NTSB Wants Alcohol Detection Systems Installed In All New Cars In US (arstechnica.com) 279
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: The US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) yesterday recommended that all new vehicles be equipped with alcohol detection systems that can stop people from driving while drunk. The NTSB can't issue such a regulation on its own but urged the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) to do so. The NTSB said it "is recommending measures leveraging new in-vehicle technologies that can limit or prohibit impaired drivers from operating their vehicles as well as technologies to prevent speeding." If adopted, this would require "passive vehicle-integrated alcohol impairment detection systems, advanced driver monitoring systems or a combination of the two that would be capable of preventing or limiting vehicle operation if it detects driver impairment by alcohol," the NTSB said. The agency urged the NHTSA to "require all new vehicles to be equipped with such systems."
Under a US law enacted last year, the NHTSA is already required to examine whether it can issue this type of rule. While drunk driving is a longstanding problem that has caused many deaths, the NTSB said its recommendation was spurred by its investigation into one crash that killed nine people -- including seven children -- in January 2021 on State Route 33 near Avenal, California. On that two-lane highway with a speed limit of 55 mph, an SUV driver leaving a New Year's Day gathering "was driving at a speed between 88 and 98 mph," the NTSB report said. [...]
Section 24220 of the Bipartisan Infrastructure LawSection 30111 of Title 49 in US law, it can delay issuing a rule for three years and submit annual reports to Congress describing the reasons for not issuing the rule. Each annual report would also have to contain an update on "the deployment of advanced drunk and impaired driving prevention technology in vehicles." In writing the law, Congress noted that "in 2019, there were 10,142 alcohol-impaired driving fatalities in the United States involving drivers with a blood alcohol concentration level of .08 or higher, and 68 percent of the crashes that resulted in those fatalities involved a driver with a blood alcohol concentration level of .15 or higher." Congress also cited a study by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety estimating that "advanced drunk and impaired driving prevention technology can prevent more than 9,400 alcohol-impaired driving fatalities annually."
Under a US law enacted last year, the NHTSA is already required to examine whether it can issue this type of rule. While drunk driving is a longstanding problem that has caused many deaths, the NTSB said its recommendation was spurred by its investigation into one crash that killed nine people -- including seven children -- in January 2021 on State Route 33 near Avenal, California. On that two-lane highway with a speed limit of 55 mph, an SUV driver leaving a New Year's Day gathering "was driving at a speed between 88 and 98 mph," the NTSB report said. [...]
Section 24220 of the Bipartisan Infrastructure LawSection 30111 of Title 49 in US law, it can delay issuing a rule for three years and submit annual reports to Congress describing the reasons for not issuing the rule. Each annual report would also have to contain an update on "the deployment of advanced drunk and impaired driving prevention technology in vehicles." In writing the law, Congress noted that "in 2019, there were 10,142 alcohol-impaired driving fatalities in the United States involving drivers with a blood alcohol concentration level of .08 or higher, and 68 percent of the crashes that resulted in those fatalities involved a driver with a blood alcohol concentration level of .15 or higher." Congress also cited a study by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety estimating that "advanced drunk and impaired driving prevention technology can prevent more than 9,400 alcohol-impaired driving fatalities annually."
Wrong direction (Score:5, Interesting)
and how would it distinguish between a driver and a passenger that was drunk without having a breath interlock in every car? Plus, with the self-driving car technology getting better and better, the aim should be to be able to have a car that can get a drunk driver home without issue vs. preventing them from getting home.
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A breath system, which measures alcohol as a driver breathes normally, when in the driver's seat. It will be designed to take instantaneous readings as the driver breathes normally and to accurately and reliably distinguish between the driver's breath and that of any passengers.
Re:Wrong direction (Score:5, Interesting)
and how would it distinguish between a driver and a passenger that was drunk without having a breath interlock in every car? Plus, with the self-driving car technology getting better and better, the aim should be to be able to have a car that can get a drunk driver home without issue vs. preventing them from getting home.
That's a laudable wish, but we're not to the point where we can guarantee that a self-driving car decreases the probability of avoiding a drunk driving death more than increasing the probability that the self-driving car's malfunction results in a death.
