As much as I dislike governmental interference in automobile design I would like to see touch screens eliminated from motor vehicles or perhaps limited to use when the car is not moving. I can operate all the controls in my current cars withing having to look at them. Each control has a distinctive shape that tells me what it’s function. My grownup car cas steering wheel controls for the radio/CD player and my fun car was built without a radio and none of it’s controls are labeled in any way yet I can find them on the dash without looking at them. My fun car (Austin Healey Frogeye) has the factory heater controls mounted under the bonnet and requires that the car be stopped and the bonnet opened to turn the heat on or off. No touch screens needed here.
Rather than outlawing touch screens, banning texting, banning cell phone use in school zones, outlawing applying mascara at a red light, but allowing applying lipstick- HOW ABOUT we just give out tickets for Distracted Driving- period. Then we can spend time working on some different laws. In 1975 you still had to push the buttons on your radio to change stations, or scan stations- you still had to turn the heat or air conditioning or fan controls. I remember fast forwarding my cassette tapes to find the good song. There were no intermittant wipers- you had to turn them off and on curing a light mist, etc. If you are driving while distracted and cause an accident because of it, you deserve the ticket or punishment.
Forget about touch screens let get national laws enforced in every state for cell phones and text messaging. This is the inital problem which now the goverment is passing over to go to touch screens. Touch screens are no more dangerious than a 1950’s car with a radio, as you too had to push these buttons to change stations and turn a knob to increase or decrease volume which neither had a time limitation on them.
Useable Voice reconigtion in vehicles and cell phone would make much more sense.
Touchscreens and all other similar devices (such as GPS screens, etc.) should be disabled at all times when the vehicle is moving. I also would like to see the government get out of our lives to the greatest extent possible, but since the government insists on its intrusions, at least let them be intelligent (or is that a contradiction?). There are far too many distracted drivers now, with their cell phones, texting, and going anything and everything besides paying attention to their driving. We all see thjis every day.
I’m in agreement about keeping distractions to a minimum; however, turning off a GPS screen when the car is moving is truly counterproductive. Hands-free and voice activated devices allow the driver to keep his eyes on the road and his hands on the wheel.
You can tell who doesn’t have a touch screen by the comments. I was right there with Huh! because I thought it would turn everything off. Now I get it, thanks for pointing out the obvious. (not sarcasm – promise!)
My wife uses the GPS touch screen to find nearby restaurants while on the road, or to find alternate routes in the event of an accident on the Interstate. While I’m driving, I don’t even worry about that and am therefore not distracted as I know she’s taking care of it.
I absolutely hate that my navigation cannot be operated when the car is moving. If the seat sensor indicates a passenger is in the car, it should not be disabled. Many times I have been en route to somewhere and need my husband to program in a different address while I’m driving but I have to be stopped or in park. This is a ridiculous proposal.
But then you could just stick a cinder block, bowling ball or other dense, heavy objects in the passenger seat to get around this “fail safe.” Then they could raise the weight requirement to say, 150 lbs, or 200 even to get around bowling balls and lead ingots. But then this begs further questions: What if your passenger is light? What if they only weigh 120 lbs? How about 140? Of course, this brings in a secondary function, if you want to find out someone’s weight you can just stick them in your passenger seat and see if it trips the “movement disable” function in your touchscreen or not.
Here’s an idea that eliminates this whole problem – USE BUTTONS. Nobody stares all day at BUTTONS when they can just FEEL THEM. Who would have thought that the smart, futuristic technological idea was to disable one of the 5 human senses by having flat everything.
Such regulations I suppose will work fine for such devices installed in the vehicle. But what about portable GPS units or smartphones with GPS software installed in them? Another situation where our elected politcians have not thought this through. Surprise, surprise.
I agree that touchscreens should go and tactile controls should be returned. Touchscreens look nice but they do provide a great distraction for the driver.
Idiots will find a way to drive dangerously regardless of what regulations the bureaucrats impose. Intelligent individuals don’t need restrictions in order to know they shouldn’t be excessively fiddling with a touchscreen while driving.
