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Automotive News & Views Lotus, the blind, and legislation?
18 messages, Last post on Oct 05, 2008 at 1:13 PM
You are in the Automotive News & Views Forum. Your Hosts are steve_ & claires
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Replying to: steve_ (Oct 04, 2008 8:59 am) When I started tracking this issue, I looked for 'habis corpus,' where is the body? There aren't any after 5 years of traffic data. Neither us nor the NHTSA can find any statistics that support the claims of the blind. But the blind have made claims. The blind have used a series of anecdotal stories; (1) 8 year old boy turns into a Prius; (2) circled in a parking lot; and (3) foot run-over in parking lot by backing up Prius. Except for the backing over foot incident, a real problem with rear vision in all vehicles, the others had nothing to do with sound or injury. We have had the Prius rolling around since 2001 and this is all they can find. There are no accident statistics that support their claims. The blind have commissioned various 'experiments' only the results have no consistency. This remains a problem with all such experimental efforts. You can always design an experiment to show something you want, which is the risk. Bob Wilson
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Replying to: bwilson4web (Oct 04, 2008 10:50 am)  ); anyway the exec was testing a prototype hybrid electric and someone asked if the exec was cruising parking lots creeping up on people and the exec admitted that was a fun trick. I always relied on tire and general car noise when I did a lot of biking back in the 70's, and could hear a car approaching behind me a long way away, but I could see where a clip-clop or other noise would be a beneficial addition to an electric car in slow moving situations, like at intersections or in parking lots (beneficial to pedestrians that is).
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Replying to: steve_ (Oct 04, 2008 12:48 pm) I sat back and thought about this after I read it. What I pictured was what life in a city would be like with several million vehicles driving down the street with a clip clop sound coming from each one. Imagine a back up beeper on every car in LA driving down the street. Or maybe a voice saying..."woops watch out here comes a car.." over and over again. Even a ching ching like bell would drive us nuts if it were magnified 300,000 times in a small City. We have laws in some cities where you are not allowed to let you dog back for more than 10 minutes at any one time. How will people feel when they hear a noise loud enough to get a pedestrians attention 24/7.
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Replying to: boaz47 (Oct 04, 2008 1:13 pm) Cars are pretty noisy as it is. My last house was near an intersection and you'd frequently hear brake squeal and grinding shifters as people navigated through the intersection. But yeah, when I used to hike in bear country, other hiker's bells would drive me batty. Sort of depends on what you get used to I guess. When the weather is right I can hear the roar of tire noise on a highway 2 miles away and it's not pleasant.
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Replying to: steve_ (Oct 04, 2008 1:33 pm)
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Replying to: boaz47 (Oct 04, 2008 3:22 pm)
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Replying to: steve_ (Oct 04, 2008 3:41 pm) I shouldn't be surprised that someone would suggest we study this issue, which is after all the purpose of the legislation, to pay some friends and family to conduct a study at taxpayers expense to see if there is an issue. The study contracts will cost less than 800 billion I hope. I also hope it doesn’t create another department like CARB. But if it does it could be called, California Research Against Possible Silence. Even the Feds had enough common sense to ignore this suggestion.
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Replying to: boaz47 (Oct 04, 2008 6:56 pm)
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Replying to: steve_ (Oct 04, 2008 7:20 pm) |
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