Using breathalyzers to immobilize a car is tricky (e.g., how to know who's breathing). Maybe using self-driving car tech to monitor the sanity of driving might be a better way to determine when to declare a driver to be either drunk or otherwise incapacitated (e.g., sleepy, distracted, heart attack, etc.) and then immobilize the car. In that use case, false positives are annoying (like a flat tire) but the probability of a fatality is hopefully very low.
Re:Wrong direction (Score:5, Interesting)
Using breathalyzers to immobilize a car is tricky (e.g., how to know who's breathing). Maybe using self-driving car tech to monitor the sanity of driving might be a better way to determine when to declare a driver to be either drunk or otherwise incapacitated (e.g., sleepy, distracted, heart attack, etc.) and then immobilize the car. In that use case, false positives are annoying (like a flat tire) but the probability of a fatality is hopefully very low.
You bring up a critical point here: we persecute drunk driving mainly because we have an accepted way to measure it (it also helps that there's a pre-existing puritan vilification of alcohol). Tired and distracted driving are just as bad, and probably more prevalent, but there's no roadside test for fatigue or a failing marriage. If we can leverage lanekeeping sensors to detect the actual problem (ie, reckless driving patterns), that would be a massive improvement.
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My lanekeep on my Honda Insight would have to get an order of magnitude better but I like the idea. Right now, it can do straight-aways just fine. It can even take a single slight curve and do fine. Asking anymore then that and it quickly starts to over-correct then over-correct some more.
It's a nice assistant but can easily get confused. A Y in the road will confuse it unless you are really off to the side of the lane. Once you learn these things about the software/sensor setup it's a nice assistant but it
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I imagine most manufacturers will use passive monitoring, i.e. a camera (using IR to see through sunglasses) to monitor how much attention the driver is paying and if they appear alert. The same stuff already used by some driving aids, and to warn the driver if they appear to be getting tired.
Rather than immobilize the car, it would probably present a warning to the driver. Like the incessant noise cars make when you fail to put your seatbelt on. That alone would probably save quite a few lives by making dr
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The tech will have to get better first. The speed sign recongnition is kind of neat but sometimes it will pickup streets while you are on a freeway. Be very lame of my car to decrease to 40 or 35 while I'm suppose to be at 65.
I would love gps-based governor's for all new cars. No reason to be going more then 10 over the limit. Primarily this is for dense cities which is a lot of California. Each state could choose to use the technology or even each city.
If it was only ever used in major city limits that wou
Re: Wrong direction (Score:4, Insightful)
No reason to go 10 over? How about not being rear ended on the highway by the entire stream of cars and trucks going 20-30 over.
Re:Wrong direction (Score:5, Insightful)
Sorry, and respectfully, but FUCK all of that.
This isn't about safety, it's about control.
And I just can't believe how many of the younger people are so willing to cede control of their lives, their possessions, everything to the government.
I guess it's true...what one generation tolerates, the next generation embraces.
Just wait till we're all in EVs that are all remotely controlled, and the social credit score disables your vehicle, 'cause it knows you want to go to a protest rally...
Re: Wrong direction (Score:4, Insightful)
Yep...without personal transportation, you are in control of the govt. that runs the public transport.
You are at the mercy of their schedule and destination choice....they cut off any of that, you're stuck.
Re: Wrong direction (Score:4, Interesting)
Yep...without personal transportation, you are in control of the govt. that runs the public transport.
You are at the mercy of their schedule and destination choice....they cut off any of that, you're stuck.
There is no government control or restrictive scheduling of Uber and Lyft, or Bird and Lime scooters, or bicycles. These are the tools young people use to get where they want to go when they want to go, unless they live in a city where the public transit system is faster at times (NYC, Chicago, DC etc.).
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I generate a lot of hatred for myself in here by relating that stuff. In reality, it isn't bragging or even being contrary, it's pointing out that there is a different way than the hatred of work and the man that so many have.
Time to put on the old fire resistant outfit again. 8^)
It's probably because you seem to think that is a sure fire guaranteed way to success. It worked for you why can't it work for literally everyone else?
