From Roger Taylor
The “vibrating accelerator pedal” is a clever device and it is easy to see how designers would be seduced into including in it ever more complex and comprehensive features (20 March, p 24).
But consider this. Motorists who see a red light 200 metres ahead and simply roar up to it and slam on their brakes fall into one of two categories: the ignorant and the stupid. Ignorance is cured by a little education: a simple explanation of the benefits to fuel consumption, tyre and brake wear, not to mention personal stress levels, of lifting the foot off the accelerator.
Stupidity, on the other hand may be incurable and those drivers too dim to see that a red light in the distance means “start slowing now” are unlikely to take any notice of a vibrating pedal telling them the same thing.
Wirral, Cheshire, UK