Like virtually all legislation this will solve nothing and just result in increased costs and reduced freedom for the consumer.
Also – why should a passenger be limited to the same number of touches as the driver? If my passenger is fiddling with the touchscreen options, they should be able to use the system unencumbered.
Good point Rosenblatt! I just bought a car 1 month ago with a touchscreen. I intend to use the device. You can use it to change the radio station (but the driver can also use the button on the steering wheel). If I was really stupid, I could use it to manually dial a phone number from the blue tooth cell phone- but I would not do this while driving. The passenger might need to call a number. Better than trying to use my cell phone to manually dial- I need my reading glasses for that trick.
I think if they do pass this regulation, and one is to touch the screen too many times, MC Hammer should be programmed to show up on the screen and sing, “Can’t Touch This.”
“My, my, my music hits me so hard, makes me say, Oh my Lord! Thank you for blessing me with a mind to rhyme and two hype feet…”
I really don’t like this Ray LaHood guy. All the Republican criticisms of the Obama administration actually seem to apply to the US DOT. And yet people here seem to be supportive, because of this perceived “new” problem of distracted driving.
They’ll figure this touchscreen deal out.
I would rather see some standardization of the location of controls in cars. If I’m driving a rental, or even if I’m driving my wife’s car at night…it can be a bear to hit headlights or windshield wipers when I need them quickly. Same with emergency flashers, cruise control, etc. They place them differently in different cars. If they were generally placed the same way in all cars, that would improve driving safety, especially at night.
As much as I dislike governmental interference in automobile design I would like to see touch screens eliminated from motor vehicles or perhaps limited to use when the car is not moving. I can operate all the controls in my current cars withing having to look at them. Each control has a distinctive shape that tells me what it’s function. My grownup car cas steering wheel controls for the radio/CD player and my fun car was built without a radio and none of it’s controls are labeled in any way yet I can find them on the dash without looking at them. My fun car (Austin Healey Frogeye) has the factory heater controls mounted under the bonnet and requires that the car be stopped and the bonnet opened to turn the heat on or off. No touch screens needed here.
I think cars should be updated with a version of Apple’s Siri or similar software with voice recognition.
That way, when I get road rage and call the other guy an “@hole”, I get my rear end wiped.
And the car’s, too.
This is exactly what is wrong with today’s distracted and/or truly stupid drivers, “reality bites”. Keep your wrotten language to yourself.
“Siri, remove rigid cellulose blockage from Expert’s tailpipe”.
Rather than outlawing touch screens, banning texting, banning cell phone use in school zones, outlawing applying mascara at a red light, but allowing applying lipstick- HOW ABOUT we just give out tickets for Distracted Driving- period. Then we can spend time working on some different laws. In 1975 you still had to push the buttons on your radio to change stations, or scan stations- you still had to turn the heat or air conditioning or fan controls. I remember fast forwarding my cassette tapes to find the good song. There were no intermittant wipers- you had to turn them off and on curing a light mist, etc. If you are driving while distracted and cause an accident because of it, you deserve the ticket or punishment.
Forget about touch screens let get national laws enforced in every state for cell phones and text messaging. This is the inital problem which now the goverment is passing over to go to touch screens. Touch screens are no more dangerious than a 1950’s car with a radio, as you too had to push these buttons to change stations and turn a knob to increase or decrease volume which neither had a time limitation on them.
Useable Voice reconigtion in vehicles and cell phone would make much more sense.
Touchscreens and all other similar devices (such as GPS screens, etc.) should be disabled at all times when the vehicle is moving. I also would like to see the government get out of our lives to the greatest extent possible, but since the government insists on its intrusions, at least let them be intelligent (or is that a contradiction?). There are far too many distracted drivers now, with their cell phones, texting, and going anything and everything besides paying attention to their driving. We all see thjis every day.
I’m in agreement about keeping distractions to a minimum; however, turning off a GPS screen when the car is moving is truly counterproductive. Hands-free and voice activated devices allow the driver to keep his eyes on the road and his hands on the wheel.
