NOVEMBER 2005 :: COVER STORY : AUTOS

Staying Alive
Safety Advancements Are Moving Fast, but Still Have a Long Way to Go

By Karen Lundegaard
Staff Reporter of The Wall Street Journal

Advances in auto safety have skyrocketed in the past decade, and the current pace of development is even faster. It was little more than a decade ago that most cars started to come equipped with frontal air bags, which today are required. Now vehicles can come with side bags for the chest, side bags for the head and even knee air bags. Vehicles get crash-tested frontally and sideways, and get jerked around on a track to see how likely they are to turn upside down.

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But despite the safety emphasis, more than 43,000 people die on U.S. roads annually and some 1.2 million world-wide. That number is expected to climb to 2.3 million by 2020 as the numbers of drivers and cars increase, making traffic safety the world's third-largest health concern, before even war and AIDS. Traffic safety is now commonly thought of as a public-health issue.

Those deaths, and serious injuries in far greater numbers, are what leads auto-safety researchers to say that current efforts aren't enough. "I don't think there will be enough until we eradicate the disease," says Bob Lange, safety chief at General Motors. "It's going to take some time."

How far consumers are willing to go for better safety isn't clear. Drivers tend to reject features that take control away from them, although their main concern along those lines seems to be in steering. A little automatic braking, assuming it's done properly, seems welcome.

Whether consumers will pay more for such features is also questionable. In surveys, respondents often rate safety features as important, but they're more likely to spend on a sunroof or upgraded stereo than an optional head-protecting air bag, according to data from auto makers and dealers. Some experts say consumers rely on the government to protect them. If a feature is important enough, such as seat belts, they assume it will be mandated.

Still, auto makers claim of late that better safety helps them sell vehicles, and recently they're rushing over one another to be the first to market with new features that they often deem safety-related, such as windshield wipers that turn themselves on in the rain. Safety continues to seep into ads-when the emphasis isn't on horsepower.

Here are some of the safety features that drivers might see on cars soon:

ADAPTIVE CRUISE CONTROL: These systems work with the cruise control to adjust a car's speed when a vehicle in front gets too close. Most systems currently on the market will slow the vehicle down. But they shut off when the vehicle slows below a set speed, often about 20 miles per hour. Suppliers are working on even more refinements. Bosch recently showcased a BMW 545i that operates in stop-and-go traffic, bringing the car to all but a standstill and then speeding up again once traffic clears.

LANE DEPARTURE WARNING: Several suppliers are working on this technology, which typically uses cameras in the front of the vehicle to read lane markings on the road and warn a driver who's shifting out of the lane. Infiniti currently puts it on the FX SUV and its just-released M sedan. Some systems cause the driver's seat to vibrate on the side the vehicle is drifting to; other warnings chime.

BLIND-SPOT DETECTION: Engineers have come up with a sensor that warns drivers when something is in their blind spot. Problem is, vehicles are in your blind spot whenever they start to pass. To make the warnings less obtrusive, GM put a warning light on the side mirrors of a concept vehicle that it unveiled at a conference in April. Volvo plans to put it on several new vehicles, beginning in Sweden this winter.

COLLISION-MITIGATION BRAKING: Suppliers continue to adjust these systems, trying to figure out how much to brake and when. Bosch has a system that pulses the brakes as a warning to the driver when it senses a crash. That system will be on a 2007 model-year vehicle in Europe, which the supplier won't name. An even newer system the supplier is trying to sell uses full braking just before a suspected crash. On Continental's system, the forward sensors that activate the braking also make other things happen, such as closing the windows and the sunroof and tightening seat belts.

BRILLIANT AIR BAGS: While the industry has moved to smarter and smarter air bags-the latest now recognize whether a child seat or someone short or lightweight is in the chair-the next round of designs are expected to be even more intelligent. They will use sensors in the seat to determine the passenger's weight and whether the person is leaning forward, and to track whether the chair is too close to the air bag. Future air bags will be further sensitized and customized, and could use video cameras to detect not only the age and size of individuals but how they're sitting.

BETTER CRASH PROTECTION: Even though everyone is scoring well in U.S. government crash tests, auto makers are always hoping for that extra star in the rating. Honda is starting to install a high-strength-steel front underbody that tries to lessen the danger when vehicles of unequal sizes crash. The aim is that, in a crash, the larger vehicle will be less likely to ride up and on top of a Honda Civic, for example.

ROLLOVER PROTECTION: Auto makers are installing rollover sensors that activate smarter braking when a vehicle is starting to lift off the ground and that cause air bags to stay deployed much longer-roughly six seconds, compared with less than one second formerly for frontal air bags. But more needs to be done on rollovers, which account for one in three occupant fatalities a year in the U.S. Stronger roofs are likely thanks to a government mandate expected soon. Better seatbelts are still needed. GM announced in June that it will build a new rollover-test facility, dedicating even more resources to helping prevent the deadly crashes.