[Federal Register Volume 64, Number 36 (Wednesday, February 24, 1999)]
[Proposed Rules]
[Pages 9118-9119]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 99-4582]
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
49 CFR Part 571
[Docket No. NHTSA 99-5094]
Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards
AGENCY: National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), DOT.
ACTION: Denial of petition for rulemaking.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
SUMMARY: The agency denies a petition for rulemaking from Mr. Les Boyd
requesting that NHTSA initiate rulemaking to consider requiring motor
vehicle manufacturers to equip new vehicles with instrumentation
sufficient to alert nearby police whenever the vehicles are being
operated with an unbelted occupant. Mr. Boyd suggested that
implementation of the requested amendment would lead to increases in
the rate of safety belt use.
The agency is denying the petition for the following reasons.
First, implementation of the requested amendment would be costly since
it would necessitate the installation of seat belt use sensors and a
transmitter in each vehicle. Second, the requested amendment would have
limited effect on safety belt use rates in the majority of states that
have mandatory safety belt use laws. These states permit officers to
stop a vehicle or issue a citation for an occupant's failure to use a
safety belt only if the officers also observe a separate concurrent
violation. Third, even in those states whose mandatory safety belt use
laws permit officers to enforce those laws without the necessity of
observing a separate concurrent violation, the requested amendment
might not lead to increased safety belt use. In order for officers to
readily identify the vehicle emitting the signal, the instrumentation
would have to identify such things as the make, model, model year and
perhaps even color and vehicle identification number of that vehicle.
The transmission of such information would raise privacy concerns.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Mr. Clarke Harper, Office of
Crashworthiness Standards, NRM-11, National Highway Traffic Safety
Administration, 400 Seventh Street, SW., Washington, DC 20590.
Telephone (202) 366-4916.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: On February 5, 1998, Mr. Les Boyd submitted
a petition for rulemaking requesting that NHTSA consider
[[Page 9119]]
requiring motor vehicle manufacturers to equip new vehicles with
instrumentation sufficient to alert nearby police whenever the vehicles
are being operated while one or more occupants are unbelted. Mr. Boyd
argued that automobile crashes are increasing and that more effort must
be made to insure that ``all occupants are wearing seat belts and/or
wiring harness.'' The petitioner did not provide any data or other
information relating to the cost of such devices, their effectiveness
or the feasibility of such a system.
NHTSA agrees that the failure of many vehicle occupants to use
safety belts is a significant concern. The agency has expended
considerable effort and resources to improve the rate of safety belt
use in the United States. NHTSA has prepared and distributed numerous
legislative fact sheets, position papers, success stories, model laws
for both seat belts and child passenger safety, and other materials on
the benefits of mandatory seat belt and child passenger safety laws.
Agency employees have testified, when invited by the state, at state
legislative hearings for states when they were in the process of
enacting the belt use laws. More recently, NHTSA employees have
testified in support of attempts within various states to change
secondary enforcement laws, under which police officers must observe a
separate and distinct violation before stopping a vehicle where
occupants are not using belts, to primary enforcement laws. Primary
enforcement laws allow police officers to make stops and issue
citations on the basis of observing only a seat belt violation. NHTSA
has also established Cooperative Agreements with numerous states to
demonstrate that publicized enforcement of a mandatory seat belt law
can increase seat belt use in the state and formed formal partnerships
with many national organizations for the purpose of mobilizing their
membership to promote traffic safety in general, and seat belt and
child safety seat use in particular. The agency has produced brochures,
posters, videos, print ads, bill boards, public service announcements,
and a host of other media resource materials to educate the public on
the safety benefits of seat belts. Other activities pursued by the
agency to improve belt use include programs to improve the training of
law enforcement officers, the use of child safety seat checkpoints and
other measures designed to improve belt use and enforcement of
mandatory belt use laws.
Even though the benefits of increased safety belt use would be
considerable, the agency believes that requiring all vehicles to be
equipped with a transmitter would, under present conditions, be
unlikely to improve enforcement of mandatory safety belt laws in the
majority of jurisdictions. Mandatory safety belt use laws are now in
effect in 49 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and the
Virgin Islands. Of these, 35 states and the District of Columbia have
secondary laws. Equipping vehicles with a device which alerted police
officers to a safety belt violation would be of little use in these
jurisdictions. The officers would be prohibited from taking any action
unless they observed a separate and distinct violation at the same
time. Under those conditions, the agency believes that it is extremely
unlikely that state and local governments would invest in the police
car equipment necessary to implement the scheme suggested by the
petitioner.
Even in those jurisdictions with primary enforcement laws, the
requested amendment might not lead to increased safety belt use. In
order for the transmitting device to work successfully in areas where
there are large concentrations of vehicles, the device would have to do
more than simply alert police officers that a safety belt violation was
occurring in the vicinity. In order to allow identification of the
vehicle in which an operator or occupant was not wearing a belt, the
transmitting device would have to transmit sufficient specific
information about the vehicle to enable police to distinguish it from
other vehicles. These identifying data would, at the very least, have
to include information regarding the color, manufacturer and
configuration of the transmitting vehicle. The agency believes that the
presence of such a device, particularly if it were to transmit such
information constantly as a result of a malfunction or other
circumstance, would raise potentially troublesome privacy concerns.
The agency notes that it issued a final rule in February 1972 (37
FR 3911) modifying Standard No. 208, Occupant Crash Protection, to
provide manufacturers choosing not to install passive (i.e., automatic)
restraints with the option to equip vehicles with a seat belt interlock
device. The interlock prevented drivers from starting their car unless
all front seat occupants of the vehicle had fastened their safety
belts. Although the interlock device had a more direct impact on the
operation of the vehicle than the device suggested by the petitioner,
public reaction against this measure was strong. The interlock device
option was subsequently rescinded after Congress directed the agency to
eliminate it. While the device suggested by the petitioner would not
directly affect the operation of the vehicle as the interlock device
did, NHTSA believes that a device having the capability to transmit the
location of a vehicle to governmental entities any time a seat belt was
not fastened would arouse similar public concerns.
The agency observes that installation and successful use of such a
device would require installation of additional equipment beyond that
which the petitioner may have envisioned. The transmitting device would
have to be coupled with belt use sensors at all seating positions. The
belt use sensors, in order to be effective, would have to have features
that would make it difficult to circumvent the system as in the
instance in which an occupant would sit on a fastened belt instead of
wearing it. The transmitting device would similarly have to be designed
so that it could not be readily disabled and would have to work
reliably and without emitting false signals. Police vehicles would need
to have a reliable receiving device equipped with a display or other
means to provide specific identifying information about the vehicle
emitting the signal. The cost of this additional equipment, when added
to that of the transmitter, would be considerable.
For the reasons stated above, NHTSA concludes that it is unlikely
that a rulemaking proceeding to require the transmitter suggested by
the petitioner would result in the issuance of a rule requiring such a
device. Accordingly, the petition is denied.
Authority: 49 U.S.C. 30162; delegation of authority at 49 CFR
1.50 and 501.8.
Issued on February 5, 1999.
Stephen P. Kratzke,
Acting Associate Administrator for Safety Performance Standards.
[FR Doc. 99-4582 Filed 2-23-99; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 4910-59-P
