Matt Clark - Comment

Stop....just stop legislating more and more driver aids into vehicles to compensate for the ineptitude of the average American driver. Required stability control, required rear-view cameras, required millions of airbags, required pedestrian crash safety systems...these are all dancing around the real problem, and that problem is that it is far too easy to get and retain a driver's license in this country. Basic car control and basic accident avoidance are things that are only beyond the truly incapable, far too many of whom are allowed to have legal driver's licenses. Make the tests harder, require re-testing on license renewal (and when it comes to pedestrian safety, invest in well-lit crosswalks, good signage, and pedestrian bridges if need be..) Will it cost more to test this way? Of course, but for the privilege of driving, $50 for a re-test once or twice a decade is not unreasonable. Instead the NHTSA's approach is to legislate costly and weight-increasing band-aids, reducing nationwide automotive fuel economy, increasing emissions, AND increasing the economic burden of car purchase without really doing anything to solve the problem. The world will never be accident-free; part of driving is voluntarily accepting the risks involved with this activity. I appreciate the NHTSA's mission to do what is within its power to reduce these risks, but the thing that will be most effective in making driving as safe as possible will be to more effectively screen for capable drivers and keep the incapable ones from ever getting behind the wheel in the first place. Avoiding that discussion is tantamount to sentencing more and more drivers to death each year while you pat yourselves on the back for making it more expensive for citizens to be mobile.