Comments on: Blind advocates lobby for noisier hybrid cars

They say the clean vehicles' silent nature poses real threats to pedestrians, blind and otherwise, and call for laws to encourage--or, better yet, require--minimum noise output.

[aliunde]

Best yet -- Have the blind wear honking horns on their heads

If we want to bring ourselves down to the level of politicians, I suggest this:

It would be much cheaper and more efficient to put horns that honk on the heads of the blind. They can either keep them on continually or turn them on when about to cross a street. That way drivers know to slow down or stop. Better yet, a siren and flashing police car lights to scare drivers into compliance.

Why add noise pollution to the entire country when it can be limited to the few places the blind might be? Why burden the many when the few can be burdened with equally assinine solutions?

[srikanth_janga]

Another way to tax users

what a wonderful way to tax people even more. and guess what, even blind people will have to pay this tax. TAX TAX TAX TAX ... I cant take this anymore.

[Ushiikun]

Easiest Yet!

For all municipalities across the country build pedestrians bridges instead of just painting crosswalk lines on the roads. Since no pedestrians should ever be on the road, the hybrids can stay quiet.

For those who want the blind to figure it out for themselves, what do you propose they do? I can understand people being tired of bending over backwards for a vocal minority, but what does it hurt to have to gov't look into what can be done?

[Dalkorian]

Funny

For years they've been trying to make cars quieter. Now it
appears they succeeded to well and they want to make them
noisy again. Is that irony or what?

One poster above hinted at this, but no one seems to have
mentioned it yet. There is a cheap and easy answer to this, one
which I particularly don't like, but ... you could just put whistles
on the front bumpers of cars like those deer alert devices. Stop
laughing, I'm serious. A small, cheap plastic device that
resonates below certain speeds (say under 40 MPH), activated by
nothing more than the wind going over the bumper. Of course,
living in a residential neighborhood just became a whistling
nightmare ...

You know, instead of hassling the auto industry they could
instead bug the tire industry to make tires that produce more
road noise under certain speeds. That way it'll be more of an
"equal opportunity offender" law in that it will force everyone to
make their cars noisier and not just the hybrid owners.

Or we could avoid this whole issue entirely by investing the
money it takes to separate drivers from pedestrians. Pedestrian
overpasses aren't so bad, are they?

But I like Bill Mosby's suggestion of returning the the age old
tradition of firing off our guns as we approach intersections.
YEE-HAW!
;-)

[hozelda]

Ears are a key part of moving along streets

I've spent a lot of time walking streets and
sounds are an important tool used to identify
oncoming cars. Of course, I have sight, and if I
knew I could not trust my ears, I would rely
more heavily on my eyes.

Since e-cars are new anyway, we can just require
that all of them have something as they come off
the shop. That something need not be a rattler
though.

Then again, I'm not sure what would work as well
because a major part of avoiding accidents is
the people avoiding the cars, not the other way
around, since cars move too fast, and yes
drivers are distracted quite a bit some times.

Anyway, try muffling your ears when you are out
as a pedestrian. It is a lot more tedious not to
rely on sound. Kids get in the street all the
time, and it is sound that clues them in not
sight (especially in the daytime.. actually more
so at night but for cars that have the
headlights off). You almost always hear the car
before you see it. It's not that much of an
issue if you cross exactly and only at cross
walks, but within neighborhoods it would be
especially dangerous to have fast vehicles with
almost no sound. Drivers don't have people stray
slowly in front of their cars nearly that much
because people hear the cars from afar.

Sound going down will have a positive and a
negative effect.

[dale leath]

all the noise

i can't get this straight all i have heard in past was loud radios n loud cars now quiet is not good enough?how about a cane that vibrates or beeps (using radar)but not too loud as to get arrested for noise!as i heard in past that the radio's were too loud and at some decible level you got a ticket,

[Pennydog2]

Put Clickety Clacks on the wheels

Remember when we rode bicycles as kids and to hot them up we would use cardboard or plastic which was mounted to the frame and jammed into the spokes, why not do that to electric cars.

[Ck87.JF]

directional noise = most important indicator

several people said technology should fix this, that people should carry some device that will vibrate/make noise when a car is near. The problem is, it can only say the car is near, not where it is. People can hear where current cars that make sufficient noise are coming from, as well as where they're going, because of our directional hearing.
In the case that a blind person is in the road and a silent car comes, the beeper in the pocket goes off, the pedestrian knows there's a car, but might not be sure of which way to go.

And that silent "whoosing" of air and rubber on the road might not be heard soon enough.

[Blind-Sided]

We should not cast a blind eye toward this argument. I can see what the blind are saying: we cannot see the cars coming, so we must be able to hear them for the sake of safety. Makes sense.

But let us not lend our countrymen a deaf ear on this issue. The deaf are not arguing that we need to make cars more visible for the sake of safety. Yet this is the exact same argument, but from the position of a different disability.

Since deaf people cannot hear any cars coming, and blind people cannot see any cars coming, how do we change the laws so that both disabled groups are treated equally under the law? Do we make loud cars in flourescent yellow? Do we add warning devices at sub- and super-human hearing levels so that all animals - such as deer and seeing eye dogs - are put on equal notice of oncoming traffic? Do we ban all cars from the roads and revert to travel modes of yore, such as trains, trollys, carriages, horses or our trusty feet?

Get real folks - blind and deaf people are at a higher risk of harm than are the hearing and seeing members of our population. That is a fact, and as a fact it is not discriminatory or in any other way negative. It simply is what it is.

While this does not mean we should ignore their concerns, it may likely mean that they have to adjust to another moving environmental risk - such as in-line skaters, walkers, runners, skate boarders, rollerskaters, scooters, and segway or wheelchair users.

But, in defense of the suggestion that requires a quiet mode of transportation to have a minimum noise level, the challenge is on to all inventors to create a noise-making device that can be used on all forms and modes of transportation that are hybrid-like in their lack of noise - such as in-line skaters, walkers, runners, skate boarders, rollerskaters, scooters, and segway or wheelchair users.

I mean, should a blind or deaf person be at risk of being struck by a silent wheelchair while hybrids are required to make noise? Sanity check, please!

[SilenceIsGolden]

When purchasing a car or motorcycle, some people may prefer a particular engine noise, as they believe it will enable them to impress everyone they drive past. Thus, engine noise can help sell cars. Undoubtedle, the car manufacturers know this. The car manufacturers may even be secretly sponsoring this legislation, and whatever phony research has been done to support the supposed need for car noise. So this may actually be a marketing initiative - masquerading as a safety concern.