Hybrid car owners drive more and get more traffic tickets, study finds USA Today
Hybrid car owners drive their cars more when they aren't commuting to work than those who drive conventional cars, an analysis of insurance records finds.
And despite their cars' often nerdy image, Toyota Prius owners tend to rack up just as many traffic tickets. When hybrid cars get in accidents, the repair costs are an average 13% higher than non-hybrids.
Those are some of the findings in the study by a firm called Quality Planning that pores over data for insurance companies. In this case, it looked at the records on 359,309 vehicles covered by multiple insurers across the country over a two-year period through last December.
It found that even though hybrid owners may be able to save gas, they eat up the savings by driving more on pleasure trips. Their commute habits are about the same as non-hybrid drivers, but they logged up to 25% more on trips not related to their jobs. They drove an average of 10,500 miles a year when not commuting.
“The additional miles driven by hybrid vehicle owners would seem to offset the net ecological benefit of owning a fuel-efficient vehicle," said Raj Bhat, president of Quality Planning. “What we don’t know is whether owning a hybrid vehicle encourages people to drive more miles each day or take more pleasure trips."
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