unintended consequences

it's been a topic mentioned here a number of times, but today i witnessed a very real and unintended consequence of the current trend for high window lines on cars.

a wheelchair was at an intersection crosswalk waiting for the signal to go, and a car pulled up on his left waiting to turn right over that crosswalk. so, when the lights changed, the driver proceeded to turn right nearly running over the guy they couldn't see sitting down.

so the question is, if the intention of high windowlines really is to protect unbelted car occupants from ejection in the event of a crash, is it really something so important that the slaughter of wheelchairs users is considered acceptable? given that anyone who doesn't wear a belt in their car is a well qualified darwin award candidate and deserves to be taken out of the gene pool anyway, i think not.

Reply to
jim beam
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A shorter person in a larger SUV will have the same problem, and I think even a normal height person seated properly in a car should see a wheelchair. And your wheelchair user should have enough sense to know he might not be seen for a whole lot of reasons.

Reply to
Bill Vanek

ability to see out of the side of the car when seated is a function of the seat height, the person's stature, the windowline height, and the distance to the side of the car. the right of the vehicle, that furthest from the driver, gives the shallowest angle of view. if an suv has a low windowline and a taller driver, the angle of view can easily be better than that of the medium height driver with a high windowline in an ordinary car.

as to the wheelchair guy, this was apparently something he'd encountered before - he had that thing into reverse and out of the way faster than i could say anything. but that still doesn't excuse the fact that higher windowlines are a visibility danger. today was a dude in a wheelchair switched on to the risk. tomorrow it's a kid in a stroller with a parent distracted by stooping to pick up a flung teddy. no pretty.

Reply to
jim beam

Your evidence is woefully insufficient to support your conclusion. Your scenario has presumably occurred countless times with vehicles and pedestrians of every description. -----

- gpsman

Reply to
gpsman

dude, i could recreate the scenario and measure the whole damned thing if i wanted because i'm just that kind of pedant. but to spare you that agony, i'm cutting to the point which is, and this is unarguable, that the angle of vision is decreased with a high windowline. and that reduced angle can prevent a driver seeing a pedestrian of reduced stature and potentially kill them.

it's just like those few years when seat belts were integrated with car doors. the intention was that the belts were "always on". but if the door opened in an accident, suddenly occupants were completely unrestrained. fortunately somebody saw sense and they were dropped in favor of a much more sensible audio alarm on the belt buckle instead. the same needs to happen to high window lines - they need to be moved back down to where they have been for the past 50 years. people that don't wear a belt in a car don't need to be "protected" at the expense of others.

Reply to
jim beam

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