Transport i bezpieczeństwo · 18/02/2003

Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards

The agency denies a petition for rulemaking from Mr. Ronald J. Slaughter requesting that NHTSA initiate rulemaking to consider requiring motor vehicle manufacturers to equip new vehicles with instrumentation sufficient to alert vehicle drivers and nearby police whenever the vehicles are being operated while one or more of the occupants is unbelted. Mr. Slaughter suggested that implementation of the requested amendment would lead to increases in the rate of safety belt use. The agency is denying the petition for the following reasons. First, implementation of the requested amendment would be costly since it would necessitate the installation of seat belt use sensors, seat occupancy sensors, and light sources in each vehicle. Second, the requested amendment would have limited effect on safety belt use rates in the states whose safety belt use laws permit officers to stop a vehicle or issue a citation for failure to use a safety belt only if the officers also observe a separate concurrent violation. Third, the agency is concerned about consumer acceptance of the system proposed by the petitioner. Fourth, occupants who do not want to wear their seat belts can easily circumvent the syst