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Automatic emergency braking should become mandatory, feds say

arstechnica.com

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Re: Automatic emergency braking should become mandatory, feds say

#301

Post by AlotOfReading »

hallway_monitor wrote: post #164
peteradio wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

360 deaths is noise.

Exactly. It's 0.92% of the 38,000 car crash deaths in the US annually. I agree, this is noise and honestly it doesn't make sense the NHTSA would even consider a mandatory "safety" feature like this for that small of an expected change. Personally, I will not be purchasing a car with this feature until I'm forced to.

Feel free to look at the numbers in the PRIA [1]. Those 360 deaths are a significant reduction in fatalities from baseline in the types of collisions they expect to be impacted by this rulemaking. That baseline itself assumes some 65% of new vehicles will come with compliant AEB systems regardless of this rulemaking.

[1] https://www.regulations.gov/document/NHTSA-2023-0021-0004

Re: Automatic emergency braking should become mandatory, feds say

#302

Post by interroboink »

ceejayoz wrote: post #95
dabluecaboose wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not exclusively a "gearhead" opinion to not want a system in your car that can violently take control away from you unexpectedly Statistics are meaningless to the individual. Sure, emergency braking might be safer across the board, but that means little compared to an individual who already drives safely without it.

> Statistics are meaningless to the individual. This is just blatantly untrue. > means little compared to an individual who already drives safely without it Until emergency breaking stops a bad driver from T-boning you in an intersection as they run a red light. “I’ll just drive safely” was the argument against seatbelts, airbags, and antilock brakes. Motorcycle helmets, too.

I realize you already had some discussions on this point, but perhaps I can shed some light — I think your disagreements come down to a difference in interpretation of language.

Here's one interpretation of "statistics are meaningless to the individual": If X makes people in general statistically more likely to do Y (such as "avoid accidents", in this case), it does not say anything about the effect it will have on a particular individual's behavior, such as you or me. In fact, it could very well make you or me less likely to do Y. As long as it averages out over the population, the statistic is still true. But you need to know the individual in order to know how X specifically affects them.

I think you are taking a different/broader-scope interpretation of the statement. Something like: if X makes people in general (...as above), then given that we live in a society of various people, it will have some at least some impact, perhaps indirect, on all of us (c.f. your comments about taxes, insurance rates, etc).

Maybe you got that already, but I'm a sucker for helping people be aware of when they're talking past each other (:

Re: Automatic emergency braking should become mandatory, feds say

#303

Post by mattmcknight »

ddalcino wrote: post #20
jacquesm wrote: post #6

This almost got me into a serious accident, twice. Definitely would not recommend and I switched cars because of it. The last thing I need is buggy software with the capability of instantly changing the trajectory of my vehicle (slippery surfaces, cornering). A brand car as well (MB) so really, really disappointed, what should have been a safety feature actually was the opposite. Dealer said everything was fine so th…

Would you care to elaborate on what went wrong? The other comments here make ‘automatic emergency braking’ sound like a really good idea, and it’s hard for me to imagine that this particular feature would be so problematic. If you’re talking about other automatic steering features, that’s very different, and your comment makes more sense to me.

What it keeps doing to my wife is stopping the car (Audi) in oncoming traffic when she is making a left turn from a median across a road that is two lanes in each direction. She is basically jamming the accelerator to go, and so it applies the brakes for a very hard stop, which once resulted in the car behind her not being able to stop.

Re: Automatic emergency braking should become mandatory, feds say

#304

Post by Merad »

karaterobot wrote: post #31
ddalcino wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you care to elaborate on what went wrong? The other comments here make ‘automatic emergency braking’ sound like a really good idea, and it’s hard for me to imagine that this particular feature would be so problematic. If you’re talking about other automatic steering features, that’s very different, and your comment makes more sense to me.

Not the person you were responding to, but here's an anecdatum: One time I was driving behind someone under otherwise normal conditions, and they turned right into a parking lot. As they turned right, they obviously began exiting the road. The screen on my car screamed "BRAKE!" and then the braking system activated. They were about 60% of the way into the parking lot, and continuing to exit. I was at a normal followi…

To be honest it sounds like you're making a damned good argument in favor of mandatory AEB. You're risking a collision because you assume that the car that's turning will behave in the way you expect it to behave (no judgement, I usually do it too). If you're wrong there's a high risk of a multi-car accident because naturally all the drivers in line behind you are tailgating.

