COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF PEDESTRIAN ACCIDENTS: ASSESSING THE DIFFERENT IMPACTS OF VEHICLE CLASSES

Due to the increasing number of pedestrian accidents, especially in urban areas, a study was conducted in this thesis to study the influence of different vehicle classes on the design impacts in pedestrian accidents using virtual simulations. Three classes were selected, a small compact class, a larger sedan class and a larger SUV class. The simulations were run at multiple speeds ranging from 30 to 70 km/h. The results of the work show that smaller and compact vehicles are more dangerous for pedestrians compared to larger vehicle classes.