How Car Safety Became A Major Selling Point

Car safety was once an afterthought, but now automakers brag about their safety ratings from groups like IIHS or NHTSA’s New Car Assessment Program. The journey to this has been long, and in some cases, controversial. Fierce battles have been fought over whether automakers should have to stock cars with safety equipment, such as airbags, and whether people should be forced to wear seatbelts.

Now a raft of new safety technologies help prevent collisions from happening at all. Some automakers, such as General Motors are aspiring to a world with no crashes.

While some of these new safety technologies are promising, they often rely on automation to achieve their goals, and automation brings its own risks, such as distraction, confusion, or a false sense of security.

In the meantime, the number of traffic deaths in America has risen in recent years, after hitting an all-time low in 2014. Experts are trying to figure out why, and what to do to reverse the trend.

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How Car Safety Became A Major Selling Point

[Lando-kxso]

Getting rid of SUVs would do a lot for vehicle safety

[FinanceHustle]

Safety is always important. I'm glad that these technologies have become one of the main focuses of these companies. 👏

[djp]

Making every control touch screen is a safety risk. You have to take your eyes off the road and dig through endless menus just to find the control you're looking for. By the time you find it, you may have already run over a pedestrian.

[Jompe]

Safety is important for those outside of vehicles, some of the new cars being sold are taller and overall bigger. Kids, even young adults might compeletely be in a blind spot for the driver

[barnstar]

I can vouch for modern cars being bigger and more dangerous to cyclists and pedestrians. I was struck by an SUV while out cycling! I couldn't lift my leg far enough up to avoid it snapping my ankle because the front of an SUV is taller than more traditional cars. A pedestrian wouldn't go over one, they would go under them!

[TheShowerofSlime]

Till this day, I still cannot understand people that turn their head complete 90 degrees (even more) for extended time just so they can see who a cop pulled over. What excitement am I missing here?

[edc]

Im for safety and full self driving (fsd) cars. But auto breaking on non fsd cars can be dangerous and annoying.

Once I was changing lanes on the freeway in a section with a slight uphill bend to avoid a car on first lane which was slowing down on the uphill, and the auto brake triggered and almost took out the 2 cars in the two lanes behind me and myself

[dogcowrph]

One reason that I bought my Volvo wagon was because it was very safe. The other was that they run forever.

I had a Honda Accord that I drove for over 309, 000 miles and I walked away from an accident where an eighteen wheeler fell on top of my Accords’ roof crushing most of it.

Safety sure sells with me.

[davinp]

Toyota & Honda and other foreign automakers have made several advanced safety features as standard equipment, yet the American automakers GM, Chrysler & Ford offer then as options or only on higher trims when they should be standard. These include pre-collision system with automatic breaking and pedestrian alert, lane departure alert/keeping, adaptive cruise control, sway alert and automatic headlights/high beams.

[wahid]

Rather than making cars more safer they should make the roads more safer. Roads in the suburbs feels like a formula one track

[jasonmurdoch]

No matter how safe a vehicle is it still will not correct stupidity

[kotgc]

Imho as someone who drives 10x more than the average driver, EVs and adaptive cruise control are the safest features.
Car conversation needs to be updated to distinguish ICE from EV.
EVs have a low centre of gravity which greatly improves driving safety and performance.
Adaptive cruise control can be added to any car for $1000-$3000, if governments choose to divert funds to this device rather than driving safety departments, safety campaigns and all the indirect enforcement and health costs.

[Schlierfy]

Lane keep assist almost got me crushed by a semi-truck when he didn't see me and moved into my lane the car wanted pull me under the truck instead of going onto the median to the left. Automatic follow distance has also gotten me rear ended 2 times in rental cars by excessively panic breaking on the highway at 75 MPH. If you wear glasses the driver eye monitor always thinks you're not looking at the road and slows the car because it cannot see through glare bouncing off the lenses at times. I don't trust these new systems.

[KevinGre]

No discussion of the race to the bottom of bigger is safer which is leading to everyone driving 5000 plus pound tanks. Also there are times when automated braking and steering is actually more dangerous and those systems must always come with the option to turn them off. Those who track their cars need to be able to turn them off or those cars will get banned from such activities, ironically by insurance companies covering the organizations and instructors running those driving events.

[HygienistDentist]

David and IIHS are doing amazing work! Go them! Go safety!

[baronvonjo]

I have seen younger driver in newer cars with safety features.
They are so use to only using backup cameras and lane keep assists they are actively becoming worst drivers.
I test drove a car with lane keep assit and honestly it was awful. Maybe there was a way to turn it off. But it just kept beeping and beeping.
There's a place for this stuff but it seems meh...

[BewareTheLilyOfTheValley]

I hope by the time my mom needs additional assistance in her older years, she'll still have a way to travel as public transportation isn't the best in this country. And older drivers having lapses of judgement or medical issues pose a huge risk to everyone. Would be even more cool if you could put something on the car that when it's started up, it sends a signal to a trusted second person (in my mom's case, that could be me) and so I'm aware she's gotten in the car and can monitor where she's going. I would say to maybe add remote disabling of the vehicle such as if they're trying to drive at night in the rain, but that might be rife for elder abuse.

Though that said, if we can get better with self-driving cars, this might not pose such a huge danger in the future. I could seriously do with having this myself as these conditions are my worst nightmare, especially when also combined with construction going on. When reflectors have been removed from the road and lanes have been erased or faded out, I have nearly collided with cars by riding too close to them because I can no longer tell where my lane is. Which...I'd love to see if Teslas can handle that scenario. I don't think I've ever seen anyone test it in a dangerous environment like that. Mid-sized cities like mine that are expanding with more roadways would be perfect for that kind of test.

Anywho...I'm just spitballing ideas here, they're not perfect, but I'm trying to think of how someone who is older can keep more of their independence, especially as things like frequent doctor's appointements or going grocery shopping might not be possible if someone's adult children have to work and can't take time off. Not eveyone can afford a homemaker, like my grandmother said she had and is looking for a new one after recently moving (my aunt helps her out as well).

[edyann]

I have my Jeeps Patriot and Wrangler and I'm old school: I just cannot trust a car that tells me what to do.

[KevinLyda]

Quite simply: because of government mandates. Car manufacturers were required by law to include seat belts and air bags; meet certain crash test ratings. These regulations were fought but as time went on car makers buckled and started to market for safety.

Government regulation works.

[hoorayquestionmark]

I had to chuckle at the end of the video when they talked about aggressive driving- my kids and I see this awful driving everyday on the way to school and his theory (which seems accurate to me) is that luxury car drivers think that because they paid a lot of money the rules don’t apply to them. It’s not so much aggressive as it is entitled driving.