Active travel campaigners have called for “urgent action” to be taken to tackle ‘carspreading’ and its threat to vulnerable road users, after new research revealed that the number of US-style pick-up trucks – where children can’t be seen over the bonnet – has almost doubled in the UK over the past 10 years.

The analysis, based on Department for Transport data and published by the Clean Cities campaign, found that registrations of the 10 most commonly sold pick-up trucks in the UK – including the Ford Ranger, Toyota Hilux, Mitsubishi L200, and Nissan Navara – have leapt from 308,103 in 2014 to 590,587 at the end of 2025, an increase of 92 per cent.

According to Clean Cities, hundreds of thousands of these vehicles are “longer than a World War II tank”.

Ford Ranger pick-up on street next to pedestrians
Ford Ranger pick-up on street next to pedestrians (Image Credit: Clean Cities)

A recent study of 7.5 million road crashes by the Economist also found that pick-up trucks are three times more likely to kill cyclists, pedestrians, and other vulnerable road users compared to regular cars.

Another study of international crash data, undertaken by the Vias road safety institute, showed that a pedestrian or cyclist hit by a pick-up was 90 per cent more likely to face serious injury than one hit by a regular car, and almost 200 per cent more likely to be killed.

With their bonnet heights often exceeding one metre, children can be completely invisible from the driver’s seat of most pick-ups, particularly at close range. Seated behind the steering wheel, a driver of average adult height cannot see children aged up to nine standing in front of many pick-ups, Clean Cities says.

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“This boom in US-style pick-up trucks is lifestyle over practicality in exchange for parking mayhem and dangerous roads,” the group’s UK head Oliver Lord said in a statement.

“City leaders must act to discourage these menacing vehicles from our streets. How is it acceptable to have a vehicle so tall that children cannot be seen?”

Meanwhile, Jemima Hartshorn, the founder of Mums for Lungs, said: “These pick-up trucks are built like battering rams and pump out pollution like chimneys. For children, that’s a deadly combination — invisible at the front of the vehicle and breathing in the fumes from the back.

“No parent wants their kids in daily danger, yet we’re allowing these trucks to become normal on our streets.”

"No more giant cars"
"No more giant cars" (Image Credit: Clean Cities)

The UK government’s road safety strategy, published earlier this month, acknowledged “concerns that larger vehicles, particularly the emerging trend for increased bonnet height in SUVs, may have a detrimental safety impact on vulnerable road users, particularly pedestrians, cyclists and children”.

It also highlighted the work Cardiff Council has done to charge owners of SUVs and other large vehicles a higher fee to be able to park.

However, Clean Cities has warned the situation could soon get worse, following an EU-US trade pact made in August, which will see the European Union and United States “intend to accept and provide mutual recognition to each other’s standards” for cars, opening the door for the import of more pick-ups with lower safety standards, campaigners say.

Pedestrian road deaths in the US are now three times higher than in Europe, after recording roughly similar numbers as recently as 2009, the rapid rise in “monster SUVs and pick-ups” heavily linked by activists to this sharp increase.

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EU safety standards include pedestrian protection on vehicle fronts currently not mandatory in the US. Unlike its American counterparts, the EU also requires automatic emergency braking (AEB) on newly sold cars and vans, and seat belt reminders for all seats. The UK is consulting on plans to introduce similar standards.

However, last year, HMRC re-classified a double cab pick-up truck as a car to close a loophole which saw the vehicles being purchased as commercial vehicles when they were in fact intended for personal use.

“Typically these vehicles are equally suited to convey passengers and goods and have no predominant suitability,” HMRC said.