quote:Called optical speed bars, the plastic strips were placed yesterday at intervals that narrow from 24 feet at the start to 15 feet at the end along a half-mile stretch of Lee Chapel Road in Fairfax County. When someone drives over them, the strips create a sort of flip-book effect that makes the motorist think the car is moving faster than it is.
The illusion is also meant to get drivers' attention so they will slow down as they approach the notoriously treacherous curve between the Fairfax County Parkway and Route 123.
"This is super low-tech, pretty inexpensive, and hopefully it's a solution to speeding out here," VDOT spokesman Ryan Hall said.
I know the curve being talked about, and it is VERY dangerous.
Bob, is this kind of thing in widespread use? I've never heard of it before, but now that I have it seems fairly obvious.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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Those have been around since at least year 2002, because when my college was proposing a "human factors" major, this type of illusion to decrease speed was used as an example of human factors in action.
Pretty cool stuff, and it really does seem to work.
Posts: 5656 | Registered: Oct 1999
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One thing I didn't like about the article was this:
quote:The experiment might sound promising, but some traffic enforcement experts say there's no substitute for a marked patrol car with a radar gun and flashing lights to deter drivers from speeding.
Now the article doesn't say who said this, but it sounds like utter BS to me. Doing this will not make it so you can never put a speed trap there.
It may make the speed trap catch less speeders, but that's only a problem if you think giving more speeding tickets is a good thing.
Of course since police departments partially fund themselves with the tickets they write, the police and local governments do have a conflict of interest. Less speeding tickets mean less income.
I hope that the person who said the quote above isn't hesitant in their support for these reasons.
Posts: 5656 | Registered: Oct 1999
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Also, I don't know what it's like there, but in some places traffic cops have a monthly quota for tickets they need to give out. I'm not sure about Washington state, where I am now, but in Hawaii it was a policy. I always drove a little more careful at the end of the month when cops were scrambling to make quota.
Posts: 2907 | Registered: Nov 2005
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Why didn't you just drive safely and within limits all the time so you wouldn't have to worry about whether or not it was the end of the month? Posts: 9538 | Registered: Aug 2003
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Cuz ya'd be a traffic hazard by driving at significantly less speed than that of the traffic flow; not the least portion of that hazard arising from angering all of the other drivers who are doing at least 5mph over the speed limit. And that is the way it is. The only way to stop such "natural driving-comfort zone" speeding is to put electronic speed governors on every car. Such receiver-governors would be cheaper and simpler than putting up speed limit signs.
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And such fun to hack into! Yay! Or, y'know, you could just snip the wires.
Edit : Oh, and for God's sake, since when is it 'cheaper and simpler' to add an electronic control thingy to every car, than to put up a sign made of metal and paint? You still need to check that it's working, so there's no less enforcement burden. You still need to inform the car of the speed limit in each area, so now you have to put up transmitters, with delicate electronic components that need maintenance, instead of dumb signs that only blow down once in a while. (Or, more likely, in addition to, since old cars won't have controllers.) Then, you have to have inspectors to make sure people aren't disabling their receivers; retooling of car factories; extra paperwork for exempt old cars; and above all the general hassle factor of adding just one more damn thing. Cheap at one-hundredth the price!
[ May 04, 2006, 04:29 PM: Message edited by: King of Men ]
Posts: 10645 | Registered: Jul 2004
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Cut the wires and travel at zero speed because of a lack of electronic fuel-air injection and electronic ignition and engine timing. Since speeding would intrinsicly constitute near-proof of hacking the system, automatic temporary*confiscation of cars -- for a garage-mechanic's check on the programming as evidence of concious&deliberate contempt for the law -- would make folks a lot less likely to do such tampering.
