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Hybrid, electric vehicles to become louder for pedestrian safety

By | December 16, 2010, 2:21 PM PST

The House on Thursday approved a bill that would make electric and hybrid cars louder in the name of pedestrian safety.

Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-FL) sponsored the bill. The Senate approved a version last week and now it goes to President Obama’s desk.

Under the proposed legislation, auto regulators would have to set minimum sound levels for hybrid and electric vehicles. With some additional noise, blind pedestrians will be able to hear them coming and travel more safely.

Stearns said the Pedestrian Safety Enhancement Act will protect the blind, children and joggers who need to hear traffic.

The House approved the bill 379 to 30. If the bill is signed by Obama there will be a study to “determine the minimum amount of sound necessary” to alert pedestrians. The Department of Transportation will enact the noise regulations within 18 months.

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Larry Dignan

About Larry Dignan

Larry Dignan is the editor-in-chief of SmartPlanet.

Larry Dignan

Larry Dignan

Editor-in-Chief

Larry Dignan is editor-in-chief of SmartPlanet and ZDNet. He is also editorial director of TechRepublic. Previously, he was an editor at eWeek, Baseline and CNET News. He has written for WallStreetWeek.com, Inter@ctive Week, New York Times and Financial Planning. He holds degrees from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and the University of Delaware. He is based in New York but resides in Pennsylvania.

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Larry Dignan

Larry Dignan
Larry Dignan does not hold any investments in the companies he covers.
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0 Votes
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RE: Hybrid, electric vehicles to become louder for pedestrian safety
That has to be one of the STUPIDEST ideas ever, you want to add noise pollution to the already deafening noise that gets spewed in every day life?!
Posted by angelus78gak
16th Dec 2010
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RE: Hybrid, electric vehicles to become louder for pedestrian safety
This is one of the most ridiculous things I've ever seen.
Posted by tsne
16th Dec 2010
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RE: Hybrid, electric vehicles to become louder for pedestrian safety
Our government at work.

I'm so glad that I can pay a bunch of politicians to sit around coming up with amazing ideas like "Let's make quite cars louder for pedestrian safety".

Here's a better idea. LOOK TWICE BEFORE CROSSING THE STREET.

If you're dumb enough to get plastered by a car that you "didn't hear" because you didn't look, well that is just evolution at work.
Posted by keitha73
16th Dec 2010
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RE: Hybrid, electric vehicles to become louder for pedestrian safety
um, what about blind pedestrians who can't "look twice before
crossing the street?" or cyclists who can't see behind themselves? i
think a 2 ton machine capable of smashing flat a good number of
things that get in their way should make a little warning noise.
Posted by Anna_D
16th Dec 2010
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RE: Hybrid, electric vehicles to become louder for pedestrian safety
Posts 1,2 and 3

Wait till you experience the thrill of walking in a carpark and someone in a prius
Posted by rconn@...
16th Dec 2010
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RE: Hybrid, electric vehicles to become louder for pedestrian safety
Posts 1,2 and 3

Wait till you experience the thrill of walking in a carpark and someone in a prius or similar drives quite rapidly out of a parking space absolutely silently right in front of you as you walk to the exit.

Then you will appreciate why the pedestrian requires some warning noise when a vehicle moves off. The same thing applies when walking between kerb parked cars, I never walk between a running car and another parked car as I have a great fondness for my legs and a basic distrust of drivers who may be senile, drunk or high as a kite.
Posted by rconn@...
16th Dec 2010
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RE: Hybrid, electric vehicles to become louder for pedestrian safety
This legislation is beyond stupid and ludicrious. It is not enough that I have to listen to 18 wheelers ,cars,pick-ups,and motorcycles with straight exaust pipes all day and stereo systems that shake the windows in my house;now I am told that my Prius is too quiet!Pretty soon it will be illegal to posess even a modicum of common sense.
Posted by lovequiet42
17th Dec 2010
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RE: Hybrid, electric vehicles to become louder for pedestrian safety
How would you like to be a blind pedestrian attemping to cross the street and get creamed by a distracted driver in a hybrid?
@ keitha73: do the blind not meet your definition of evolutionarily competent?
Think outside your little boxes people!
Posted by BoscoeInMotion
17th Dec 2010
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Lets see, bikes, pedistrians can be quiet too
So I suggest further legestlation requiring bikes to have playing cards placed so they are hit by the spokes and make noise.

