Designing for consequences

I don’t design cars. By the time you’re done reading this, you’ll be glad I don’t design cars. At the moment, I’m of the opinion that cars should take out seatbelts, airbags, stability control, anti-lock brakes, crumple zones, and all of those safety features they’ve added over the last fifty years.

Instead, they should put a big spike on the steering wheel where the horn is.

Do this for all cars, and suddenly people will become much more cautious and courteous drivers.

I sometimes wonder if the push and drive to increase driver safety comes at a cost. Specifically, it insulates people from the consequences of their actions.

A drunk driver plows into a crowd of pedestrians. Thanks to all of the great safety equipment inside of the car, the driver is fine, and can walk away, but the people he hit were not so well protected. Sure, he might go to prison, but prison hardly heals the injured.

There is an obvious market incentive to increase the level of protection for the buyer. After all, someone who walks away from a wreck that could’ve killed them goes a long way to brand loyalty. But, there’s no incentive to protect things not in the vehicle. The design of cars is largely to absorb as much energy as possible, and transmit the rest away from the passengers.

There is also no market incentive to punish obviously bad drivers. At best, consequences are realized through tickets and a rise in insurance premiums, but it seems that the brain has a hard time internalizing the cause and effect due to time delays between getting caught in your insurance going up, or the the number of times you get away with something vs. the number of times you are caught.

So, how to bring the consequences of your actions into a more real time, present form?

I realize there are a lot of practical issues with the spike, but once something goes from harmless to potentially deadly, it does make one redefine their priorities, as you suddenly face the same potential consequences as those around you.