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New cars will stop drivers from speeding under European laws

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Re: New cars will stop drivers from speeding under European laws

#71
post #50
post #3

There is absolutely no reason any road car should be able to (consistently) drive faster than ~150km/h

You’d eliminate all traffic fatalities if you limited cars to 5 mph. We as a society have collectively decided that X number of traffic fatalities are acceptable. It’s the price everyone pays for efficient transportation. Why 150km/h and not 40km/h? Are you too impatient to drive 40km/h even though it could save lives?

Oh no, we will just limit it at the speed limit. What could be the problem with that?

No one has accepted anything, certainly not the increasing number of dead pedestrians from ever larger cars. You surely recognize the massive moral hazard.

Re: New cars will stop drivers from speeding under European laws

#73

At this rate, Europe will become 2nd world by the end of the century. Instead of focusing on innovation and competition in the global market, Europeans are busy legislating their freedoms away.

I'm not aware of a "freedom to speed" under either the US Constitution or the EU's Charter of Fundamental Rights.

Speeding falls under the "expedient" category of crimes: it's been illegal this entire time, but selectively enforced for practical reasons. Nobody wants to live in a society where a sufficient number of police are chartered to universally enforce speeding laws, so this seems like a very reasonable solution.

Re: New cars will stop drivers from speeding under European laws

#74

I object to driving any car with a built-in GPS or an internet connection, on basic privacy grounds. It amazes me how many advocacy groups and organizations [edit: and bicycle fans right here on HN!] are willing to completely demolish essential rights like privacy and freedom of movement, in the name of preventing speeding accidents.

GPS is not a tracking technology. It's read-only. It allows you to determine your coordinates by listening to satellites. GPS receivers don't send your location.

I think they mean the advent of sending that GPS data over a cellular modem back to some home server. Due to the advent of GDPR+CLOUD Act[0], no US company can legally own a subsidiary in the EU and collect any PII-linked data from EU citizens; in other words, the GDPR's goal is to localize all citizen data within the country's borders. With this, it'll be super easy for a country to obtain that locally-stored information for the purpose of police 'investigations' (possibly via europol/similar for cross-country intel).

This should apply to GM, Ford, Stellantis, Tesla, Rivian, and Lucid, as all of them offer some sort of app functionality for seeing the location of your car.

0: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31853276

Re: New cars will stop drivers from speeding under European laws

#75
post #67
post #13

The governments will surely miss out on a lot of revenue if cars start preventing people from speeding.

But lives will be saved, that is worth the lost in revenue.

Do you have any statistics to back that claim up? E.g. loss of workforce / strain put on the healthcare system vs revenue from traffic policing.

Re: New cars will stop drivers from speeding under European laws

#76

I object to driving any car with a built-in GPS or an internet connection, on basic privacy grounds. It amazes me how many advocacy groups and organizations [edit: and bicycle fans right here on HN!] are willing to completely demolish essential rights like privacy and freedom of movement, in the name of preventing speeding accidents.

It’s near impossible to buy a new car that doesn’t have some “smart” feature. Sadly electric is synonymous with “smart” features so it’s only going to get worse.

Things like ABS, radar controlled cruise control for distance, blind spot mirrors, auto levelling mirrors are all fine in my book, even heads up display for speed. Blind spot mirrors should be regulated as a requirement on all new vehicles.

The connected GPS’s, mobile connections, digital touch displays all seem a backwards step, especially the new thing manufacturers are doing by installing hardware but soft locking the feature until you pay extra.

Re: New cars will stop drivers from speeding under European laws

#77
After their introduction to the US markets I can see these vehicles in Texas having a near zero market share.

There are far too many long stretches of open highway with very light traffic that can easily handle speeds several tens of miles per hour over the posted speed limits. Locals and long-haulers routinely speed down these stretches, slowing down for the towns and then speeding up again once you are through.

This feature - allowing the car to manage vehicle speed, acting as a backseat driver will not only be annoying but will be a nonstarter for many people out here.

I personally will never knowingly buy a vehicle that could override any of my driving decisions in real time or that would nag me with automated messages. I am a trained practitioner of defensive driving techniques since one former employer required all drivers to take classes. I can use those skills to understand real-time highway conditions better than any pre-programmed algorithm ever will.

I don't need an algorithm to babysit me or to back seat drive for me.

Re: New cars will stop drivers from speeding under European laws

#78
Not at all a subtle clue that the EU is rapidly speeding towards (pun very much intended) being a totalitarian socialist police state. On the other hand, one wonders how much support stuff like this will have in the US --- because at least it seems that we have the infamous Franklin quote and at least like to talk about our freedom a lot more...

Re: New cars will stop drivers from speeding under European laws

#79
post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A _vast_ majority of exceeding the speed limit is not done for valid reasons.

I'd argue that it's almost never correct to drive the speed limit. In the US at least they are almost universally slower than the natural speed of the road by 5-10 mph and everyone speeds a bit all the time.

Things must be crashing and burning over there in California with all the driverless cars.

Or you know, cars will just go the speed limit, 10 years from now and you won't even remember your brain simulated a shitty PID controller to hit some speed number subject to your irrational whims.

Re: New cars will stop drivers from speeding under European laws

#80

After their introduction to the US markets I can see these vehicles in Texas having a near zero market share. There are far too many long stretches of open highway with very light traffic that can easily handle speeds several tens of miles per hour over the posted speed limits. Locals and long-haulers routinely speed down these stretches, slowing down for the towns and then speeding up again once you are through. Thi…

Of the 520 drivers, just five considered that they were worse than average – fewer than 1%. The rest – even the truly abysmal drivers who were constantly making errors – considered themselves to be at least as good as the next person, and many thought they were a lot better. It was, essentially, a mass delusion that rendered them completely blind to their own failings [1].

[1] https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20200923-why-arrogance-...

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