Backup Camera Mandate for 2014 Vehicles

[TXJ]

This is old news, but I thought I'd see what everyone thinks:

http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=21020

Short version: It could cost the auto industry up to 2.7 billion dollars per year to comply with this. Raising the MSRP of the average car up a estimated 200 some odd dollars. By 2014 new cars produced to sell in the USA must have a backup camera as standard.

I don't know what to think to be honest. Seems a little silly to me.

I wonder how many of these incidents are from people on cell phones backing over pedestrians. I've personally almost been backed into with a rear view camera equipped vehicle driven by a person on a cell phone. I was in the cameras "blind spot" while waiting for another car to park. The driver could have easily seen me and avoided getting the fearsome growl of my of my scoot beep if they payed attention to their mirrors instead of the screen.

I'd be amazed if this lowers the incident rate at all (estimated at 300 incidents a year?), since a majority of drivers will just be paying attention to a screen and not shoulder checking or looking at their mirrors.

[Flashmonkey]

LOL this is going to be something else drivers ignore. If they're crappy drivers now, adding more junk to the car won't make them any better. I've driven cars with these back-up cameras and while I do see the benefit for some, I always ignore this system and revert back to what I was trained to do....you know...the thing that is now second nature to me.

[Alex]

We have it on one of our cars, and it's tremendously helpful. It is a vehicle that has pretty poor visibility to the rear just with mirrors, and it makes a big difference. But - this regulation does not require cameras, it only mandates a certain level of rear visibility. Cars can be designed with great rear visibility without the electronics, but styling of some types of vehicles would make it challenging. From a related article:

Auto manufacturers can get around the requirement by adhering to improved rear visibility requirements handed down by the DoT, but with current car design trending towards making outward visibility an afterthought, it's believed that most car manufacturers will go the backup camera route instead.

[Snake]

This would realy help out those "Soccer Moms" that drive SUVs that are too much vehicle for them to handle. Every time I see one back out of a parking spot they either almost hit pedestrians or onother vehicle coming down the lane.

[johnjohn]

What's wrong with the back beepers that most cars have now? Anything from 8 feet to 16 inches gets a warning now inside the unit. Just different intensity of beeping.

[Snake]

That would help them as well.

[ungluck]

continually stupifying the population with **** to make them think less.


humans....tsktsk

[rusninja]

id like a back up camera kids always running around behind cars and stuff on bikes and you can barely see them :S

[reaubideux]

I'm all for technology as an aid, but sometimes it seems like we're moving towards the trend of using as a crutch. I see how these are useful for people who can't turn their necks very far, but then I'm a bit nervous as to what else are they unable to do and should they really be operating a car.

I'm glad to see it's not the backup camera that's being regulated but the overall rearward visibility that's being regulated. That's the more important goal, it just looks like it's a possibility that auto makers will go with form over function and opt for the cameras.

I've never used a car with either a rear-camera or the back-up sensors. How well do cameras, generally speaking, pick up cars driving perpendicular to the parked car? I can see people relying too heavily on just staring at that little 7" LCD to back out of parking spots and the camera not picking up the car flying down the parking aisle until it's too late.

[Apex]

I hate those things. I can't stand them, something else expensive that can break. Just like those back up sensors, insanely annoying. Beep for no reason sometimes...I can't stand them. Learn to drive your car people.

I love watching people try to parallel park. It is highly amusing for me. Of course here in Houston, it is truly an awesome experience. I have watched someone go for over 5 minutes trying to get their car in the spot and still fail (guess they end up giving up).

I'm all for seeing kids and pets, but more often than not, people just don't look. This stuff promotes laziness in a good number of people. Like the Mercedes that "senses" when you are dozing off or not paying attention. Give me a break. Is it so hard to be responsible these days?

[Vampyre]

I thought there was already a back up camera in every car. It ts called the "turn your effing head around" camera.

[Jinx250]

Another fine example of making technology required instead of driver skill and attentiveness. Like the systems that tell you when you're veering out of your lane or that the vehicle in front of you stopped short. Dude, they're called lines, and there are brake lights to tell you vehicles are stopping. If people would just pay attention 100% of hte time while operating, we wouldn't have ANY issues. Seriously.

[Alex]

I generally agree with the sentiments expressed here that driver attentiveness, skill, and general caring about driving (whether backing up or not) is the core problem. If those are missing, there is no technology that is going to do much to prevent injuries or worse.

