Road safety advocates call for Alberta probe into pickup trucks and large SUV deaths

Road safety advocates in Alberta are calling on the province's chief medical examiner to investigate whether pickup trucks and large SUVs pose a disproportionate risk of death to pedestrians and cyclists.

Multiple organizations, including Bike Calgary and Youth en Route, penned an open letter Wednesday to Dr. Akmal Coetzee-Khan, Alberta's Chief Medical Examiner, requesting a review under the Fatalities Inquiries Act of road crashes involving larger vehicles. The groups are part of the Coalition to Reduce Auto Size Hazards (C.R.A.S.H.), a national effort seeking to reduce hazards tied to increasingly large vehicles.

"The proliferation of pickup trucks and large SUVs constitutes a real and preventable danger on our roads to the lives of pedestrians, cyclists, and persons with disabilities," the letter states.

Bike Calgary president Doug Clark said the objective is to determine whether larger vehicles pose an increased safety risk and, if they do, what measures could reduce those risks. "There may be a significant risk to pedestrians and cyclists from pickup trucks and SUVs, which are getting larger every year. We need proper analysis of what's happening in Alberta so we can make the right decisions based on good data," Clark said.

The push comes after 15 pedestrians were killed on Calgary's roads in 2025, a 225 per cent increase from the previous year. In February, a two-year-old child was killed after being struck by a Jeep while being pushed in a stroller in a marked crosswalk. The Jeep appeared to have been modified to sit higher than its original factory height.

Calgary Police Service said modifications to vehicles can affect safety in collisions. "Of specific concern is the modification of ride height of the vehicle which can greatly affect collision outcomes, especially those involving vehicle versus pedestrian collisions," CPS said.

Advocates are pointing to U.S. research indicating a 10 cm increase in a vehicle's front-end height is associated with a 22 per cent increase in fatality risk for struck pedestrians. Coalition members are proposing federal design requirements for vehicle front ends, safety warnings accompanying advertising, provincial driver's licence requirements for operating large vehicles, and a sliding scale for registration fees based on a vehicle's danger to pedestrians and cyclists.