New Safety Guidelines Could Eliminate Touchscreens in Cars?

[Top_Fuel]

The latest NCAP guidelines could encourage automakers to ditch touchscreens for physical buttons and switches.



The European New Car Assessment Program, or Euro NCAP as it's known, has announced that it will introduce new safety testing in a couple of years that could result in a fundamental change to how automakers approach new vehicle interiors and touchscreens, requiring more physical controls which are believed to cause less distraction while driving. Changes required of automakers for the European auto market could translate to changes on U.S. market cars as well, at least from European automakers, or future U.S. regulations could follow with similar physical control requirements.

The overuse of touchscreens is an industry-wide problem, with almost every vehicle-maker moving key controls onto central touchscreens, obliging drivers to take their eyes off the road and raising the risk of distraction crashes.

Full article here on motortrend.com:

https://www.motortrend.com/news/new-car-interior-touchscreen-euro-ncap-safety-testing

[7milesout]

I haven't driven or even been in a vehicle with a big touch screen like that. Off hand, I don't like the way it looks, like a tablet is attached to the dash ... it's just a style thing, that I don't care for. Manual controls look more integrated into the design of the dash ... with style. And I enjoy the variety between different designs, center-stacks, instrument clusters, etc.

I can certainly imagine it would take some time to stare at such a big screen (longer than might be safe) to find the right button to push to lead to the next category of buttons and so on and so forth.

[Mark]

The latest NCAP guidelines could encourage automakers to ditch touchscreens for physical buttons and switches.

The overuse of touchscreens is an industry-wide problem, with almost every vehicle-maker moving key controls onto central touchscreens, obliging drivers to take their eyes off the road and raising the risk of distraction crashes.

This testing should have been done long before installing them.

[Eggman]

Edit: I should preface this post by stating that I own & drive a Tesla Model 3 for almost two years now.

While I don't disagree that having most controls on the touchscreen can lead to distraction, the design gives nearly unlimited flexibility over the vehicle controls, far beyond what can be had with physical buttons/switches. New features can and have been implemented with a software update.

The physical buttons, switches & thumbwheels are located on the steering wheel. In a typical drive or commute to & from work, I find I rarely take my hands off the steering wheel at all.

Tesla encourages owners to learn and use voice commands instead of the touchscreen. That goes a long way to minimizing the hazard of distraction. Myself, I'll sometimes ask a passenger to figure it out while I'm driving. I have also used the 'Autopilot' on a clear stretch of road to keep in between the lines if I ever need to change something. But at this point I've become more familiar with where to find stuff and spend less time staring at the screen than I used to. It's a learning process, not unlike learning any other new car.

Touchscreen technology is a new innovation, and innovation is usually rewarded and celebrated. I'm curious to see if anyone complains about government over-reach...

[Mark]

Edit: I should preface this post by stating that I own & drive a Tesla Model 3 for almost two years now.

While I don't disagree that having most controls on the touchscreen can lead to distraction, the design gives nearly unlimited flexibility over the vehicle controls, far beyond what can be had with physical buttons/switches. New features can and have been implemented with a software update.

The physical buttons, switches & thumbwheels are located on the steering wheel. In a typical drive or commute to & from work, I find I rarely take my hands off the steering wheel at all.

Tesla encourages owners to learn and use voice commands instead of the touchscreen. That goes a long way to minimizing the hazard of distraction. Myself, I'll sometimes ask a passenger to figure it out while I'm driving. I have also used the 'Autopilot' on a clear stretch of road to keep in between the lines if I ever need to change something. But at this point I've become more familiar with where to find stuff and spend less time staring at the screen than I used to. It's a learning process, not unlike learning any other new car.

Touchscreen technology is a new innovation, and innovation is usually rewarded and celebrated. I'm curious to see if anyone complains about government over-reach...

"Tesla drivers are the most accident-prone, according to a LendingTree analysis of 30 car brands. It found that Tesla drivers are involved in more accidents than drivers of any other brand. Tesla drivers had 23.54 accidents per 1,000 drivers." Dec 18, 2023

My Mirage steering wheel has the horn control, & that's it.

As a driving instructor, I would ban touch screens in automobiles (but that's not my decision to make).

When I got my CDL a few years ago, I was even a bit surprised by the serious level of enforcement of things like cell phone usage in commercial motor vehicles.

"Using a hand-held mobile phone while driving a CMV can result in driver disqualification. Penalties can be up to $2,750 for drivers and up to $11,000 for employers who allow or require drivers to use a hand-held communications device while driving."

I realize touchscreens are not hand held cell phones, but anything that distracts drivers should be taken seriously.

I am really close to one of my younger cousins. He's a tech guy for a large company in Milwaukee. He loves extra features on vehicles. He bought a 2023 Honda Ridgeline last summer. When I asked him about it last fall, he went off on how nuts things have become on vehicles. I found that quite interesting.

I like simplicity! Radio & climate controls with knobs, & I'm good!

[Top_Fuel]

Sounds like Mark hasn't made up his mind which one he prefers...



I still like those manual HVAC knobs...but that's a different thread.

[Eggman]

"Tesla drivers are the most accident-prone, according to a LendingTree analysis of 30 car brands. It found that Tesla drivers are involved in more accidents than drivers of any other brand. Tesla drivers had 23.54 accidents per 1,000 drivers." Dec 18, 2023

I don’t doubt it, and would expect this statistic is influenced not just by the distracting touchscreen but the sheer power & acceleration.

When I got my CDL a few years ago, I was even a bit surprised by the serious level of enforcement of things like cell phone usage in commercial motor vehicles.

You might be pleasantly surprised to learn that Tesla uses the interior camera to monitor the driver & occupants. If it detects the driver is using a phone it sounds a warning. I don’t know of any other car that does this.

[sunbeam]

More electronic junk to break.

Makes car harder to service.

Makes car harder to use.

Should not need to read a book to use the switchgear on a car, this is some feature driven nonesense sales tactic for the general public.

Now we see it is actually electronic to the point of safety risk.

[Mark]

You might be pleasantly surprised to learn that Tesla uses the interior camera to monitor the driver & occupants. If it detects the driver is using a phone it sounds a warning. I don’t know of any other car that does this.

That sounds pretty creepy to me!

I'm just glad that I grew up in a different era.

Adding a $20 Kmart FM converter to the AM radio of our farm truck was pretty cool, however!

Party line phones, TVs without remotes, manual typewriters, etc... - times were tough back then. I doubt I was ever put in a child car seat growing up. I'm lucky to be alive!

On that note - child car seats are awesome! I'm not knocking them.

[7milesout]

Touchscreen technology is a new innovation, and innovation is usually rewarded and celebrated. I'm curious to see if anyone complains about government over-reach...

Eggman - I find this last sentence especially thoughtful. Here I sat in my mind poopoo'ing the big screen tv's that are coming that are going to block out the view to the front of the vehicle, as they keep getting bigger.

Yet I'm totally down with your line of thinking. Ultimately my opinion is, Tata should put as big a screen in their vehicle as they want. And as many controls there as they want. You know, to a fairly loose degree. I'm down with freedom. Whether these are "allowed" in a car should not be an exclusive gobment control. I vote with my wallet. That's how a Capitalistic society is supposed to be. If I'm the only one who doesn't like a big screen tv in my car, but everyone else loves it ... I'd have to just deal with it. And vice-versa.

So yeah, I hope our trusty gobment doesn't over-reach on this aspect.