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Department of Transportation Makes Rear View Cameras Mandatory
An anonymous reader writes "The Department of Transportation issued a new rule (PDF) on Monday requiring car manufacturers to include rearview cameras in all cars manufactured after May 1, 2018. The rule applies to all cars weighing less than 10,000 pounds, including buses and trucks, but does not include motorcycles and trailers. '[The cameras] must give drivers a field of vision measuring at least 10 by 20 feet directly behind the vehicle. The system must also meet other requirements including dashboard image size, lighting conditions and display time.' An estimated 13 to 15 deaths and 1,125 injuries may be prevented with the implementation of this new requirement."
I've got eyes in the back of my head, you insensitive clod!
Time for bed, said Zebedee - boing
Let's just ban cars. And scissors. How many people died from choking last year? Surely there's some way to prevent those.
They can include a dash cam and side view cameras as well along with an interface that allows me to copy filmed material to an SD card or something... That would have saved me twice from getting stuck with being 50 percent at fault (both times the other driver ignored a red light).
Only to idiots, are orders laws.
-- Henning von Tresckow
What society really needs to do is admit that some people are simply unfit to be in control of a vehicle and deny them a license.
Fail the test three times, that's it. No more chances.
PS: I guess this isn't too expensive. By 2018 screens will be standard instead of analog instruments (they're cheaper!) and cameras will cost $0.10.
No sig today...
So about 2 years after this is required most high end autos will be equipped with self driving systems making the rule almost irrelevant. It won't be long before technology will be outpacing this kind of safety law. We really should be putting energy into liability issues around the self driving car.
It all starts at 0
All because people are too lazy or too fat to turn around in their seat and look behind them or check their side mirrors.
I can't count the number of people I see every week who, when backing up, only look in their rear view mirror to see what's behind them. It is a rare sight indeed to see someone do what they're supposed to and turn around both ways to look behind them.
This is the result. Another piece of useless cruft shoehorned into a car just waiting to implode and cost the owner hundreds of dollars in repairs.
We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
they can be tilted slightly up!
Set your phasers on "funky"!
So, an average of 7 million cars sold each year.
About half already have these cameras.
Using the NHTSB estimates ($43 to upgrade models that already do backup cams to meet the new spec, $143 to put them in models that don't currently do that), we get an approximate cost to implement this mandate of $650 milllion annually.
Which will prevent ~15 deaths per year, and ~1200 serious injuries.
So, $40 million per death, or $$500,000 per injury. Seems to me it costs less than $500,000 to treat someone for an injury, so I'm not sure how this is going to "save money".
And 15 deaths is so trivial as to be ridiculous. Hell, we even have more measles deaths than that (60 on average, in years we don't have a massive outbreak like this year)....
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
Our rearview camera is completely useless about 70% of the time, as the snow and mud almost always have it covered unless you physically get out of the car and clean it off. But good thing for this, lets make cars even more expensive for average joe just trying to get by.
neorush
Yeah, they probably monitor your turn signals too, so they can do turn by turn spying on you. Sheesh
Having had a backup camera on my RV for the last several years, I can state they are an inexpensive godsend.
Because it isn't all about safety. It's about seeing where stuff is, and to avoid it when I'm backing up Keeps the RV dent free.
But the safety aspect is important also.It keeps me from backing over people in campgrounds. I do personally know two people that have run over and killed one of their children while backing up. Lest someone spout off with the "Won't someone think of the Children!" nonsense - It isn't about them. Those kids could care less now because they are dead. . It's about the Parent who is now tortured with knowing they killed their child.
I detest safety culture. But a backup camera makes as much sense as having a fire extinguisher in the garage or kitchen, or car. A backup camera makes as much sense as turn signals, or brake lights, or tempered glass rear windows and laminated safety glass for windshields. Just makes sense.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
You're forgetting the non-zero cost to the economy of people who would ordinarily be stripped from the gene pool by their own idiocy, by standing behind a car, below the sight line of the driver, while the car is reversing.
So you'd strip toddlers from the gene pool? Yeah, that's the ticket...
1. The mirrors have blindspots. That's why this proposal exists. Kids being backed over by cars is a common problem.
2. The "expensive new cars" are likely to be, like, $10 more expensive. How much do you think an LCD, wire, and cheap 1990s-cameraphone camera costs right now? You're seriously fucking telling me there are people out there who WILL buy a $25,000 car, but not a $25,010 car? SERIOUSLY?
Technology improves and gets cheaper over time. Sometimes it's a good thing to take advantage of it.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
Of course, this is ignoring the INCREASE in accidents this will cause by people looking forward, staring at a screen rather than backwards while backing up, missing little details like traffic to the left and right, etc. I'd be much happier if they mandated a minimum visibility spec out the back than cameras, we're now mandating distracted backing up... blech.
(Side note, I won't be riding a motorcycle on the street ever again, too many idiots not paying attention at the wheel now, this isn't going to help.)
How about costing millions a year for 12-15 theoretical deaths?
That's assuming people USE the backup camera. After all, don't we already have THREE MIRRORS?
Are you seriously going to use that excuse? Seriously? Now I want you to tell me that with those three mirrors, you have a view of everything behind you.
There are few investments with such a poor return.
Nothing on a car is an investment, You use that word. I don't think you know what it means.
How about all the deaths caused by people driving old, worn-out cars without proven safety features like air bags
So people driving cars without airbags are killing people? By the way, airbags occasionally kill people. That's a lot of violence going on when one of them actuates. Lots of broken noses, burns, and broken arms are not all that unusual. A backup camera is pretty benign by comparison. Even so, Airbags save more people than they kill or hurt.
because they can't afford expensive new cars with mandatory cameras?
Starting to have a little trouble parsing you. Seems like you are arguing against your point.
How about wanting a simple, well-organized instrument cluster, but instead you have a big LCD screen in the middle that's useless except for the .1% of the time you're backing up?
To attempt to answer what I think you are trying to say, Who on earth would put a monitor in the middle of an instrument cluster? My backup camera is in the middle of the top of the dashboard. It only comes on when I am in reverse. At that point I am stopped, or nearly so. The rearward cam takes no more than a glance, just like I do with the mirrors. Doesn't interfere with anything. And its not on when I'm moving forward.
Because it's not like the auto makers are going to throw in touch-screen climate controls and entertainment systems for free.
I truly am not following this line of reasoning.
Instead, your conventional controls are going to be squeezed into an inconvenient area with tiny controls you can't reach, so when you try to shut off the radio you rear-end someone.
As noted before, it isn't that way. I have no idea how a little screen in an area away from the instrument cluster, and is only on when I am in reverse is going to cause me to rear end someone. Seriously, your hatred of these devices, and the objections you raise that have no basis in fact, are showing that you might be advised to look into them before you condemn them.
Otherwise it would not be incorrect to say you are just pulling shit out of your hat.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
Side note, I won't be riding a motorcycle on the street ever again
Thank you! Please spread the word.
I've had it with motorcyclists who invent their own rules and take unnecessary risks (like passing me on the right while we're both executing a right-hand turn) putting everyone in danger.
Required reading for internet skeptics
Exactly.
Think of the rear monitor as just another mirror. You're supposed to check all the mirrors. Well, the rear monitor is just one more to check. Big deal.
Check out my world simulator thingy.
> Technically, it is neither legal nor illegal in California.
BY DEFINITION is something is NOT illegal, then it is LEGAL.
What part of the 10th amendment do you not understand??