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Carsales Staff2 Apr 2014
NEWS

US mandates reversing cameras

New laws designed to reduce child deaths will make rear-view cameras mandatory in all US cars by 2018

New regulations in the US will mandate that all new vehicles sold there must be equipped with reversing cameras within four years.

The US Department of Transportation's National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has finished work on nationwide standards that will make it illegal to sell a new vehicle that weighs less than 4.5 tonnes in the US without a rear-view camera after May 2018.

The regulations were originally proposed by the US congress in 2008 following a high incidence of parents reversing their vehicles over their children, killing them. Dozens of similar incidents have also tragically occurred in Australia.

The 2008 proposal was pencilled in for ratification in 2010 by the US federal government, but was delayed by the Obama administration as it was deemed too expensive for car-makers to adhere to.

The NHTSA announced that all vehicles manufactured on or after May 1, 2018, including buses and trucks weighing less than 4500kg, must be equipped with "rear visibility technology".

There are strict rules around the requirements of the camera systems, which must adhere to a certain zone behind the vehicle, and also meet image size, linger time, response time, durability and deactivation.

The technology will "save lives", says the NHTSA's acting administrator David Friedman. He stated that it would stop many families suffering "tragic incidents".

"We're already recommending this kind of life-saving technology through our NCAP program and encouraging consumers to consider it when buying cars today," said Friedman.

In the US an average of 210 people die every year after being reversed over by a motor vehicle. Children under five years old account for around a third of all those deaths, or roughly 65 a year.

The NHTSA says that between 58 and 69 lives will be saved each year once the new laws are enacted in the US.

According to the Australian Department of Infrastructure and Transport, an average of seven children aged under 14 were killed every year in Australia between 2002 and 2010 due to drive-way and low-speed vehicle run-overs.

According to the NHTSA, it is estimated to cost between $132 and $142 per vehicle to install a rear-view camera system and display screen in 2018. The new rule will costs car-makers between $546 and $640 million in 2018, due to almost three quarters of all new vehicles predicted to have rear-view cameras already installed by then.

Many new vehicles already come as standard with reversing cameras, and Lexus Australia has just committed to fitting rear-view cameras to its entire range, making it the first luxury brand to do so in Australia.

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