Red decals used to identify teen probationary drivers in New Jersey have significantly reduced involvement in motor vehicle crashes according to a study conducted by the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP). In 2010, New Jersey enacted “Kyleigh’s Law,” an act that required all 16 to 20 year old drivers who hold a learner’s permit or intermediate license to display a red decal on the front and back license plates of any vehicle they drive.

New Jersey has some of the most comprehensive Graduated Driver License (GDL) laws in the nation and the intent of the act was to aid police in the enforcement of the GDL laws . While other industrialized nations have used some sort of identifying marks for teen drivers for quite some time, New Jersey was the first state in the US to implement such a law

In the first study on the law’s effect, CHOP compared teen crash statistics from the four years before the enactment of Kyleigh’s Law with crash statistics for the two years after. After eliminating factors such as gender, age, gas prices, month of the year, and crash trends among older drivers, CHOP determined that the presence of the red decals led to an overall reduction of 9.5 percent in the crash rate among teen drivers.

Even more significant was a reduction in the cash rate among older teens with a reduction of 13 percent per year for 18-year-olds and nearly 17 percent for 19-year-olds. In the years prior to enactment of the law, there was no significant reduction in crash rates for those two age groups.

According to the CHOP researchers, an estimated 3,197 fewer intermediate drivers were involved in motor vehicle crashes after enactment of the law.

The red decals not only aid law enforcement in identifying GDL license holders but the teen drivers themselves, with essentially a red target on their back, tend to drive more safely to avoid attention. If it leads to crash reduction rates like those identified in the study and saves lives, it’s worth it. Read more: New Jersey’s Teen Driver Decals Show Sustained Link with Fewer Crashes

Photo: www.state.nj.us