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Roads fill with older cars in fad for 4WDs

The lumbering vehicles have become popular among wealthier families for school and shopping runs despite debate about their higher accidental-death rates and fuel use.

The average age of vehicles is rising despite the sale in 2004 of more new cars than in any year since 1989. The steady aging worries the Motor Industry Association, which says the older, often diesel-powered, vehicles are pumping out more polluting fumes.

In 2004 the average age was 11.78 years, up from 11.69 in 2003. This figure has climbed steadily since 1992, when the average age was 9.93 years.

Four-wheel-drives were the main culprits, association chief executive Perry Kerr said. Along with passenger vans, they are exempt from stricter frontal-impact rules introduced in 2001 to cut down on older vehicles on the road.

Coupled with growing popularity of four-wheel-drives among Kiwi drivers, this has led to huge growth in imports. Mr Kerr said the number of four-wheel-drives being imported had more than tripled in the past three years, from about 10,000 in 2001 to more than 36,000 in 2004. "Some importers at the bottom end of the market focus on older four-wheel-drives and vans."

United States and Australian studies show that four-wheel-drives are more liable than ordinary cars to roll over, to kill their drivers, and to kill child pedestrians.

According to Land Transport Safety Authority figures, about two-thirds, or 1.6 million, of New Zealand's 2.5 million cars are between seven and 16 years old. About 500,000 are less than seven years old and the remaining 400,000 are older than 16 years.

"The older they are at the time of arrival, the shorter is their remaining useful life and the sooner they need replacing, so it's a cycle that is compounding on itself," Mr Kerr said.

A spokesman for Transport Safety Minister Harry Duynhoven said Transport Ministry officials were looking at whether to amend the frontal-impact rules to include four-wheel-drives. In Japan, frontal-impact standards were adopted for four-wheel-drives in the late 90s.

Associate Transport Minister Judith Tizard is also looking at emission screening aimed at the heaviest polluters.

These policy changes, though a step in the right direction, could be as much as two years away from implementation, Mr Kerr said. "At the moment there's no policy decisions made which will ensure we get a more modern, less polluting vehicle fleet, apart from the old frontal-impact rule."

The growth in new car sales had not helped. Because new car prices had fallen, it was not worth importing vehicles that were only a few years old, so importers were bringing in cars that were eight years old or more.

The removal of tariffs in 1998 had not helped, either. "When you had a $1500 tariff on every import, it wasn't economic to import a car over a certain age," Mr Kerr said. "When that was removed, the age profile of the imports got older and older."