Segways need to have a noise emitter added. (even grandma's scotter!)

Remember, none of this does anything for those that are deaf (blind or not) so I guess all moving objects needs to emit a constant ground effecting pound so any aporaching object can be felt as it approaches.

To those other sited people's comments, use your EYES, low volume moving vehicles are only 1 thing you need to avoid. A rapidly moving car out of a spot is a hazzard, engine running or not. You should at least see the reverse lights first (for sited people that is)

Bad drivers are in hybrids and non hybrids! The lady that hit my car backing from her spot was not in a hybrid, just someone that was not paying attention. The noise of her engine did nothing to warn me of her being a stupid driver (& uninsured!).

Guess pedistrians, joggers, bikers & small children also need to wear noise emitting hats with the twrling light so you can see & hear them when they are not paying attention so you don't drive over them while they are not paying attention to where they are going & walk infrong of your vehicle. (bikers can turn their heads to look behind before changing lanes as they should!)

Also unless the vehicle is moving very slowly, the car does make noise from the tire / road impact (if we had hover cars the highways would be much quieter) and at 30ish MPH, a electric / hybrid vehicle makes as much noise as a well muffeled vechcle.

So much stuff needs to be addressed & the US government pulls this crap.
Posted by jhimes
17th Dec 2010
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Similar problem with turbine engines
There was a similar problem with race cars equipt with turbine engines. To have electric and hybrid cars make more noise is not a silly idea but a practical one. Not everyone has good hearing or see well and hearing a noise indicating a moving vehicle will help. It also benefits the driver of an electric or hybrid vehicle to not have to slam on the brakes when a blind person steps in front of them.
Posted by sboverie
17th Dec 2010
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RE: Hybrid, electric vehicles to become louder for pedestrian safety
This is an easy fix. Just equip each car with a recording of those
annoying tin-can mufflers that are so popular with the younger set.
Combine this with a loud rap music track, the kind that shake every
car within 500 feet, and you have the perfect early warning system.
Posted by mjmce
17th Dec 2010
0 Votes
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RE: Hybrid, electric vehicles to become louder for pedestrian safety
I hope the sound will emulate a Ford V8 with dual glass packs.
Posted by ITOdeed
17th Dec 2010
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RE: Hybrid, electric vehicles to become louder for pedestrian safety
Post 13 is on the right track, although Kia is going to make auto engine sounds standard on their new hybrid.

There are a lot of people posting here that may want to exercise their right to be anti-social and totally alone, the Unabombers property in Montana is up for sale, no irritating people to deal with...
Posted by arcrews@...
17th Dec 2010
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RE: Hybrid, electric vehicles to become louder for pedestrian safety
Seriously!!! I am tired of government trying to protect people who are too stupid to be responsible for themselves. Pedestrians need to pay attention to traffic, yes, the motorist have the responsibility to watch for pedestrians in cross walks, especially the blind. But the parents of the children should be the ones watch other for their own. As for joggers, I seem to remember we joggers FACE oncoming traffic. Congressmen Stearns stop trying to fix STUPID.
Posted by murfy729@...
17th Dec 2010
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RE: Hybrid, electric vehicles to become louder for pedestrian safety
I submit that blind people who are jaywalking, without a guide dog, or at least a cane to alert drivers, need to be taken out of the gene pool.
Seriously, though, how about simply equipping ALL new vehicles with an ultrasound-generating device that blind people could activate remotely and listen to with special earphones? It would work very much like remote keys do now. Car makers could even optionally have the car notifiy the driver about the nearby blind person. The ultrasound generator would have an alternate use as a deer repellant. Drivers could turn it on when traveling on roads with lots of deer. In fact, deer crossing signs could turn it on and off automatically.
I'm sure there are lots of good ideas out there. In contrast, this legislation is stupid.
Posted by dmm99
17th Dec 2010
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RE: Hybrid, electric vehicles to become louder for pedestrian safety
Not to mention how many idiots walk/jog/bike with headsets on to listen to their ipod or whatever and can't hear anything anyway.

Another case of fixing something that isn't broken, at taxpayer expense of course.

