandatory all day
Modern cars also tend to have daytime running lights that are switched on automatically when the ignition is turned on, and are meant purely for visibility.
With modern cars, you mean cars since some time early 2000s? Actual modern cars (5 yo cars), are the only ones I see not have headlights turned on during day time.
Apparently, it’s not required under EU law to have the headlights turned on during daytime, and manufactures will rather have a couple of cm longer milage…
Bikes have lights too though?
Their visibility is quite different tho
That is not a requirement, you to have to have front and rear reflectors, I don’t remember if side reflectors are required or not.
One thing that a lot of bikes has that is illegal here but ignored by the police, is a flashing front light.
Rear lights can absolutely be flashing, but front lights can’t.
The front lights are allowed to flash in Denmark and it’s super annoying, and dangerous in my opinion. The lowest allowed blinking frequency is also way lower than rear lights in Sweden, so it’s like being flashed by a camera repeatedly.
I still don’t understand why lights even have a flashing option
Depends on the country you live in 😂 here they are absolutely required and also are not allowed to be blinking.
That is not a requirement
It is, actually: https://www.transportstyrelsen.se/sv/vagtrafik/trafikregler/cyklist-mopedist-motorcyklist/trafikregler/regler-for-cykel/
You’re liable to pay 500 SEK if you bike without lights when it’s dark outside.
Ah, nice, I didn’t know that!
They are actually required at night. https://www.transportstyrelsen.se/sv/vagtrafik/Trafikregler/Cyklist-mopedist-motorcyklist/Trafikregler/Regler-for-cykel/
Reflectors are also required.
And yeah the rear light are allowed to flash.
I still agree that cars are way more visible.
As others have said, this depends on the jurisdiction.
In the UK, you have to have lights on at night: white at the front, red at the back. They can either be steady or blinking.
In Belgium at least they are required (reflectors aren’t on all styles of bikes), problem is that cyclists often have battery powered lights which are not very bright to the point you could say they are not even working. And in my experience it really renders cyclists invisible at night until you almost run into them.
In that sense high-viz vests definitely help because they usually make them stand out more than even normal lights.
Ofcourse this is mostly needed in the places with no separate infrastructure and no street lights. (Edit: which is what the situation is in near where I live, the shortest route to bike is through farmlands with no infrastructure for bikes and no streetlight ms for sections of it. I’d personally love better and separate infrastructure since it’s basically part of the reason why avoid biking there during the lang dark winter)
Whatever law required headlights on totally backfired. Rear lights are off and people don’t realize or don’t care, and now they won’t switch on the actual lights manually because there’s an automation.
IIRC there was only a short window when turning the rear lights off was a thing, and the law has since gone back to having to turn them on when the car is turned on. While there are still people in cars like that, they’re a minority.
And in the States cars are required to have side markers, as well.
Corner markers?
I remember that Volvo had those for a few years here, but that was in the very early 2000’s I haven’t seen the on normal cars for a long time.
Seems like a good idea though.
Side* markers. lol
They can be on the corners or not, i believe.
Seeing as many people drive WITHOUT LIGHTS
Can confirm. My car is that colour. Am yet to collide with a cyclist.
I only wear hi-vis to take one more excuse away from the driver when they hit me. It doesn’t actually help people see me in my experience.
In my city, the roads are not lit very well so high vis helps me see bikers a lot better.
Score!