Ain't gonna happen cuz most politicians are "zoom zoom" fantasizers even more so than the general public. As proven by the lack of decent and easily-achievable fuel-economy standards even after over 30years since the first crude oil price spikes. Most cars could get 3to5miles per gallon / 1.3to2.1kilometres per liter improvement in overall efficiency merely by reprogramming their electronic engine controls to economy mode. Only a few high-efficiency cars would achieve significantly less savings.
* Of the type currently practiced on drunk drivers.
posted
The reason it would be cheaper is cuz the speed-control system could be piggybacked onto existing cellphone networks. New cars would have a speed-limit receiver&governor as part of the electronic engine-controls. Older cars could be retrofitted. Paperwork for classic cars would be no different than before...even if one concedes that classic cars belong on the road.
Thanks for posting that article. I had not heard of that before, which kind of surprises me since it's the sort of thing I figure I would've run across at the annual Transportation Research Board meeting.
I suspect this would work great in an environment with low salience alternative cues to speed -- e.g., at night on a rural road, in a simulator, maybe a few other places.
I wonder about how well it will work in a real-world situations.
But hey, it's a cheap solution if it works. Drivers do attend to external speed cues so if these lines are salient enough, and are giving drivers an illusion of higher speed, they probably will slow down. It'd be interesting to see how well it works and under what conditions.
The quotation from the cop is a tad bit misleading since, realistically, no enforcement agency can afford to put speed patrols out at a single location on a constant basis. That spokesperson is correct in what he said about driver's behavior in the presence of a marked enforcement vehicle, but that doesn't mean that enforcement is the only effective way to affect people's behavior.
aspectre, The cost of in-vehicle electronic systems like what you are talking about is high. Think about the failsafes it would have to have. The feedback it has to give drivers. The liability if it fails in ways that make it harder for drivers to recover from an error. I'm not saying that our vehicles may not someday have systems like that -- there are some being tested now.
Another thing to consider is that the savings from not putting signs out on the roadway will not accrue for years (maybe decades, if ever) after such instrumentation is put into cars. There's no way this stuff would be deployed throughout the entire vehicle "fleet" instantaneously, so for whatever lengthy deployment period is decided upon, the signs will have to be maintained. Chances are signs will stay for a lot longer than that too. When the various devices fail, there has to be something out there to give drivers information on the proper speed for that roadway.
To give you a sense of where we are today in terms of instrumented roadways, the most advanced systems have sensors that give back speed and traffic volume data, weather conditions (precipitation, temperature of pavement and air), and maybe a few other variables. The data come in to a central system in a nearly continuous stream (high sampling rates). Using various models, the most advanced automated systems can predict whether the pavement might be icy, or that visibility may be low. There are some systems that can give a guess that "something" has happened on the roadway -- maybe an accident.
We're just now at the point where these advanced traffic management centers are going to start broadcasting alerts and "incident ahead" warnings to vehicles upstream of the location of a traffic tie up.
There are major research projects ongoing to tell us how best to give that information to drivers. Maybe it should be an audible warning, maybe heads-up display, maybe a suggested routing from in-vehicle positioning systems.
Lots of research to be done there.
Okay, now for the vehicle sid of things:
As for external controls over vehicle speeds. There are HUGE barriers to overcome. User acceptance is a biggee -- people will not trust a car that starts to "do things" on its own. We're just now getting people used to adaptive cruise control -- a system that backs off of the programmed speed automatically (maybe even to the point of applying the brakes) if the following distance goes below a pre-set limit.
There are vehicles that have speed limiters, of course, but none of those have external controls. They have reporting and recording instruments, but nothing like the kind of technology that would allow someone (let alone some external automated system)to remotely control what speed the vehicle is going.
There is going to be heavy lobbying against some of that kind of thing from the auto manufacturers because it's not a selling point, it adds a lot to the expense of a vehicle, and, most importantly, they'll be really afraid of liability should the system be blamed for injuries or deaths in a crash.
