U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood on Friday said he planned to urge carmakers to crash-test child safety seats in their vehicles and recommend which child restraints are the safest in each auto, responding to a Chicago Tribune investigation.

If adopted, this new system would be a victory for parents who struggle to find the best car seats for their children. While federal regulators rate new cars for safety, they have no such system for child car seats. Making matters more difficult, a child restraint that performs well in one vehicle may perform poorly in another because it doesn't fit snugly in that back seat.

A Tribune investigation in March revealed that nearly half of all infant restraints failed catastrophically or exceeded injury limits when federal contractors strapped them into the back seats of model-2008 vehicles and crashed those cars and trucks into walls at 35 m.p.h. The Tribune found the results buried in thousands of pages of documents from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. NHTSA used those tests to rate the safety of the cars, not the child restraints in them.

The Tribune investigation "really inspired us to look at the data we had and also look at the fact that it was very difficult for the public to review the data," LaHood said in a meeting with the Tribune's editorial board.

At LaHood's insistence, the child seat crash-test results -- including reports, video and photos -- are posted online. They can be viewed at chicagotribune.com/testresults

"What I'd like to talk to the car manufacturers about is the idea that they get some seats, they put them in their car, they crash test them so they can tell people, 'This is the best seat for this model car,' " LaHood said. "That is the safest thing to do."

European regulators require automakers to include child seats in their crash tests of new cars. The safety rating for those European vehicles is based in part on how they protect kids, while the U.S. safety ratings have nothing to do with children. LaHood held up the European system as a model.

However, LaHood said he would push for a voluntary system. The secretary said he also ordered NHTSA to institute stringent safety standards for child seats in side-impact crashes, which account for one third of infant highway deaths. For years, regulators have studied side-impact tests for child seats but have not yet required any. pcallahan@tribune.com

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