Proposed bill aims to set minimum auto sound levels
By Donald Melanson 
posted April 10th 2008 1:44PM
posted April 10th 2008 1:44PM
Fisker Karma's recently announced hybrid sports car that generates motor noise through some external speakers might have received a good bit of derision when it first made itself known, but it now looks like it may actually be a bit ahead of the game, at least if a bill expected to be introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives ever actually becomes law. As AutoWeek reports, the bill was apparently prompted by concerns that hybrid and electric vehicles are a little too quiet, and pose a risk to pedestrians, especially the blind. To address that supposed danger, the bill reportedly demands that the U.S. Secretary of Transportation initiate a study to determine if a minimum sound level is in fact needed and, if so, require that automakers comply with it (possibly as early as 2010).
i felt the air displacement, alright
I think I actually smelt it.
Terrible... finally the potential for some peace and quiet and they want to take this away from us?
The answer was already given. A notification system the disabled person could carry, provided free of charge. Less? expensive than retrofitting or forcing new sound level regulations onto manufacturers... have them foot the bill for a few devices or have the disabled buy them or provide a discount.
Most new cars already carry or will be carrying the equipment to provide this system... Just develop a carry size device that detects the TPMS signals from the car (Tire Pressure Monitoring System), yes range might be an issue... but "develop" is the key word :p
The cost of providing devices to the few, instead of hobbling/modifying the many should be much less. The responsibility of the disabled person to not walk out into oncoming traffic is their own... give them the means to react to the world around them instead of forcing the world around them to react... to them.
Maybe i'm oblivious to everything but at least in my town i do not see too many blind people walking around with absolutely no assistance (i.e. a seeing-eye dog or a person). Not to sound heartless but is this legislation really needed or just blown way out of proportion? If so i propose the next congressional debate to figure if Chuck Norris or the Master Cheif would win a fist fight.
:rolleyes: freaking :rolleyes:
All you need is a spoked wheel and baseball cards...
Yet another excuse for setting my stereo to "Aural Pwnage".
This was the first thing I said when everyone made fun of the car with the speaker.
interesting
The real question: has anyone ever been injured or killed by a car who would not have been if the car was "normally" loud?
We have enough real dangers in this world. If quiet cars aren't provably a real danger, let's not pretend they are.
On a lighter side: A thriller based on this premise: "The Silence of the Amps". Sorry, I just coudn't resist.
Doesn't it seem weird that everyone comes here like it's open mic night at the Apollo?
At this rate we'll never get rid of traffic noise :(
I propose that quiet cars have warning messages on the sides in large raised braille letters.
Ok, that about wraps it up. Wonko indeed WAS the Sane. Time to build the house outside the Asylum where these silent killer cars cant come.
At least the blind & deaf are always keenly aware of traffic exercising caution. What waring system do we need for pedestrians with earphones or using their cell phones while crossing the street against the light; I rely on my horn!
Trains make tons of noise and they're still required to blow their (deafening) horns whenever they cross an unguarded intersection. I'm willing to have one of those installed on my Prius
They should just make a law that forces Prius owners to blare gangsta rap at at least 3/4 volume whenever the car is moving. Gangsta rap is how we make our streets safer!
Ridiculous law!!!!!! I want things to get QUIETER over time. Who here likes hearing the constant road noise from nearby streets? I would LOVE if that stopped.
Noise pollution needs to be stopped
This has already happened.
When my grandfather (b. 1896) was growing up in the small east Texas town of San Augustine there was only one car. It was owned by an elderly widow and it was electric. It ran almost silently, she did not have the best eyesight, and people were totally unused to cars anyway, so it happened that she ran down pedestrians on two separate occasions. Therefore, the town council voted a special ordinance concerning this car. From then on, whenever operating it she was obliged to be immediately preceded by her servant on foot leading a mule with a bell around its neck.
So, at least one government has already mandated minimum sound levels for cars.
Owen
Hey! HORNS are electric. (Next thing you know someone will be telling us "loud pipes save lives!".
No problem if I get to choose the sound and can crank up the volume. I want something that sounds like a 840 cu. in. Cummins diesel, turbocharger whine, creaking chassis sounds, airbrakes, and all. They can even throw in some sounds from a honkin' big airhorn, though that's not mandatory.
When I accelerate, I want it to go through the gears...all 18 of them. And when I lift my foot off the pedal, I wanna hear that Jake Brake kick in. Hey, if the Utopians are allowed to design their perfect world, I can design mine.
Anyone blind guy who steps out in front of my "rig" will be trying to commit suicide by Peterbilt.
technology evolves, and noise-emission is a sign of poor or limited engineering and wasted energy (unless we're talking about speakers). forcing newer technology to emulate the flaws of older technology is simply ridiculous - something only politicians or morons could dream up.
what percentage of the population is truly walking-around-with-a-stick blind anyway - half a percent? so the other 99.5% of us need to listen to noise so as to protect them on the occasion they might want to wander into traffic randomly?
a better idea would be to require cars to have collision-detection-and-avoidance systems, and to maybe expect blind people to cross streets at crosswalks, and to maybe expect drivers to take personal responsibility and not run over blind people crossing the street.
2 words:
Mandatory sub woofers
subwoofers*
This is very sad because it is completely stupid. People are complaining of noisy cars since God knows when, now somebody invented quiet hybrid cars and now this talk about minimum sound? Simulate engine noise? Well, that's great for novelty but requiring every car maker to "downgrade" the technology because some Joe schmuck might get killed crossing down the street because he can't hear the car passing by? Even dogs know how to look both ways of the street before they cross! Did anybody ever complain why bicycles are quiet? Did you ever hear somebody say they got hit by car because they couldn't hear it? Use your eyes! That's what they are there for! Blind people getting hit by hybrid cars? Don't even go there. We have pedestrian crossing lights that play weird music... and that those dogs, yada-yada-yada! And have you seen pedestrians on the street lately, most of them have things on their ears anyway, listening to their ipods or yapping away with their bluetooth headsets like they are the only people in the world! These people would easily get killed anyway even with an annoying ice cream truck! People should just back down and think about what we are proposing. Then we might finally realize and just say, "Whoa! Did I just sound dumb just then! Oh, please! Help eradicate cancer, save human lives in Darfur or bring our troops home! Stop acting stupid over taxpayer's expense.
I've thought this way for a long time & I can see & hear quite well. Its not just about looking both ways at a crosswalk - its about walking down the road & some idiot whose drunk or on a cell phone (mostly the same thing) isn't paying attention & pops the curb behind you. But since their decibel level was, you know, nil, s/he takes out your legs cause you had no idea they were coming at you.
Don't most blind people have better hearing than the typical seeing person? I'm fully-sighted and I can hear the whine of the electric engine when a Prius approaches... I'd think that a blind person with better hearing could definitely hear that.
If the rest of the cars didn't make so much noise, having a quiet car wouldn't be a problem... how about we work on making all other cars quieter (especially Harleys and coffee-can mufflers - so deafening), rather than making them noisier. It seems to me that we are continually adding more and more noise in the cities to try and blare over each other.
Seems like another race to the bottom to me.