High-tech loses out to basic common sense
Recently I was driving a test vehicle when a chime sounded and a warning light appeared on the dash. It was the tire pressure monitoring system (TPMS), telling me a tire was low.
I got out my tire pressure gauge ($2.99 at Canadian Tire – you do have one, right?) and checked them. There wasn't a problem; it was a false reading, no doubt due to a sudden cold snap.
You can probably expect that warning chime in your next new car; the U.S. has mandated a TPMS be installed on every new vehicle. The reason is the TREAD Act, a direct result of the Ford Explorer/Firestone tire fiasco some eight years ago. Millions of tires were recalled, and millions of dollars were spent, and now we have TPMS.
What's missing in the whole equation is common sense. The one thing no one ever seemed to say was that if you're stupid enough to drive a top-heavy SUV like a racecar driver on underinflated tires, something has to give.
We don't need a warning system that everyone's going to ignore anyway (and to its credit, Transport Canada is holding off on mandating TPMS until it determines there's actually any need for it). What we need are people who take responsibility for their actions.
More and more, we're accepting technological "advances" in our cars that do little more than drive up the price, make them harder to repair and move us that much further away from actually controlling the vehicles we're driving.
We don't need cars that dial our cellphones by voice commands; we need drivers who hold off on their calls until they're safely in Park.
We have active cruise control that monitors traffic and hits the brakes if you get too close, but if traffic's that heavy, you should be controlling the throttle yourself.
As for rain-sensing wipers (which never work properly anyway) – are you too dense to figure out there's water on your windshield and you should turn them on?
Technology isn't bad in itself. The problem comes when people use it in place of paying attention and practising good technique.
Anti-lock brakes are one of the best inventions ever, but not if you drive expecting them to save your skin.
Same with electronic stability control – oh, and in case you missed the memo, the U.S. is mandating that in all cars by 2012, too.
We need our vehicles to be reliable and safe, but there comes a point where we have to get back to thinking for ourselves.
In 2006, I went to General Motors in Michigan, where the company had just spent $10.2 million on a rollover crash test facility. Rollovers are rare, but they account for 40 per cent of road fatalities.
Car companies are spending scads of money to keep people alive in these crashes – and yet, of that 40 per cent killed, 70 per cent hadn't bothered to buckle their seatbelts.
The average cost of a new car is now about $32,000. I get letters all the time from readers who want a full set of safety, convenience and entertainment features, and then whine about the high price of new vehicles.
Be careful what you wish for – you just might get it.
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