But...

There truly are vehicles that have piss-poor rear visibility. Cameras provide a viewpoint that you simply can't get from mirrors, even if they are adjusted perfectly. Mandating that manufacturers build vehicles where you can see directly behind you is a good thing (IMO). If that means smaller vehicles with lower beltlines and larger rear windows closer to the ground, great. But if the public continues to find different vehicles more attractive (light truck, SUV's, cross-overs, whatever), the use of cameras allow some of those vehicles to have similar or even better rearward visibility. I'm not particularly outraged by that. I'd be more outraged if those types of vehicles were banned or penalized outright without giving them the ability to meet the safety goals in a variety of ways.

[peachdiddy]

This might not be such a bad idea. When I'm pushing carts up at the Wal Mart, I cringe every time I see an itty bitty person hop up into a crew cab, long box dually Ford F350. You'd swear bombs were dropping, I'm moving so fast to get as far away from these people as possible.
But like everyone else is saying, most people will ignore it anyway. And living in "The salt belt" of the country, these devices will rot out due to road salt pretty fast. I've already seen it. The components to replace them are tremendously and unreasonably expensive. So being the cost of the parts is so high, I'll be hard pressed to say people will pay to get it fixed.

[CynicalC]

You know most SUVs don't really have the worst visibility. Have any of you sat in a mustang or camaro for the past 20 years? You can't see **** out of them.

The truck I'm looking at does have a backup camera. The screen is built into the rearview mirror and it does come in handy.

[Azhyen]

I agree that vehicles with poor rear visibility should come with the OPTION of a rear view camera but to MANDATE it on all vehicles is ridiculous. Why isn't it enough for manufacturers to realize for themselves that poor design on their part results in no sales? To have a government mandate such a requirement on a vehicle is a waste of time and money.

On a lighter note, this guy probably could've used a rear view camera...
Fast forward to about 1:10

Link to original page on YouTube.

[TXJ]

Originally Posted by Azhyen

I agree that vehicles with poor rear visibility should come with the OPTION of a rear view camera but to MANDATE it on all vehicles is ridiculous.

I agree, backup cameras are a great option for those who need it or want it (like backing up to a trailer hitch with a truck), but it seems a little extreme to put on anything with 4 wheels.

Originally Posted by Azhyen

On a lighter note, this guy probably could've used a rear view camera...
Fast forward to about 1:10

Bad driver. That pole would have been visible in his side view mirrors and not even on the screen with a rear view camera. Two of our fleet trucks have rear cameras, and the sides are pretty much completely blind. A few guys here have done this exact same thing when backing up. Because all they looked at was the screen and ignored the mirrors, hitting a obstacle at their side.

Plus, everyone knows backing up a ferrari, lambo, aston martin etc is a group event. You need at least 3 guys to guide you out of your garage and driveway!

[bdavison]

They should spend the 2.7 million on cellphone jammers.

[TXJ]

Originally Posted by bdavison

They should spend the 2.7 million on cellphone jammers.

it will cost the auto industry up to 2.7 billion dollars, per year. But yeah. No signal jammers in a cage would be nice. Just outfit them with onstar or something for 911 assistance. But then you'd probably see people driving around like a dog hanging their head out the window so they can continue their conversation.

[almost40]

Originally Posted by Alex

I generally agree with the sentiments expressed here that driver attentiveness, skill, and general caring about driving (whether backing up or not) is the core problem. If those are missing, there is no technology that is going to do much to prevent injuries or worse.

But...

There truly are vehicles that have piss-poor rear visibility. .

Like my Cobalt SS
Worst thing about the car IMO
I can only imagine how crappy it is with the huge optional spoiler that only an 18 year old would love.

[CynicalC]

Originally Posted by almost40

Like my Cobalt SS
Worst thing about the car IMO
I can only imagine how crappy it is with the huge optional spoiler that only an 18 year old would love.

They put that on there to make it look like an STi

[almost40]

Originally Posted by cynicalc

they put that on there to make it look like an sti

and its ugly as hell.:d

[Liber]

F*** That Sh**

are you kidding me? Forcing manufacturers to put cameras on cars they produce? I think they are a good option to have, but they should NOT be mandatory.

