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Comment by echlebek | Hacker News Reader

Every visible angle of a car has multiple lights on it so I don't think that's actually a double edged sword???

Multiple lights that can all be turned off - except for the so called "daytime driving light", but that's also a double edged sword: many drivers seem to think that if they have these they can get away with leaving the "real" headlights off for longer, but forget that there is no daytime light at the rear of the car. So yeah, a murky-matte-gray car in murky gray weather at twilight is the worst situation for visibility I can think of too...

Cars are also festooned with retro-reflectors in case the lights are off, including the license plate.

Reflectors glow only when somebody else lights them up. Background-colored cars makes it a lot easier for two unlit fools to connect. Head on.

Black suffers from this somewhat, but less since backgrounds on the road are rarely black until the hour when headlights become essential. Muted grays are a handicap all day long in any form of suboptimal weather.

The ones that are also blacked out?

I only really see this issue on old vehicles. Most vehicles have lights set to automatically turned on when it gets dark. I very rarely see a new vehicle that doesn't have this enabled and/or daytime running lights. Even newer Honda civics have a feature to automatically turn on high beams when no oncoming traffic at night

That’s not the only setting. I’ve seen many modern cars running around after dark with only DRLs.

In my case, I frequently bump the light knob with my knee as I’m entering or exiting.

That's not accurate, so many designs of cars are hard to see the side profile of even with lights. Even if it were, it's not bourne out in studies of paint colour and crash risk. Grey/silver represents an increased crash risk, especially at night.

Something I think hinders visibility is also that cars are often amongst dozens of other lights, especially at intersections where it matters most.

Actually the Australian study you quoted earlier showed that the difference in crash risk was largest during daylight hours, as in Australia many people drive with their lights off during daylight.

But yes, I suspect if you were to redo that study in a country where people always have the lights on (perhaps due to local law if nothing else), you'd see the biggest difference in poor lightning conditions.

Plus tons of reflectors that manage to work well at night without also blinding people during the day.

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