Solving all of that, the first generation systems are still likely to cost a LOT of money. Not just a few bucks and hook it via a cell phone. Think about the environment in which it has to operate. And the level of flawless operation it has to have. And the way that it must fail in controlled ways when it does break (because it will break). That's not cheap off-the-shelf technology. That's testing, and retesting, and running under every possible condition for hundreds of thousands of miles.
That's not to say that people haven't started building such systems in prototype mode. Just that what we're looking at now are one-offs built in university and manufacturer-based research centers at costs that would far exceed the cost of the rest of the vehicle.
Eventually, if there's political will in favor of it, there will be a way to mass produce the things at much lower per-unit costs. Gradually, it'll be the case that every new car would have them as an option, or... if the government really changed how it works in these situations, we might see it forced on the manufacturers as a required piece of equipment by a certain date.
But that leaves us with the question of retro-fitting.
The government in the US is just not likely to require retrofitting of older vehicles with a technology like this. In the first place, there'd be a huge uproar from the folks in poorer rural states that their constituents just can't afford it. Even at best with major mass production, the cost per unit in the beginning is likely to be hundreds if not a thousand or more dollars. Easy enough to hide in the base price of a luxury or mid-level automobile, but a HUGE hit for buyers of low-end vehicles or, of course, owners of used vehicles.
It might be tempting to say "well people shouldn't drive those older, less safe vehicles anyway." But that kind of "answer" never works with legislators because they know that the people who vote for them aren't made of money. The average per-capita income of workers in the US is something like $32,000 (if I can believe the USA today article I read this morning). Telling someone at or below that income level that they have to spend a month's wages to stick a device on their old beater of a car...not going to happen.
At least not without a LONG fight.
And remember...all that time, we'll have to maintain the signage and markings, and all the other stuff that tells the drivers what the limits are for that road.
Posts: 22497 | Registered: Sep 2000
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For Bob_Scopatz later -- length of ownership, US and Canada -- but first...
Farmgirl asked why people don't just drive within the speed limits all of the time. Pointing out that the only way to prevent "natural driving-comfort zone" speeding is through use of electronic speed-governors isn't advocacy to do so. KoM stated that the system would be easy to defeat. Showing why such sabotage would be counter-productive for drivers also isn't advocacy of such a system.
There would be no privacy issue: it would take a deliberate addition of an identity-transponder and of a program to track&record the whereabouts of specific vehicles. Admittedly, legislation has already been passed to make it mandatory for US cellphone service providers to track&record cellphone locations. So whether or not car locations would also be tracked&recorded* would be a matter of additional legislation. Either way, the privacy concern is moot for cellphone owners. Discussing technology and legislation isn't advocacy.
I deliberately didn't mention a far more privacy-intrusive alternative that the British are using: extremely widespread deployment of networked recording cameras, and of networked radar-activated camera systems to catch and automaticly ticket speeders. Which I dislike because it punishes first, even unintentional and/or momentary speeding, rather than prevents first. Anytime the law rewards the government for dishing out punishment, the government has ever more reason to concentrate on punishment rather than prevention. Witness eg the rise in tobacco taxes. Writing about the existence of a more privacy-intrusive alternative isn't advocacy for a speed-governing system.
* A similar (without electronic speed-governing) but separate (from the cellphone network) system was recently considered by the British government as a way to catch and fine speeders through comparisons of trip distances with trip times. Didn't run across any follow-up stories about whether it went up for a vote in Parliament or whether it was passed.
quote:Originally posted by aspectre: Since speeding would intrinsicly constitute near-proof of hacking the system, automatic temporary*confiscation of cars -- for a garage-mechanic's check on the programming as evidence of concious&deliberate contempt for the law -- would make folks a lot less likely to do such tampering.
Your living in a country where people get upset if you start talking about taking their M16 away. This aint gonna happen, not right now.