It also doesn't help that it's absolutely drenched in smugness.
Re: Wrong direction (Score:3)
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Re:Wrong direction (Score:5, Insightful)
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To be clear, I understand there are concerns about whether someone will pay attention when the Tesla is doing the driving for them. My opinion is that a good driver would pay attention like they're supposed to. Anyone that that doesn't would be classified as an inattentive driver either way, and would be a higher risk behind the wheel regardless.
Re:Wrong direction (Score:4, Insightful)
Look at airplane crashes. It is not rare for the autopilot to be indirectly involved because it encountered a situation it couldn't handle and either over-corrected or threw up its hands and handed over manual control. The crew, who are professionals and presumably train for these situations fail to correctly assess the situation because they were not in full control of the aircraft. They in turn provide inputs that the automation deems unsafe and the whole situation spirals out of control.
Now in an aircraft at 20k feet you have 10 of seconds to minutes to recover from the situation. If professionals fail at that, what hope for the average driver on the highway with obstacles all around with 800ms to react have when the "autopilot" cuts out and say "on your own boss"?
Partial automation that demands 100% of attention while offering 0 engagement is the absolute worst of both worlds. Either 100% automate it with the manufacturer assuming all liability, or limit the automation to lane departure warnings, adaptive cruise control, and failsafe collision avoidance -- things that augment human interactions instead of replacing them.
Autopilot: on balance, saving lives (Score:5, Informative)
Currently Teslas interpret motorcycles with low dual taillights as cars very far away... and go ahead and hit them.
I hadn't heard anything about this so I did a Google search for "Teslas on autopilot hit motorcycles" and came up with a news story about two incidents where a motorcyclist was hit. Two.
Oh, I guess you said two, but you had a typo and I couldn't figure out what you meant. (I thought you were saying "too many")
Let's widen the scope a bit. How many deaths has Autopilot caused? I discovered the macabre website Tesla Deaths [tesladeaths.com] whose whole purpose is to count people dying in Teslas, and this site's number for total deaths caused by Autopilot: 15. That's in about six years (the first one recorded was in January 2016).
Tesla Autopilot is, on average, safer than a human [cleantechnica.com] already. But it's hard to count how many crashes didn't happen.
And Autopilot isn't finished yet; it's still improving.
It's very sad when anyone is killed for any reason, but it's clear that Tesla Autopilot is overall a good idea that saves lives.
IMHO the whole "alcohol detection system" thing will be forgotten in just a couple years when Teslas with Full Self-Driving are running the non-beta version of the software and are driving several times more safely than even a sober human.
And when inexpensive robotaxis are widely available I hope judges will have a low threshold for revoking the driver's license from drunk-driving offenders. "But I need to drive to my job" (totally unsympathetic) "Take a robotaxi"
P.S. I just discovered the TESLA_saves_lives [twitter.com] Twitter account, devoted to "tracking all accidents avoided thanks to Tesla Autopilot and safety features".
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Note that that chart can't compare apples to apples.
It compares miles that autopilot deign to be activated for to total miles. So it can be that the autopilot is safer than a human in the same circumstances, or autopilot nopes out of scenarios that a human deals with no matter what. The data does suggest less ambiguously that the active safety features mitigates risk, since those are more applicable across the board. Of course, there's also the possibility that the sort of person that turns off the safet
Re:Autopilot: on balance, saving lives (Score:4, Informative)
To turn on Tesla Autopilot, you need to demonstrate that you are a safe driver. So this isn't a comparable data set. Bad use of statistics 101.
Incorrect.
To be a part of the Full Self Drive pilot, you need to be in the top X% of drivers as measured by your car. But Autopilot is available to anyone who wants to pay for it.
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Thanks
Re: Autopilot: on balance, saving lives (Score:4, Informative)
Wake up McFly, indeed. That data is normalized to number of miles driven, to account for different the number of Tesla's vs everyone else. 4.41 million miles per crash on autopilot vs 2 million miles per crash on manual driving.
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and how would it distinguish between a driver and a passenger that was drunk
Let me think for 0.1 seconds...
Maybe it could have a sensor on either side of the car and calculate the difference.
