251

- 16

point where people who were not familiar with the conditions in

off - road terrain were now riding the three - wheelers . Honda hoped

that , through the methods being developed , the safety awareness

of these individuals would be increased and safe riding behavior

would be adopted by users .

In early 1984 , the Consumer Product Safety Commission

informed the ATV industry , including American Honda , that there

was a rise in accident rates and that they were beginning an

investigation .

The CPSC provided Honda with statistics showing

the rise in accident rates , it was based upon a nationwide

reporting service .

A concern we have with the comparisons that CPSC has

made between ATVs and other off - road vehicles such as Snowmobiles

and off - road motorcycles is that the latter two categories of

vehicles do not have either the year - round usage of an ATV or the higher number of users and user hours per machine that our figures show are typical for ATVs . These considerations suggest

that the CPSC data is preliminary in nature and not a proper data

base for the drawing of conclusions . Further , off - road

motorcycles and snowmobiles are representative of mature and

stable markets that have been engaged in safety training and rider familiarization for several years , but ATVs are now peaking

in popularity .

CPSC also provided to American Honda its in - depth reports , which seem to correspond with what Honda had determined to be the problem in the rise in accident rates previously . The

seem

COC