Intersection Crash Countermeasures Set for Field Test
July 18th, 2007 8:43 PM
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Pistonheads lamenting the rise of the machine will not be heartened to hear there's a new acronym in town: ICAV. "Intersection Crash Avoidance, Violation" systems sound an alarm if a driver is about to run a stop sign, red light or other mission critical intersection warning. According to a pdf downloadable at Accidentreconstruction.com, researchers are set to field test practical ICAV systems. While enthusiasts may regret yet another attempt to "dumb down" safe driving, there's no denying the magnitude of the problem. In 1999, some 261k light vehicle crashes occurred at intersections where a driver was later charged with running a stop sign. That same year, 133k crashes involved traffic signal violations.
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I loved my last car, then some old lady blew through an unopposed stop and met me head-on at combined speed. Her first words were, "Did I have a stop?" I'm divided over these sorts of things.
An alarm sounding might be just the thing: Shame people into better behavior.
Well, we're still losing over 43,000 lives each year in the US, despite advanced safety features in more and more cars. Seems like something like this is worth a try -- I know of some very blind intersections locally that could warrant some kind of warning either to the innocent or potentially guilty party -- or both!
Won't change the outcome when the stop sign/traffic light runner has the stereo cranked to 150dB. Unlikely to change the outcome when the stop sign/traffic signal runner is yakking on a cell phone. How about a broad band cell phone jammer at every controlled intersection? Actually, an ignition activated low milliwatt in-car jammer with an effective radius of 4 feet or so would be even better. You could flange one up now, but I think they're illegal as hell.