20-11-2020, 01:47 PM
It's interesting to reflect on how vehicle technology has advanced since 1900 due to a combination of market-led competition and government regulations. In the 1960s* and 1970s flyweight hatchbacks with vast performance - but few safety features - killed hundreds of thousands every year across the world. Seat belts (thanks to Volvo who refused to patent the cross-lap system), air-bags, crumple zones, anti-side-intrusion bars, superior rustproofing, better tyres, etc. have made things so much safer. Cars now weighing twice as much as the same models of 30 years ago yet are more economical, comfortable and with better road-holding. After five years they are no longer the rusted-through-death-trap-as rotten-as-a-pear Mk.1 Ford-Escort and continue to survive crashes just as well into old age as when new. Although these developments are all most welcome, has something been missed, or deliberately excluded - and might this be 'longevity'? Could designers make a 'lifetime' car or truck that could last, say, 50 years without major work? Or would that be the death of motor manufacturing and fashion-led consumerism - and lead to a communist-style "Trabant situation"?
*The highest UK deaths-on-the-road figure in peacetime was 7,985 in 1966.
*The highest UK deaths-on-the-road figure in peacetime was 7,985 in 1966.