It won't matter though:
a) This won't fix old cars
b) Full self driving will probably arrive long before this gets passed.
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b) Full self driving will probably arrive long before this gets passed.
This could be a trickier outcome than predicted. We went from nothing special to like 90% of the way there real fast. It's been a slog to go from there to like 95% there. So progress is getting more and more daunting as we get closer.
Re:Wrong direction (Score:4, Insightful)
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If we assume that drunk driving is a problem in America... and having lived nearly half my life in the U.S. and watched pretty much half the country or more drink with dinner and say "one beer per hours is ok" rather than "one been then wait and hour"... which where I live (Norway is one beer, wait overnight)... at least half the country is probably driving impaired at least sometimes.
Basically, the US is one big fat nation of drunk drivers and pot heads.
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If you can afford to drink at a bar, you damn sure can afford to pay someone else to drive your drunk ass home.
I think you're underestimating the cost to pay someone to drive you. Someone could buy $30 of drinks to get drunk but not be able to afford another $60 to get home (plus more to get back to the bar later).
Now it could be said that the cost of transportation back from the bar should be included in how much you can "afford to drink" but unfortunately that's not how a lot of people think
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Most certainly not after having a few drinks either. And most of us have cars for work and school so why not use it for fun too...
Re: Wrong direction (Score:3)
83% of the us population live in urban areas. So actually, yeah, most of "us" live in areas with taxis, buses, etc
Re: Wrong direction (Score:3)
There are something like 10000 deaths per year with drunk drivers. Extrapolated by the FBI that means an estimated 1M rides happen annually with drunk people behind the wheel out of the estimated 411B annual rides.
The system would need to be extraordinarily good not to lock out a great amount of people for no good reasons. As in the chance of error on the order of 10^~5 would lock out ten times as many people daily as drive drunk. The typical error rate for breathalyzer used by the police is 1-20%.
Any estimates? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: Any estimates? (Score:3)
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Don't try that defence if you kill someone while driving drunk. "Your honour, my client may have killed this one person, but think of all the time and money saved by driving inebriated over the years! You can't put a price on a human life, but you can put one on taxi fares."
Re: Any estimates? (Score:3)
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How exactly will you have false positives for alcohol?
Maybe you meant "false negatives".
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How exactly will you have false positives for alcohol?
Here. [google.com]
Re: Any estimates? (Score:4, Insightful)
Doesn't even has to be a false positive.
Think: an accident or a medical emergency (heart attack, or injury with large blood loss), impossibility to call an ambulance, and a slightly inebriated potential driver with a car. The chance of actually making an accident are a lot higher than with a sober driver, but fairly low altogether. All while death is a certainty for the one who's had the accident.
Before you say "...but drunk!", remember that specific Western European states had their legal limit at 0.8 per thousand -- for decades. Eventually they changed it, but it wasn't like there was an epidemic of accidents. So where would you draw the line for a driver? 0.3? 0.5? 0.0 in accordance possibly with local legislation? 1.0, just to be sure?
Re: Any estimates? (Score:4, Insightful)
Do not, ever, drive a critically injured person to the hospital yourself. [...] Stablize the victim, and if necessary do CPR until the cavalry arrives.
You're right if you're in the middle of Beverly Hills (or whatever passes for "densely populated area with good infrastructure" in the US). But sometimes you're on the ass end of nowhere and the nearest ambulance would need hours to get to you. They may be able to send a helicopter, or the may not. Or you may not even have a usable phone and need to drive to get to one.
My point: any given set of rules is bound to fail specific scenarii at one point or another. Humans, impaired or otherwise, should have the ability to ignore and set themselves above that specific set of rules. Technology should not get in the way of that. It should limit itself to helping, logging, enhancing etc, but not restricting. That's not for technology to determine.
Even elevators have override mechanisms that enable you to open doors when they think you shouldn't.
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Where is the hospital anyway?
Usually it's closer to civilization. Next city? Usually they have signs.
you get mad that you have to wait while your patient is lying helpless.
I'm pretty sure that once you're in the door to emergency care, they'll prioritize.