I think what Expert meant was have the touch screen function inoperable while the car is moving.
You can tell who doesn’t have a touch screen by the comments. I was right there with Huh! because I thought it would turn everything off. Now I get it, thanks for pointing out the obvious. (not sarcasm – promise!)
My wife uses the GPS touch screen to find nearby restaurants while on the road, or to find alternate routes in the event of an accident on the Interstate. While I’m driving, I don’t even worry about that and am therefore not distracted as I know she’s taking care of it.
I absolutely hate that my navigation cannot be operated when the car is moving. If the seat sensor indicates a passenger is in the car, it should not be disabled. Many times I have been en route to somewhere and need my husband to program in a different address while I’m driving but I have to be stopped or in park. This is a ridiculous proposal.
But then you could just stick a cinder block, bowling ball or other dense, heavy objects in the passenger seat to get around this “fail safe.” Then they could raise the weight requirement to say, 150 lbs, or 200 even to get around bowling balls and lead ingots. But then this begs further questions: What if your passenger is light? What if they only weigh 120 lbs? How about 140? Of course, this brings in a secondary function, if you want to find out someone’s weight you can just stick them in your passenger seat and see if it trips the “movement disable” function in your touchscreen or not.
Here’s an idea that eliminates this whole problem – USE BUTTONS. Nobody stares all day at BUTTONS when they can just FEEL THEM. Who would have thought that the smart, futuristic technological idea was to disable one of the 5 human senses by having flat everything.
Some navigation systems are now voice activated.
Such regulations I suppose will work fine for such devices installed in the vehicle. But what about portable GPS units or smartphones with GPS software installed in them? Another situation where our elected politcians have not thought this through. Surprise, surprise.
I agree that touchscreens should go and tactile controls should be returned. Touchscreens look nice but they do provide a great distraction for the driver.
Idiots will find a way to drive dangerously regardless of what regulations the bureaucrats impose. Intelligent individuals don’t need restrictions in order to know they shouldn’t be excessively fiddling with a touchscreen while driving.
Like virtually all legislation this will solve nothing and just result in increased costs and reduced freedom for the consumer.
Also – why should a passenger be limited to the same number of touches as the driver? If my passenger is fiddling with the touchscreen options, they should be able to use the system unencumbered.
Good point Rosenblatt! I just bought a car 1 month ago with a touchscreen. I intend to use the device. You can use it to change the radio station (but the driver can also use the button on the steering wheel). If I was really stupid, I could use it to manually dial a phone number from the blue tooth cell phone- but I would not do this while driving. The passenger might need to call a number. Better than trying to use my cell phone to manually dial- I need my reading glasses for that trick.
It’s the Stig! Cool!
Didn’t know the Stig followed insurance news, the Stig just got way cooler.
(Please tell me there are more than 2 people in IJ land that know of the Stig…)
I think if they do pass this regulation, and one is to touch the screen too many times, MC Hammer should be programmed to show up on the screen and sing, “Can’t Touch This.”
“My, my, my music hits me so hard, makes me say, Oh my Lord! Thank you for blessing me with a mind to rhyme and two hype feet…”
I needed some good MC Hammer on this Friday, thanks Planet!
Seems like it’s going to be a loopy afternoon.
When the driverless “Google car” is available, it will solve all these problems (and probably create new ones..lol).
I really don’t like this Ray LaHood guy. All the Republican criticisms of the Obama administration actually seem to apply to the US DOT. And yet people here seem to be supportive, because of this perceived “new” problem of distracted driving.
They’ll figure this touchscreen deal out.
I would rather see some standardization of the location of controls in cars. If I’m driving a rental, or even if I’m driving my wife’s car at night…it can be a bear to hit headlights or windshield wipers when I need them quickly. Same with emergency flashers, cruise control, etc. They place them differently in different cars. If they were generally placed the same way in all cars, that would improve driving safety, especially at night.