I like the idea of metering the pressure on the brakes. However, an idea I've been kicking around for some time provides an earlier warning that someone is going to (or is likely to) brake - an indicator that someone has taken their foot off the accelerator. While this is not always an indication that someone is about to brake, it is an event that always precedes braking (except for those few incomprehensibly dense drivers who always keep one foot on the gas and one on the brake.....). The indicator (e.g. a yellow light on the tail of the car) would light when the gas pedal is in the completely non-depressed position. This would provide additional warning to cars following.
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The idea is a good one, but I have to disagree on the basis of the paradigm. It doesn't extend the existing paradigm of brake light indication, but rather adds yet another indicator for the driver to interpret. This indicator is not necessarily related to braking.
Too many people out there use the "accelerate and release, accelerate and release" method, even when they're simply trying to maintain their speed. This fact would make reading that indicator an impossibly unreliable task. Also, it doesn't do any good for people that are using cruise control.
About 10 years ago I was a director on a television car show. We had an item on an Israelian company that had a little device mounted on the accelerator pedal. If you let the pedal go fast, the breaklights went on.They proved that the following driver would start breaking just a bit earlier. This little difference made quite difference in distance between the two cars when stopped completely. This would prevent a certain pertencage of the front-tail accidents.
The person posting the idea mentions the old "left and right brake light system". Just out of interest, what was this? Many thanks.
Good idea! I like it.
These ideas are great.Here is what I thougt:We need to get rid off all those unnecessary brake light signals that come when we just touch the brake pedal. It causes nothing but abruption to the flow of traffic. The signal cascading backwards in the que whithout reason.What we need is a sensor that lights the brake lights only when the car decelerates a significant ammount, eg. 5% of speed per sec.That way we would only get brake signals that really meant something.No cry wolf brake signal. This would increase traffic flow and increase safety because we then would only get brake light signals that mattered.
I disagree with this one. I drive in a fairly hilly area, and often coast with my foot off the gas pedal for miles at a time on gradual declines (constant speed) with no intention of braking whatsoever. On steeper declines, I coast and downshift to maintain -- that way, the only time I hit my brakes is if I actually want to slow down (rather than ride the brakes). This will only serve to confuse drivers more as the people behind won't be able to tell if someone has their foot off the gas simply because they want to gradually coast, or as a precursor to immediately hitting the brakes. If someone simply wants to coast, and the guy behind starts braking because he sees an indicator light change, that could initiate a traffic jam for no good reason reason.
What I would rather see would be some sort of brake lighting that was graduated based on the intensity of braking -- sudden braking