Application of Electric Utility Workers' Anthropometry to Clearance between Vehicle Pedals and Adjacent Structures

Abstract

Many electric utility fleet vehicles—notably pickups and vans—have limited clearance between the accelerator and brake pedal for workers who wear larger shoe sizes and even larger boots. The objectives of this study were to establish a analysis protocol for determining safe clearance between pedals and adjacent structures and then apply this protocol to existing utility fleet vehicles to determine which vehicles have adequate clearance for safe driving. Three sources of data were measured:1) detailed dimensions of the cabs of 16 common utility vehicles 2) anthropometric dimensions of 187 male electric utility field and generating station workers, including boot size and 3) width, length, and height of work boots, snow shoes, and rain slickers. Analysis revealed that many common fleet vehicles provide inadequate foot clearance between the pedals and adjacent structures, thus creating an unsafe driving condition. The approach of data collection and analysis of this study can be applied to other types of vehicles in order to determine the safety of pedal design, particularly risk of “unintended acceleration.”