It makes me embarrassed to be a Floridian to have the wackos in Tallahassee come up with this crap.
Posted by milesandmiles
17th Dec 2010
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Harley-Davidson
I've lived in a mountain cabin a couple hundred yards from a 2-lane highway parallel to railroad tracks. The sound of four diesel locomotives pulling a mile-long freight train uphill doesn't begin to compete with a single Harley carrying a Sunday rider.
Put a Harley engine and muffler on each of those hybrids, and you'll never have a problem knowing it's in the same state with you.
Then smash it for scrap.
Posted by kidtree
17th Dec 2010
0 Votes
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another idiot 'fix'
Recently they added clackers to the traffic light pedestrian crossing push button units so that blind people can find them. They're so darned loud I can hear them from hundreds of feet away. Very annoying.

Now hybrid owners will have to pay to add noise makers? What a crock. They already have a noise maker - it's called a horn. Every car's equiped with one by law. Duh. Add to that if anyone is jaywalking they deserve to get mowed down IMAO.
Posted by wizardjr
17th Dec 2010
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RE: Hybrid, electric vehicles to become louder for pedestrian safety
There two ways I see that this will work; both penalize the person for
buying an electric car. Either add a speaker with a sound that is
loud enough to be heard over the background, or make the car
more inefficient so the electric motor whines more loudly. The
speaker requires power, enough said. The loud motor literally
"speaks for itself." This is yet another attempt to underhandedly kill
the electric car. What I wonder is why?
Posted by QuiMoi
17th Dec 2010
0 Votes
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Why not?
Most of us have seen people almost hit in parking lots because the driver of a car didn't see them before moving. If you hear a car idling and the idle changes you know to be more aware of your surroundings. An electric car gives no such clues, it just moves. What is the harm in giving the car the sound of an engine?

I'd like mine to sound like a Porche 911 please.
Posted by Alzie
17th Dec 2010
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RE: Hybrid, electric vehicles to become louder for pedestrian safety
Now we can personalize our cars with CarTones.
Posted by johnkes
17th Dec 2010
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RE: Hybrid, electric vehicles to become louder for pedestrian safety
I am thinking.. that a transponder carried by the blind person, indicates such a vehicle is approaching.. the higher the pitch, the closer the vehicle. It would be mandatory that these "indicators" are installed in hybrid or silent vehicles.. Then a system of signals, developed.
We cant really quit evolving, because there is someone visually impaired.
I have a friend who walks with a white cane.. he is assertive.. will step on to the roadway, with his cane raised.. having raised his cane as a warning at an intersection.. beware anyone that doesnt yield to him.
He has been that way for the best part of 15 years, assertive, and always a smile and a thank you, whether you can lipread or not. I have seen large trucks slow down.
I dont know.. can we legislate against idiots driving on the roadway.. if momma duck and her ducklings can paralyse traffic as she crosses a four lane highway.. surely a large homo sapien will have similar respect.. Hit those emergency flashes.. that is what they are there for.
Posted by Katie5757
17th Dec 2010
0 Votes
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RE: Hybrid, electric vehicles to become louder for pedestrian safety
How about what we did as kids, put some baseball trading cards
next to the spokes, eh?
Posted by jtarheel
17th Dec 2010
0 Votes
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RE: Hybrid, electric vehicles to become louder for pedestrian safety
Does anyone remember the first year of electric carving knives?

They had been hyped on TV with images of Happy Families at
Christmas Dinner and were one of The Hot Gifts that year.

That first generation of knives was nearly noiseless and vibration-
free. Thousands of heads of families across the country opened
theirs up, plugged them in, and then wondered, "Is this thing ON?"

Emergency Rooms across the country were swamped.


Maybe electric vehicles could make the sound of crickets next to a
waterfall.
Posted by AugustM
18th Dec 2010
0 Votes
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RE: Hybrid, electric vehicles to become louder for pedestrian safety
What are we to do about the deaf pedestrians? Would it not be
better to think out of the box? How about emitting some sort of
signal that could be received by a smartphone or some other
inexpensive device? If people want to hear or otherwise augment their perception, they can choose to wear some sort of receiver to
alert them of a nearby vehicle. Cars could then use it like ADS-B in
aircraft (RTCA SC-186).
Posted by tildejac@...
18th Dec 2010
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As a cyclist....
...I'd rather people learned to look before crossing the road.
Too many folks don't. My bike makes almost no noise at all and it'll
hurt ya plenty if you step out in front of me when I'm doing 20+ mph.
And what about quiet petrol cars? For years we've had luxury
brands proudly telling us that their cars are so quiet you have to
look at the rev counter to see if they're running.
But now there's a new technology, suddenly there's some need to
legislate...
Posted by steve_jonesuk@...
20th Dec 2010
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