I can't help but think this article smacks of something I don't like. Its the attitude that it implies about the relationship between the public and law enforcement. For instance, down the street from my apt they just put in a 10,000 dollar camera system that photographs cars running a red light. This particular 5 way intersection is notorious for being very wide, and approached on one side from downhill. The light periods are long, and there are lots of cyclists and pedestrians crossing there. Anyway its not at all certain that one will make it from the far side to the line in the time it takes for yellow to change to red.
What I've been seeing there lately is that people see that sign with a $500 fine warning, and guage the light, give themselves a little space behind the next person, then jamm across the intersection even faster to avoid being in danger of catching a red. I've never ever seen or heard about an accident there, since it is a low speed area in a small town, and I can't help thinking this is just some pet project of a local official or group. Anyway I get a little ticked every time I pass by the camera, and I feel a little harassed to have to be worrying about being photographed instead of just driving.
This to me, feels the same way. If its a really dangerous road, maybe they should redesign it. On the other hand, this might save lives, which I think is good. And that comment about it being no replacement for a cop-car? Who are "traffic enforcement experts" if not cops? Some cop is afraid of losing his job snagging weekend drivers. How lame.
Posts: 9912 | Registered: Nov 2005
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I wish we could just teach people to be better, more responsible, more respectful drivers. That's the real problem. For any measure designed to deter fast or unsafe driving, the people who want to drive quickly or unsafely will continue to do so, and will bemoan the government for trying to stop them. Witness radar detectors, websites pointing out speed traps, license plate covers to reflect radar and lasers, etc.
Driving 5 miles an hour over the speed limit on an open road, or with the other drivers going the same speed with open spacing isn't inherently dangerous. When the speed limit was increased from 55mph to 70mph, people's cars didn't start suddenly exploding and smashing into each other. There may have been a slight increase in accidents, I'm not sure, but I see safe 65+ driving conditions all the time.
The danger is people who drive carelessly, people who pass without enough room, people who tailgate, people who run red lights, people who put other drivers at risk with their careless driving. Unfortunately, these people can do so at any speed.
My fear with mechanically enforced speed limits is that people who are chronic speeders now will only become more frustrated and will drive even more recklessly, trying to pass constantly, cutting people off, and so forth, in an effort to "go faster", even when their car is driving the speed limit.
Some people will be stupid and irresponsible at every opportunity. Limiting their ability to do so only forces them to improvise.
Posts: 3950 | Registered: Mar 2006
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Immigration, the war in Iraq, oil prices-none of these things made me go out on the street and protest. But if the government tries to put a damn computer in charge of my motorcycle or car, I'll be on the 6 o'clock news Posts: 1412 | Registered: Oct 2005
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Um...maybe you could provide a page reference for that 15 year old document you linked to. I searched on every variant I could think of for data on length of ownership.
I found one reference in the article from the US:
quote:The product plan assumes automakers install technologies that pay for themselves in four years (the average length of ownership for a new car’s first owner) assuming a 10-percent discount rate and $1.50/gallon (in 1989$) gasoline.
Was your point that Canadians keep their cars longer than US owners? That's not too suprising, but look more closely at something from the Canadian one:
quote:In Canada there are over five million vehicles on the road which are over 10 years old, about 30 percent of the total.
I suspect that percentage for the US today is probably not that far off from what Canada sees. Your article from the US was written in 1991. That means the information used to back up the arguments in that article were from around 1987 through 1990 (at the latest) -- with maybe a bit of prognostication of the then current view of the future.
But let's think about what that would mean in terms of a "10 year old car" in that time frame. We're talking cars built in the 1970s. Comparing US purchasing habits throughout the 1980's with present day Canada would be a mistake. Comparing cars built in the 1970's (1991's "10 year old - plus cars") with cars built in the early/mid 1990's (2006's 10-year-old-plus cars) is also a mistake.
I guess I'm just failing to see your point.
