Changes to Livery and lights

The low profile design of the LED light bar will reduce drag on vehicles and create a fuel saving. Photo: Richard Scott

Better, safer and more cost-efficient. This is not often a phrase that flows together in modern times – but true of the new livery and light-bar being rolled out in the marked police vehicle fleet.

The move to new livery was first flagged in February’s Ten-One, when Assistant Commissioner Gavin Jones announced the phasing out of the orange and blue colour mix and a move to a consistent yellow and blue half battenburg look for the entire marked fleet.

“The new look means no overt differentiation between general duties and road policing vehicles, as these functions are now recognised as the responsibility of all staff,” he explained.

Stan Pope: National Manager Procurement and Maria McCoy: Fleet Procurement Manager highlighted the improvements to police and public safety as well as the significant savings that the new livery and light-bar combo will bring.

“Police vehicles need to be instantly recognisable to deter bad behaviour both on and off the roads. They also need to be highly visible to protect officers and members of the public at the scenes of road traffic collisions, crime scenes or wherever police cars are parked,” says Maria.

UK Home Office research, “High Conspicuity Livery for Police Vehicles”, carried out by the Police Scientific Development Branch in 2004 showed that vehicles carrying full livery were no easier to identify, especially in a visually cluttered modern urban environment. A decision was taken to refine the livery which in itself generated a small cost saving. As an additional safety feature the rear quarter panels of cars will now be screen printed. This means that the white areas which previously were just exposed paintwork are now highly reflective.

The most significant improvement to safety and savings has been generated by the introduction of the new low profile LED light-bar. “The old light-bar has rotating lights which require an awful lot of power to run,” says Stan. “Since the introduction of the VE Commodore, cars carry two batteries, one to run the vehicle and a second to run emergency equipment such as the light-bar, radios and automatic vehicle location systems.

“Power use within fleet vehicles was at saturation point not only making the introduction of new technology in vehicles extremely difficult, but also risking dead batteries. The new LED light-bar uses only five percent of the power used by the old light-bar, yet its performance is far superior.”

Police presence at a scene is defined by blue and red flashing lights.

The old light-bar flashed blue and red in unison. As a result the colours tended to bleed together, when viewed from a distance. The new LED light operates sequentially meaning that there is no blend of colours. The lights are so bright – Maria likens them to a Guy Fawkes display – the power input has to be reduced by a further 30 percent when they are used at night, to avoid excessive glare.

The low profile design of the LED light generates the greatest saving, by reducing the drag on vehicles and creating an estimated fuel saving of around eight percent.

This translates into a saving of around $800,000 dollars a year – money that could potentially be ploughed back in to front line policing.

Vehicles carrying the new light-bar and livery are being rolled out as part of NZ Police’s fleet management programme which currently sees around 500 new uniform cars purchased and distributed each year. The entire marked fleet is replaced every six-and-a-half years, so the new livery and light-bar will be in use countrywide by the end of 2014.