Or maybe the clinic you managed to get to doesn't have the right practitioner to save your patient
If they have an ER, they have what it takes to stabilize him long enough.
If you would have somehow managed to call the cavalry, they would already know which nearby hospitals can receive emergencies and once they have assessed the situation they would already know what kind of attention your patient needs and would drive directly to the right place. On the way, they can radio the hospital and get confirmation or change plans and re-route. You can do none of the above.
Well, yes, it 99% of cases that's what will happen and everything will be peachy. What we're talking about are cases in which this isn't the case, in which I could do something, but my opinionated car will me prevent me from doing that.
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My point, which apparently went over your head, is that while there may be a cost to false positives, using that as a justification for bypassing the system isn't going to get you very far.
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How much will this cost (installation, time spent for testing, delays due to false positives), and how much will it safe (accidents, deaths, injuries)?
I dunno, but I'd be totally in favor of convicted drunks having to pay for this to be installed and put up with the hassle of using it for the rest of their lives.
If it were up to me I'd also mandate a pink flashing light on top of their cars so everybody would know...
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If this passes, I think the manufacture should be required to cover all legal, towing, repair and alternative transportation costs related to any fault with the detection system for the life of the vehicle.
Disaster (Score:5, Informative)
Having worked with people that had interlock devices ( IID or BAIID ) installed, all I can say is: it'll get people killed.
Their failure rate is very high, and people traveling in adverse conditions will get stranded.
As for the drunks? They'll just bypass the system anyway.
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Re: Disaster (Score:3)
Re:Disaster (Score:4, Funny)
Re: Disaster (Score:2)
Wish I had mod points.
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The classic work around is to just force your kid to blow into the tube.
You have to take a kid out drinking with you and have him sit in the car because he's not allowed in the bar?
The third line of the summary says "...passive vehicle-integrated alcohol impairment detection systems, advanced driver monitoring systems or a combination of the two that would be capable of preventing or limiting vehicle operation if it detects driver impairment by alcohol,"
The kid will also have to sit on your lap all the way home and pretend to be driving?
I ain't seeing it.
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Different states have different laws on children in bars. Florida doesn't mind one iota. I remember playing a lot of billiards and darts before I was ten. Also grew fond of karaoke in those days. Good times.
By age twelve I could have a single drink(not, not at the bar) but wasn't allowed to leave the house if I did. Every so often I might have a wine cooler (remembers those?!).
I imagine all this is why alcohol was never a big deal to me and I'm a very light drinker as a result. I did a bit of bar drinking i
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Would a bicycle air pump work?
Re:Disaster (Score:4, Informative)
I think there is pretty much zero chance they would recommend actual interlock devices in every car. They are way too expensive and impractical for such purposes, and the automakers would fight them tooth and nail (because nobody would want to buy a new car with them).
More likely they go for some modification to existing lane tracking technology that looks for patterns indicating an impaired driver and then gives a warning in the cabin.
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modification to existing lane tracking technology
Like rousting all the cops from Li'l Jon's cocktail lounge and putting them on the roads to watch traffic.
Re: Disaster (Score:2)
I bought a new KIA and when I drive on roads with a lot of pot holes and have to swerve to miss them the car suggests I take a coffee break, seriously. One road I occasionally drive on does it every time.
Bad idea in any case (Score:2, Insightful)
Even if that wasn't the case, it'd still be a bad idea.
Drunk driving is a people problem, people failing to take responsibility. You can't fix that by adding more tech to the mix. That'll just get people worked up and those most irresponsible with be the first to remove, bypass, disable, subvert the things.
Worse, the most irresponsible are the newly minted drivers, ie So no, this isn't going to work. And the NTSB has to know this, so why the fuck do they even suggest it?
Re:Disaster (Score:5, Insightful)
Here we have a law that ostensibly prevents a crime we all despise and want eliminated. The logical facts of it are that interlocks will prevent drunk driving. You must be in support of drunk driving if you object to this right?!? The true reality, that anyone with experience, brain cells, and a critical eye is that it will inconvenience or harm untold masses who were never going to drink and drive. Further, its adding one more penalty on top of the much more punitive laws a certain few are already willing to ignore. I’m totally sure the threat of jail for drunk driving didn’t stop them but a $200 fine for disabling your mandatory device will stop them in its tracks.