Posts: 22497 | Registered: Sep 2000
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Sorry, Bob_Scopatz, this scrolled off the frontpage before I saw your response. It's pretty easy to forget from getting distracted reading new threads. Couldn't hone in on a more recent report with the keywords I was googling. You found the "4 years (the average length of ownership for a new car’s first owner)" that I was seeking. Might also want to take a look at the charts accompanying it on page60. I was aware your counter-arguments before I had posted the first time on this thread. Which I'll respond to... ...but first a link to the news article which led to me refinding up this thread...
"You're living in a country where people get upset if you start talking about taking their M16 away." "...if the government tries to put a...computer in charge of my motorcycle or car, I'll be on the 6 o'clock news "
posted
Actually, from those numbers, 78% were willing to give up "something" (100% minus the 22% who actually said they wouldn't give up anything) and 23% would give on all available measures in order to get better mileage.
Posts: 22497 | Registered: Sep 2000
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Nearly all of that "willing" 78% could already have better gas mileage. This is a 32year old problem. They've contradicted what they say by the choice they made in their last car purchase. Most especially the ones who helped that unwilling 22% to elect shortsighted panderers into the Congress.
Posts: 8501 | Registered: Jul 2001
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quote:Originally posted by aspectre: "You're living in a country where people get upset if you start talking about taking their M16 away." "...if the government tries to put a...computer in charge of my motorcycle or car, I'll be on the 6 o'clock news "
You used my tongue in cheek comment to support another one of your crazy assertations. But that's not what really irks me. Where do you get off telling people what they have or haven't, can or can't, should or shouldn't give up? I've seen you do it on several threads and the arrogance of it just blows me away every time.
You have no idea what sacrifices each of us have made for what causes. Yet you persist in identifying your causes as the ones that matter most. You know everyone's situations better than they do, so you can tell them what they need and what they can do without. Any sacrifices made are not enough because more could be done. It gets old.
Posts: 1412 | Registered: Oct 2005
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quote:They've contradicted what they say by the choice they made in their last car purchase.
I don't see that statement supported by the link you gave. It's just not even addressed except for the statement down near the bottom that acknowledges that people might answer one way and decide to purchase another way.
From a personal pocket-book perspective, without incentives most high-mileage car purchases don't make a lot of sense:
- you pay a premium for a hybrid. The savings in gas usage alone don't make up for the increased cost of the vehicle except in very specific circumstances. Only truly "green" motivated and "high tech" motivated people are buying hybrids in appreciable numbers at present. Incentives have a huge impact on this buying pattern, it appears, so the thinking is that it's purely a pocket-book decision. Just like economic theory tells it should be, eh?
- high-mileage diesel cars are still viewed as noisy and smelly (although they really aren't anymore). The perception persists. There is a certain reluctance in some areas of the country to stay away from diesel engines because either the fuel is unavailable or the cost/gallon is higher than regular unleaded. Engine power is a concern, but not that big of one because most of the high-mileage diesel cars are economy models and buyers at that end of the spectrum aren't expecting to get much zip.
- higher mileage small cars: Sure, they're out there, but they simply don't meet many driver's needs. They do tend to sacrifice safety (just being small is a factor, but also since they are usually the low-end economy models they do lack some features that the more expensive models have.
I'm not really seeing what you expect to happen aspectre. I have friends who deliberately sought to purchase a 30 mpg+ vehicle that met their needs. In contrast to when they purchased their older cars (10+ year-old-Honda Civic 4-door wagons), they found out they had almost NO choices. They eventually whittled it down to one vehicle on the market today that met their requirements for gas mileage, roominess, price, and reliability.
You act as if consumers aren't acting rationally, when, realistically, I think consumers are acting in response to myriad concerns (not JUST mileage) and purchasing from among the available options.
Whether all those consumers choose rationally or not, I won't venture an opinion. But I do know that at least some people try to balance their requirements and find that the choices are rather limited.
If it helps any, my next vehicle is going to be a hybrid minivan, unless it costs so darn much that I can't justify the expense.
We're lucky in that we can probaby hold off on buying a new car for at least 4 or 5 years if we don't see what we want on the market.
