---
title: "Roads Need Taller Guardrails for Added Safety, Study Says"
description: "Cars are getting taller, and so should guardrails—but not too much."
date: "2017-08-01"
modified: "2017-08-01"
authors:
  - name: "Justin Hughes"
    link: "https://www.thedrive.com/authors/justin-hughes"
url: "https://www.thedrive.com/article/13104/roads-need-taller-guardrails-for-added-safety-study-says"
categories:
  - "News"
tags:
  - "Crash Test"
  - "Highway Safety"
  - "suvs"
---

# Roads Need Taller Guardrails for Added Safety, Study Says

![](<https://www.thedrive.com/wp-content/uploads/images-by-url-td/content/2017/08/gettyimages-631546606.jpg>)
*\<em\>www.thedrive.com</em>*

Guardrails are the unsung heroes of automotive safety. If you're unlucky enough to be going off the road, they're *usually* there to save you from an even worse fate. With taller vehicles comprising more and more of the vehicles on the road today, a study from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln's Midwest Roadside Safety Facility has recommended raising guardrails to account for their height, according to[ *Motor Authority*](<https://www.motorauthority.com/news/1111841_study-shows-taller-guardrails-could-save-lives>).

Currently, guardrails are installed at a standard height of 31 inches. This standard was set back when there were many more sedans on the road, which ride lower and have a lower center of gravity than the crossovers and SUVs that are slowly but surely replacing them. The study recommends raising guardrails to a height of 36 inches to contain taller vehicles and prevent them from rolling over.

The study also demonstrates just how big a difference a small change in height can make for smaller cars. Researchers tested a 2003 Kia Rio against a 36-inch high guardrail and found that it caught and contained the car well. But when they repeated the test with a 37-inch high guardrail, the Kia slipped below the guardrail, which then directly struck the passenger compartment in what would likely be a fatal crash, rather than the minor accident with the guardrail just one inch lower. The study recommends the 36-inch height to protect as many different types of vehicles as possible.

https://youtube.com/embed/o0uT8UDScrA

The next step for this study will involve crashing pickup trucks into the 36-inch tall guardrail to compare the safety benefits for taller vehicles to the current 31-inch height. Computer simulations show that the higher guardrail will help, but there's no substitute for crashing trucks in the real world.

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