Re: Automatic emergency braking should become mandatory, feds say

#305

Post by AlotOfReading »

matheusmoreira wrote: post #237
maximinus_thrax wrote: post #32

Looking at the comments here I need to double check if I'm on some gearhead forum where automatic transmission is considered appropriate exclusively for teenagers and geriatric patients. Anyway, I'll add my anecdote when my Toyota surprised me with a panic brake in a blind corner which probably saved my life by not ending up under a stopped bus. But the kicker is that my insurer gave me quite a steep discount when I…

Wanting to have control over the vehicle is not some "gearhead forum" thing at all. I barely care about cars and I still care about this. I'm the driver, I should be in control and there's literally no need to justify it any further. Anything that forcibly takes away control is automatically wrong from a basic human dignity perspective. I couldn't care less what governments or insurers think, I'm the goddamn human an…

I'm baffled by this comment. For one thing, this is literally not how vehicle regulation has worked in any western country for at least half a century, probably longer. There are already legally mandated systems that take away driver control in certain circumstances, notably ABS.

For another, the NPRM being discussed assumes that essentially 100% of new vehicles will eventually come with AEB systems in the near future. The proposed rulemaking is just formalizing that situation and setting performance standards.

Re: Automatic emergency braking should become mandatory, feds say

#306

Post by imp0cat »

hnick wrote: post #115
ics wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wrote up a long comment that got scrapped by my focus filter but I feel the need to voice strong agreement here. I have a recent Mazda which in almost all ways is my perfect car except for the newfangled safety features all new cars seem to have. Lane correction and emergency braking, even set to the lowest sensitivity levels, are bad to outright dangerous in city (and some country) driving. In NYC it's common to h…

My new car has lane keep assist and AEB and I haven't had these issues. From what I hear it's very much to do with a maker's implementation (mine is Hyundai, who for various reasons seems to have a bad reputation in North America but a good one in Australia). For the lane keep assist I feel a nudge but it's extremely easy to overcome just through a normal grip on the wheel - if I don't budge it won't move. It's been…

Yes, *near* perfect is the correct word. Anecdotally, in a 2021 Hyundai, I do get random AEB warnings in the city mostly when merging into fast-flowing traffic.

Thankfully it is possible to have the system set to beep only as slamming on the brakes while merging is an experience everyone wants to avoid.

Also, it sometimes panics when coming to a stop on an incline with a car ahead. I guess it is unable to account for the fact that the car will stop by itself just because the road is going uphill?

Re: Automatic emergency braking should become mandatory, feds say

#307

Post by imp0cat »

midoridensha wrote: post #250
ISL wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Automatic lane-keeping assist is generally turned on at all times with modern cars.

Interesting; when did this happen? From my experience, ~2017-era cars had it only as part of cruise control. Keeping it on at all times sounds like a terrible idea for cars used in the US, because it's a developing nation with extremely poor road quality. In developed nations, it's probably OK because you can count on the road markings being good almost everywhere, but not in the US.

I think it only turns on above certain speed and yes, it can get easily confused by various road imperfections.

But yeah, you need to make sure there is a physical button on the steering wheel or somehere on the dashboard to easily enable/disable it. Otherwise it can be annoying.

Re: Automatic emergency braking should become mandatory, feds say

#308

Post by imp0cat »

mkmk wrote: post #69
jacquesm wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seatbelt tensioners are life savers. They're a little explosive charge under the chair near the seatbelt attachment point that yanks hard on the belt to squeeze you against the chair while the car comes to a stop. They're super powerful and you don't want to mess with them unless you know exactly what you're doing (see also: airbags).

Interesting! My recollection was that it was a non-explosive tensioner, but maybe I'm wrong. Thinking about explosive tensioners reminds me of an EOD tool I recently learned about – the rocket wrench. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=11qa5LFB6zI [1:36]

Was that a VW? Sounds like their PreCrash system. When it detects impeding collision, it tensions seatbelts and closes windows.

Re: Automatic emergency braking should become mandatory, feds say

#309

Post by nerdponx »

taeric wrote: post #25

I confess that I find a dark humor in how many self professed "great drivers" find these features a nuisance. All the while so many people are completely unaware that they have these, as they have never activated. Hard for me to square those pegs in a favorable way. Which, yes, being a great driver means you may be pushing close to limits while still be completely under control a lot. I just don't have a strong prior…

Nuisance or not is a false dichotomy. Mandating it rather than simply offering it makes cars even more expensive, by making cheap cars even more unprofitable to sell. Imagine if car ownership becomes increasingly unaffordable, like what homeownership has become.

Re: Automatic emergency braking should become mandatory, feds say

#310

Post by imp0cat »

trgn wrote: post #272
getmeinrn wrote: post #138

I've always wondered why brakes don't have a variable brightness based on how hard the driver is braking. If you've ever been behind someone who has braked hard, part of the danger is not realizing just how fast they're stopping.

New cars they flicker rapidly I thought

Yes, they do. Some even activate hazard lights when coming to a rapid stop.
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