The incidents involving reversing vehicles most often occurred in driveways, and occasionally in car parks. By the age of two years, the proportion of cases involving reversing vehicles had declined to 4 per cent and, by four years of age, no such cases were recorded. As expected, the injury consequences of these cases were generally less severe, none resulting in admission to hospital. The pattern of risk changes as children grow. As children become mobile, they are able to move around vehicles at increasing speed.
Parents are often unaware of their rapidly increasingly capabilities.
As children grow older they show signs of recognising hazards and are given a little more freedom. Their judgement, however, is inconsistent and parents often need to intervene to prevent a disaster. Prevention strategies are not simple because close supervision at all times is impossible. Environmental control strategies that separate the child from the traffic flow on both road and driveway or provide a means of actively controlling unexpected movements by the child when in high risk areas are more likely to be reliable than behavioural control strategies.