But...that means that what's available to me when I do finally buy is dictated by the purchasing habits of all the others who do need to purchase a car in the next 3 or so years. If the manufacturers aren't cranking out hybrid minivans soon, I'll be stuck buying something other than what I hope to buy.
Posts: 22497 | Registered: Sep 2000
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quote:Originally posted by Bob_Scopatz: - high-mileage diesel cars are still viewed as noisy and smelly (although they really aren't anymore). The perception persists. There is a certain reluctance in some areas of the country to stay away from diesel engines because either the fuel is unavailable or the cost/gallon is higher than regular unleaded. Engine power is a concern, but not that big of one because most of the high-mileage diesel cars are economy models and buyers at that end of the spectrum aren't expecting to get much zip.
Really the only reason I didn't buy diesel was the only manufacturer I could find here in the states with a diesel engine (excluding large trucks) was Volkswagon. They've had a less than stellar reliability record, they're expensive to fix, and the closest dealer is an hour away. They also cost more. Really, there's a lack of choices for a high mileage diesel engine. I think it has to do with the 'smelly, loud' perception that you mentioned.
My motorcycle (daily commuter & weekend toy) was <$1000, has California emissions, gets 55-60 mpg, and is more fun to ride than the VW Beetle.
Of course, I know, aspectre, I didn't sacrifice enough since I'm still having fun (although that early morning commute is still pretty chilly). The materials used in my safety gear probably raised the pollution level somewhere. Also the only reason I really got it was because I saw them in the media- tv, movies Posts: 1412 | Registered: Oct 2005
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quote:Originally posted by BaoQingTian: You know everyone's situations better than they do, so you can tell them what they need and what they can do without. Any sacrifices made are not enough because more could be done. It gets old.
posted
I'm just concerned about what kind of microparticles these paint stripes might be diffusing into the atomosphere. No, actually, I was rather angry the other day that I fell for a fake speed bump. There were a couple of real speed bumps, and then a couple of strips the same width as the speed bump that made me brake just like the real thing. Now brake pad dust- doesn't that actually contain asbestos?
The weirdest part was that the Shoppers Food Warehouse had the real speedbumps and Babies "R" Us had the fake ones.
Posts: 11017 | Registered: Apr 2003
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Back in 1996, Asbestos brake pads were banned from use on new cars sold in the US; not sure whether that included light trucks, vans, and SUVs. I think that the ban didn't cover big rigs and tractor-trailers. However as far as I am aware: Asbestos in replacement brakepads are still legal. Don't think that anyone manufactures them for newer model cars. But they are manufactured&sold as replacements for big rigs and tractor-trailors; or were until relatively recently.
"Nevertheless, logic does seem to favour putting responsibility in the driver's own hands. If, for example, drivers were strapped to their bonnets, in such a way that the most forward points of their cars became their heads, we would almost certainly see a marked shift towards greater care and attention by road users."
Posts: 8501 | Registered: Jul 2001
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It bugs me that they know that this is a notoriously trecherous and dangerous curve, but instead of remedying that, they are trying the cheaper fix of optical speed bars. I assume that there have been plenty of accidents and -- G'd forbid! -- fatalities at that spot (which is how it came to be known as notoriously trecherous). At what cost to life, health and property are they saving money by not regrading the curve?
Posts: 10397 | Registered: Jun 2005
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You assume that is doable. It may well not be. Also, if this is just as effective (I don't know that it is, but if), then shouldn't they use the cheaper solution, even if it is possible?
Posts: 32919 | Registered: Mar 2003
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I was in a traffic jam the other day and couldn't even get a CALL to go though.
But of COURSE he knows more than Bob does regarding this....even if all he can find is a bunch of out of date documents that don't don't actually say what he claims to back him up.
We'd be STUPID to believe otherwise. Posts: 15082 | Registered: Jul 2001
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I wonder if there is a driver learning curve with these optical speed bars that would either render them ineffective in the long term or train people to hit real speed bumps at full speed.