Who makes these video screens and the required hardware that comes with them? Anyone wanna bet they've spent a ton of money to get our elected officials to push for these regulations?

Stuff like this infuriates me.

Rough Estimates here: $2.7 billion? Considering the average cost of raising a child is somewhere between $250,000 to $500,000 depending on where you live in the US, with $2.7 billion, the economy would be able to afford around 7000 fewer children.

I'm sorry for the 300 that died in backing up incidents, but placing such an enormous burden on manufacturers and consumers is ridiculous. It is not justified by so few deaths and to assume that a video system would have reduced that number significantly is shear nonsense.

[Alex]

Read the (proposed) law closer. Cameras are not mandatory. Adequate rear visibility on passenger vehicles is what is being mandated. Cameras are one way to meet it (perhaps the cheapest).

[Liber]

Ok, so compliance would cost from $1.9 billion to $2.7 billion. So, regardless of how we achieve the goal, it would still cost the economy as much as ~5000 children would.

According to their own numbers, if they saved every single one of the three hundred lives they would have saved the economy $3.39 billion to $21.66 billion per year in human life. Using the NHTSA numbers and assuming 5000 newborns have equal average value of $41.75 million(an average of their numbers), by removing at least $1.9 billion from the economy through these particular regulations, they are foregoing at least $208.75 billion worth of American human life per year.

I don't know how they get their numbers for the value of a human life. In just a quick glance I think they are over-estimating the measurable monetary value of a human life in order to push their own policies, but I could be wrong. I would just like to see how they arrive at these numbers.

[Alex]

There appear to be some typos with the numbers in the linked articles on Dailytech. The same information on Autoblog (link here) corrects the major one, with the "statistical life" set at $6.1M, not the $6.1B on the dailytech page.

The cost per life saved is that $11M - $72M as listed, but of course it comes down to how many lives are saved. If it saves 1 life and it cost $3B, that's a pretty expensive life, granted. The 18,000 injuries per year cost something as well, but certainly not millions per instance.

The NHTSA sees their duty as saving lives by encouraging safer vehicles. Years in which fatalities go down are wins, and those where they go up are losses. There have been tremendous gains over the past few decades, to the point where cars are pretty darned safe. It's clear that improvements going forward are continuing to work around the edges, like this proposal. Here is a link to the main FARS reporting database, where people can play around with the numbers:

http://www-fars.nhtsa.dot.gov/Main/index.aspx

It is pretty interesting to me that the "Fatalities per 100 Million Vehicle Miles Traveled" has gone down on an almost predictable path year after year after year (other than the tiniest of blips in 2005), and even more predictable when calculated as "Fatalities per 100,000 Population".

[Liber]

I agree. One thing I always find interesting are the estimates of how government regulations affect fatalities. For instance, CAFE standards are a trade-off between fuel economy and safety. It amazes me how many more people have died in car wrecks partially due to the implementation of CAFE standards. At the same time though, it is also pretty amazing that fatalities have continued to decrease as lighter substitutes for the steel cage are discovered and implemented.

[Alex]

Originally Posted by Liber

For instance, CAFE standards are a trade-off between fuel economy and safety. It amazes me how many more people have died in car wrecks partially due to the implementation of CAFE standards.

I think that could make for an interesting debate. It's clear that everything else being equal, a lighter/smaller car is generally going to less safe than a heavier/larger car, and will also generally get better economy.

But that's not how things worked. Car makers don't have a (cost-effective) option of not meeting CAFE, and they don't have a cost-effective way of avoiding required safety standards. Both are requirements, and both have ratcheted up piece by piece over the past 5 decades, from the earliest requirement of seatbelts. (yes, this is side-stepping the issue of some cars/trucks so heavy that they aren't covered by many CAFE and other passenger car requirements)

A hypothetical argument could be made that if fuel economy were thrown out as a goal, and safety alone was promoted and improved incrementally year by year, we'd likely end up with heavier cars that were also safe.

And if safety wasn't an issue, and fuel economy was the sole goal, we'd likely end up with very fuel efficient death traps.

But neither of those things happened. Cars are safer, they use less fuel, along with being more reliable, faster, better equipped, etc. And model by model, segment by segment, they remain similarly priced over the past 50 years, when plotted against the number of weeks the average family has to work to buy one. It's a good time to be a car (and motorcycle!) buff.