Are car makers blind?

November 6, 2007 - By John LeBlanc

If you think the number of cylinders under the hood is less important than the number of airbags in the cabin, you’re not alone.

Where my Dad would’ve checked-off a high-output V8, optional vinyl roof, stereophonic eight-track player, or a slick two-tone paint scheme (heavy on the earth-tones) as preferred options, today’s car buyers are looking for five-star crash ratings, side-curtain airbags and anti-lock brakes.

Go ahead. Strike up a conversation about your new car’s horsepower ratings or zero-to-100 km/h performance at your next neighborhood cocktail party. As sure as an impending UAW strike threat, you will forever be now known as the ‘hood’s Threat to Society.

Instead, open up that your newly purchased family cruiser comes fully-optioned with ABS, EBD or ESP. Now wait for the knowing nods and approving looks.

Feeling cocky?

In the right crowd, once you’ve shown off your abilities to spew automotive safety feature acronyms, the impending debate on whether adaptive cruise control or lane-departure is this season’s must-have safety statement. This response is especially provocative from the members of the opposite sex who have reached an age where “responsible” equates to “sexy.”

Think I’m wrong? Ah, you must be the social pariah on your street, better known to our neighbors as “that guy who likes cars.”

OK. So it’s no news that safety features that concentrate on accident avoidance and survival has replaced performance and styling as the numero uno priority with the enlightened car buyers. And it’s even less newsworthy that carmakers want an arm and a leg for said safety stuff.

“Who cares how much it costs? If it ‘saves lives” it must be a good value.

“Right?”

Yes… Maybe…

Ask any professional driving instructor: What’s been the most significant new technology in reducing traffic accidents—ABS, stability or traction control, or airbags?

Their answer would be “none of the above.”

“Your earliest warning system is your eyes.”

In other words: all the ABS in the world isn’t going to help you if you can’t see the tractor trailer you’re just about to sideswipe whilst changing lanes. Kind of like the car I was driving last week: Chevrolet’s new $19,855 HHR Panel.

As you may have surmised, this is the newest panel truck version of Chevrolet’s take on the PT Cruiser. Marketed as an economical, stylish delivery vehicle for small businesses, the compact Chevy wagon’s passenger doors have been replaced by solid cargo doors that open via a dashboard release buttons. From the outside the HHR Panel certainly looks cool, in a Harley-shop-parts-runner kind of way.

Like a racehorse blinders, one drives the HHR Panel in day-to-day city traffic with virtually no peripheral vision. From the driver’s seat, I couldn’t really tell what was going outside of the HHR Panel aft of the B-pillars.

Geez, is that a car beside me? A kid on a bike? Someone walking his or her dog? Uranus?

How safe can that be? And with such an emphasis recently on safety—from both consumers and manufacturers—how did we get to the point where despite an Apollo-mission’s worth of on-board electronic nannies, the Chevy seems about as safe as my Dad’s Nova?

Beyond the blanked-off side windows, with it’s retro chopped roof design, even the regular HHR has minimal glass for viewing. Of course, the HHR Panel isn’t alone in its faddish form over function over safety issues.

Anything with a Hummer badge suffers this same high-waist, thin-glass malady.

Inspired by the original military-grade Hummer H1, if one lives in a neighbourhood where you feel more comfortable with gun slit windows in your SUV, maybe you need more protection than mere side-curtain airbags.

Toyota’s FJ Cruiser is another vehicle with a rear three-quarter blind spot seemingly larger than Prince Edward Island. And pretty much every new seven-seater crossover suffers from an oversized C-pillar, all in the name of not looking like a minivan.

So what’s a new car buyer to do if one wants to make sure they’re getting the safest car possible?

Look for lots of glass above the car’s beltline. Then, before you sign on the dotted line, get yourself in the driver’s seat. Adjust your mirrors properly. Now, do you feel that you could spot a car sitting off your rear flanks? Or kid walking across your laneway? When parallel parking, are you thinking 9-1-1 in case of an emergency?

Bottom-line when it comes to safe driving and choosing a even safer car, seeing is believing.

Otherwise, you might as well spend your money on that vinyl roof.

- John LeBlanc , Publisher