Posts: 2445 | Registered: Oct 2004
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Distances and times between locations from warrantless GPS tracking in the US could easily be converted into speeds, and thus be used to issue speeding tickets.
quote:"This means that to most people, 40 feet looks like a lot less than 40 feet when they're on the road," Shaffer said. "People cover more ground than they think in a given period of time, so they are probably underestimating their speed."
quote:Originally posted by scifibum: From the line length link (from Feb):
quote:"This means that to most people, 40 feet looks like a lot less than 40 feet when they're on the road," Shaffer said. "People cover more ground than they think in a given period of time, so they are probably underestimating their speed."
Speedometer!
Also from this article:
quote: A new study has found that people grossly underestimate the length of these lines -- a finding which implies that we're all misjudging distances as we drive, and are driving too fast as a result.
....
He acknowledges that the study will come as no surprise to transportation engineers, some of whom his team consulted with during the study. But this is the first study to quantify Americans' misperceptions of the lines.
This is the problem with reporters. The study makes no such claims as "we are driving *too fast.*" It seems to indicate that we are not aware of the lengths of dashes in the road, and that we misjudge their lengths by up to 4/5ths. No crap it doesn't surprise highway engineers.
Has anyone here ever had the experience of vertigo caused by sitting in the last car of a large metro train as it passes the last columns inside a particularly large station? I have that almost daily- to the point where I have to close my eyes as the train leaves the station because I will get dizzy otherwise. Because the columns are widely spaced and vertical with lots of orienting objects, it is easy to guage acceleration. It happens to also be easy to be made sick by the over stimulation.
Highway engineers design roads to be comfortable to drive on at the speed for which the road is designed. What benefit can be gained by overstimulating the driver on a road on which her only task is to stay within the dotted lines? As Scifi says, we HAVE SPEEDOMETERS. And this article presumes to have actual insight into the implications of this effect, when it really doesn't. This has got to be the number one most annoying part of articles like these- they show such an obvious lack of understanding, even as they admit in their actual quoted content that there is no real support for the conclusions implied by the journalist. A good journalist would simply ask, as any diligent reader should REQUIRE of the writer: "does the fact that we misjudge the distance mean that we are driving too fast?" But no, that isn't in the article.
I've been told before that the journalist is often not in control of the actual title of the piece. I credit that possibility, but why would he say anything at all about driving too fast, when his own article provides the explanation:
quote: One possible explanation: as we drive, we look out far ahead the car for safety reasons, so the only lines we really see are faraway lines that look small.
Even though lines appear to expand as a car passes by, drivers can't safely notice that effect. Rather, the first line we can comfortably look at while driving safely is some 120 feet ahead -- the fourth line ahead on the road. So perhaps we think that all lines are as small in reality as that one faraway line appears to be.
Some researchers have proposed the idea of "size constancy" to explain our perceptions -- meaning that we see an object as being the same size, no matter how close or far away it is, Shaffer said.
So he says here that the effect is caused by the way we behave WHILE WE ARE DRIVING SAFELY.
So what's the message here, really? What goes on? Why the stuff in the beginning about driving too fast? Did the author not go back to the beginning and check to see that he wasn't spouting complete nonsense? Did he tack that bit on the end without thinking about what he'd already said? I mean, if this were a current event report in the 9th grade, he'd get dinged just for being lazy.
Posts: 9912 | Registered: Nov 2005
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Thank you for the corroborating testimony. I found the assertion that drivers are calculating their speed by the perceived length of lines on the road bizarre.
Posts: 4287 | Registered: Mar 2005
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Given the way a lot of people seem to drive on the highway, I think a greater awareness of the length of those lines might be a bad thing.
"Oh, I'm ten feet away from the bumper of the car in front of me. That ought to be plenty of time to stop-" *CRASH*
Posts: 3826 | Registered: May 2005
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