Think about this the next time you support a “protect the children from evil pedos” or “let’s make guns illegal to keep people safe” bill.
Re:Disaster (Score:5, Insightful)
Fine points, but the other aspect of this is that we have unelected bureaucrats who believe they have the power to force the equivalent of billions of dollars of cost on everybody. Our federal agencies badly need to be reined in.
Re:Disaster (Score:4, Insightful)
The logical facts of it are that interlocks will prevent drunk driving.
But it approaches a search without probable cause. Or a sobriety checkpoint. Or stop and frisk*. I don't need to be tested for drunk driving as I gave up drinking 40 years ago (but then all the drunks will say that too). So why should I have to put up with the inconvenience? This may actually generate a lot of hate by those inconvenienced, directed against the groups stereotyped (rightly or otherwise) of frequently driving drunk. Same way gun owners dislike "those other people" who always seem to shoot each other and provide statistical justification for more gun control.
*At least an automated system won't wave the mayor's nephew through and harass all the colored people.
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Good one.
Justice William O. Douglas used the amendment along with others in the Bill of Rights as a partial basis for the majority decision in Griswold v. Connecticut (1965), which cited the Third Amendment as implying a belief that an individual's home should be free from agents of the state.
Link [wikipedia.org]
So, software agents as well.
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The fuck is a wokester?
Re:Disaster (Score:4, Insightful)
Install hard-to-use monitoring devices and make their lives absolutely miserable
Correction, they will make your life miserable. People don't object to the effects on drunks. People are objecting to the effect on them. How on earth did you miss that? Also, along those lines...."your threat of violence indicates a high probability of murdering someone in the future, report to your nearest detention center for fitting with a murder prevention device (or reeducation) immediately". Do you see the problem yet? Or are you really that dense? Nobody thinks you are virtuous for posting things like this. They just think you are naive.
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This is a typical example of the kind of advice you get from someone with a single focus or concern. For example, if your single concern was on minimizing traffic deaths, you would pass a law allowing no one to drive over 3 mph, and no one could effectively go anywhere. If your single concern was minimizing COVID deaths, you would lock down a nation and allow no one to go to work or school, causing a massive disruption in the supply of goods, the loss of 1-2 years of learning, an increase in deaths due to v
What is next? (Score:3)
What is next?
Testing for... marijuana? xanax? opioids? unpaid taxes?
Hey kid, blow in this tube or I take away your phone.
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Are you saying that you support this kind of mandate for all cars at all times?
I'll just say that there is no way to prevent all accidents, whether they involve alcohol or not.
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Hey kid, blow in this tube or I take away your phone.
I think there are Internets videos that start that way...
"All cars"? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:"All cars"? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:"All cars"? (Score:5, Insightful)
After all, CAN-SPAM act exempted political spam.
When they want to come for your rights? (Score:4, Insightful)
They often pull out the "children" card: "...the NTSB said its recommendation was spurred by its investigation into one crash that killed nine people -- including seven children".
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They often pull out the "children" card: "...the NTSB said its recommendation was spurred by its investigation into one crash that killed nine people -- including seven children".
And it could have been a mass suicide -- they don't know for sure.
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Prevent speeding ... (Score:2)
But then how will police departments, state troopers, etc... make money?
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I'm much safer at high speed that the old man I was behind this morning who was driving 25mph on a busy 8 lane freeway. Both of us would pass this blow test but I'm much less likely to cause a traffic problem or be in a collision.
Re:Prevent speeding ... (Score:4, Interesting)
if you're under 25 the statistics [nsc.org] indicate that you're not safer than the old man. The best drivers are in their 60's although the difference between 30's and 60's isn't really that meaningful when comparing individuals.
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if you're under 25 the statistics [nsc.org] indicate that you're not safer than the old man. The best drivers are in their 60's although the difference between 30's and 60's isn't really that meaningful when comparing individuals.
Statistics are actually made up of individuals though, and while stereotyping is absolutely often the goal with statistics, individuals may take it more personally.
