What Colour Car?

Having long been safety-conscious, my default choice of car colour has been white or silver - very visible in poor light. But I couldn't resist a dark blue Mazda3 last time, despite the rational parts of me screaming not to. And I'm glad I was adventurous, but there have been downsides to the change in colour.

Reduced visibility to others. I'm definitely not as visible to others. On more than a few occasions, cars have popped out of side roads into my path as if I did not exist. After this happened several times on one weekend last year I decided to keep my headlights on permanently. Now I'm noticed again, and there haven't been any more such incidents. There is solid evidence that car colour can make a large difference to safety. For instance this research shows that at dawn or dusk, black cars are involved in 47% more accidents than white cars.

Dirtier. My car shows up dirt more than previous lighter colours. I can wash my car on a Sunday night and my Monday morning, the car could well have been involved in the Paris-Dakar Rally without my knowledge.

Hotter. A dark car does absorb the heat more than a lighter coloured one, as proven by the Mythbusters:

A black car heats up faster than an identical white car. 

CONFIRMED

A fan wrote in and asked a follow up question: "Does the color of a car affect the way it heats up?". The MythBusters used two identical cars, one black the other white and left them both out in the summer heat with thermometers in both. By mid-afternoon the black car had heated up to a temperature of 135 °F while the white car topped off at 126 °F, almost 10 degrees cooler.

Prettier. Despite all of the above, I do like the classy look, and don't regret my decision. After all safety and comfort are not as important as style and looks.