Lot of shakin’ going on

It pays to pay attention

Alady we know has a new car. It has a video screen of what's behind her when she’s in reverse. It tells you the tire pressure of each tire, in real time. It has heated seats. If you drift across a line in the road, it beeps.

And if you get too close to the car in front of you, it will shake the driver’s seat—to the point of scaring the bejesus out of somebody new behind its wheel.

So to the news of the day: According to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS), driver warning systems aren’t all that. If that’s the case, we shudder to think about the potential dangers of “self-driving” systems, but that’s another editorial or seven.

According to IIHS, only one of 14 “partially automated systems” tested by the group performed well enough to get an overall rating of “acceptable.”

Two others were rated “marginal” and the rest were rated “poor,” which means that no system received the top rating of “good.” We were hoping that “excellent” would be the top category, and that at least one auto manufacturer with these systems in their vehicles would be worthy of it.

“Most of them don’t include adequate measures to prevent misuse and keep drivers from losing focus on what’s happening on the road,” said IIHS President David Harkey, according to the Associated Press.

The institute came up with the new rating system to get automakers to follow standards, including how closely these systems watch drivers and how fast the cars issue warnings if drivers aren’t paying attention.

Harkey went on to say that the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) needs to do more to set standards for the systems. And while the 14 systems are among the most sophisticated on the market, only one of them, Teammate (in the Lexus LS) earned the adequate rating.

Adequate? That’s not adequate enough.

GM’s Super Cruise in the GMC Sierra and Nissan’s Pro-Pilot Assist with Navi-Link in the Ariya electric vehicle were rated “marginal.”

In the “poor” rating were systems from Nissan, Tesla, BMW, Ford, Genesis, Mercedes-Benz and Volvo.

While safety features such as automatic emergency braking, lane departure warnings, lane centering and blind-spot detection were built for safety, they now provide drivers with a false sense of security as they look away from the road for a period of time. This obviously raises safety risks—and scares the heck out of us drivers who pay attention. Even worse is that the earthquake rattle on approaching a car too closely.

IIHS recommends systems should be able to see when a driver’s head or eyes are not directed on the road, and whether their hands are on the wheel—or ready to grab it if necessary. Further, audible and visual alerts should be included that activate within 10 seconds of failing to perform these tasks.

Driving’s not that hard. It requires pushing an accelerator, keeping hands on the wheel, and staying alert. A 16-year-old can do it. Let’s keep it that way until all the systems are rated as “excellent.”

Keep your eyes on the road, and yo’ hands upon the wheel. Safety first.

“Keep your eyes on the road and yo’ hands upon the whee-u-ll…”

—The Doors