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The best drivers have more training, at any age.
I see a new market for snorkels coming up... (Score:2)
Excellent. (Score:2)
Last thing I do before heading into the office is brush my teeth and use listerine. It's been known to set off other alcohol breathalyzers, typically cheapos, so I love this idea. Excuse to work from home forever? Sure. Thanks.
cool (Score:2)
another sensor on my car that I don't need that costs me $300 to replace.
Easily defeated with a simple snorkel apparatus (Score:3)
There is a much better solution (Score:2)
This would reduce collisions dramatically for all causes, including distracted drivers as well as those who are impaired.
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With ultrasonic, radar and/or lidar, it should be possible to have the brakes automatically applied to avoid collisions.
Most cars without a full self driving sensor suite can’t tell the difference between a turning vehicle and an imminent impact. I get warnings about every two days that an impact is less than a second away when it’s not even in my path anymore because it can’t even tell the road is curved. Happens alot when a vehicle is exiting the freeway ahead of me. Never had to pay in an accident because I was always legally in the right and yet if the car got it’s way I’d be on my 40th
speed limit DB needs $299/year map updates (Score:2)
speed limit DB needs $299/year map updates
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Yes but we should just have it connect to your phone and bam, it has maps. Numerous options in faction. For free! I'm sure they are paid ones too.
DUI defense to get off? (Score:2)
DUI defense to get off?
Say you blow the car starts and then later you get pulled over for DUI then this may make it easy to win in court even more so it's an government one.
Why punish the majority for the bad few? (Score:2)
"I Can't Drive 55" (Score:2, Funny)
"I Can't Drive 55"
One foot on the brake and one on the gas, hey
Well, there's too much traffic, I can't pass, no
So I tried my best illegal move
A big black and white come and crushed my groove again
Go on and write me up for 125
Post my face, wanted dead or alive
Take my license, all that jive
I can't drive 55, oh no, uh
So I signed my name on number 24, hey
Yeah the judge said, "Boy, just one more, huh
I'm gonna throw your ass in the city joint"
Looked me in the eye, said, "You get my point?"
I say "Yeah!, Oh yeah"
Wr
Approved driving (Score:2)
I wonder how fast we'll go from "no one needs to speed" to "not enough social credit to start your own car".
Ya ya, conspiracy theory...but they keep coming true.
Fantastic!!! (Score:2)
No wonder they wanted to pretend this was a 'bipartisan bill' and the timing is perfect. Obviously no, since congress lacks the authority to do this these agencies do as well but that isn't the point.
Just like that the Democrats forgot their prohibition initiative was a flop and made a move to lose most of those Gen Z votes they bought with my tax dollars right before the midterms.
I'll not drink to that! (Score:4, Informative)
-Time-consuming annoyance, forever.
-Cars will cost hundreds more, forever.
-This will add to overall repair costs, which will likely require dealer involvement.
-What if one wants to go back and forth between the hood and re-starting the car during a driveway repair?
-By definition, this will make cars less reliable.
-There are rare times when an emergency requires the car start immediately.
-This increases pollution and e-waste, increases energy use and costs energy to manufacture. Why the dubious feature--is the planet warming or isn't it?
I think.. (Score:2)
The NTSB needs to have their budgets cut severely.
I don't drink/drive, I ride motorcycles on the street and offroad. It's called personal responsibility.
Solution to the ACTUAL problem (Score:3)
We need a bat (I'll even allow a NERF bat) with an end shaped like an interlock device. Whenever any politician mentions this type of legislation, they are immediately hit in the face, repeatedly, by the bat until they stop talking about such nonsense.
Why, cars too cheap? Too much privacy? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
How about the NTSB agency work on developing an asshole detector and we can install those in the cars and also in all federal buildings to boot.
We could, but I'm not sure why taxpayers would continue to pay for empty Federal buildings.
Not to mention New York City turning into New York Airport with roads so barren you could land planes.
Re: (Score:3)
Poor English, perhaps, but very insightful. 60% of the country would suddenly be going no where. Multiple sectors of the economy would come to a halt. The resulting death toll could be worse than before, at least during the transition. But really this would work no better than prohibition did.