Can Modern Cars Make Bad Driving Feel Safe?
You have a brand-new SUV, and you’re driving down the highway.
It feels like the car is doing half the work, though, so it’s even more relaxing than you thought it would be. You’re always at a perfect distance from the car in front of you, thanks to adaptive cruise control, and the lane assist nudges the steering wheel back every time you go a little bit too much to the side. The cabin is smooth and quiet, the car beeps and taps the brakes for you when the traffic slows down, and you can’t help but feel safe.
The way you feel is intentional. Manufacturers engineered it, and nobody in their right mind would even think to complain.
But here’s an uncomfortable question for you: does feeling THIS comfortable make you a worse driver?
How Modern Cars Changed the Feeling of Driving
Have you ever driven an older car? Something from the 90s or the 2000s? If you took that thing 80 mph, you knew EXACTLY how fast you were going.
You didn’t have to look at the speedometer; it was obvious. The engine was loud, the steering wheel would shake a little, you’d feel every single bump in the road, and overall, you weren’t really comfortable. And that discomfort was a good thing because you were aware of your speed.
Now compare that to a modern car. It doesn’t have to be anything too expensive, just a basic family sedan. It feels completely different than something old, and you’d say it’s different in a good way.
How could it be anything but good, right?
You hardly notice the cracks in the pavement because of how smooth the suspension is, and the cabin is so quiet you could whisper in there. And let’s not forget driver assistance features that make your mistakes pretty much disappear. Then you up your speed, and it feels calm and manageable. It’s nothing as it would feel in an old car.
That calm feeling is problematic.
If your car feels stable, you get comfortable, and when you’re comfortable, your brain thinks you’re safe. Which you never truly are in a car. Just because the cabin is nicer doesn’t mean that your reaction time is quicker or that stopping while going 80 mph takes the same distance as it would if you were going 60 mph. Unfortunately, you get too confident when you’re comfortable, and the car won’t warn you when you’re driving too fast.
Technology can make driving a whole lot less stressful, but the law doesn’t care about that.
And it shouldn’t. How speeding is handled depends on the state you’re in, but it’s never good. Take Illinois, for example. They’re pretty tough on speeding there, and a speeding accident attorney for injured Chicago drivers, like the ones from Rosenfeld Injury Law, would warn you that driving 26 mph or more above the speed limit isn’t a ticket but a criminal misdemeanor.
That means a court record. Virginia is even more strict because really high speeds get treated as reckless driving pretty much right away. It could even land you in jail.
Why the Way You Behave Is More Important Than Tech
Here’s what a lot of people get backward.
All those cool features your car has to help you out aren’t here, so they can take over when you check out. They’re meant to help someone who’s already laser-focused on driving because you can NEVER check out while you’re in traffic. They’re kind of like a friend who taps you on the arm when you do something stupid – that’s it. Nothing more.
And as useful as they are, you can’t take a nap and hope the car tells you when to slam the brakes.
Really, the scariest part of this whole thing is overconfidence.
No sane person decides to drive like a maniac because their car has safety features. It happens over time. You take the same route to work every morning, and even though the lane assist caught you drifting a lot of times, nothing bad ever happened.
The automatic braking beeped here and there, but have you ever hit anything? Nope. So you relax a little more every day, and you don’t even notice it.
Then you start building habits that are… Iffy, at best.
You get a bit closer to the car in front of you because the cruise control will brake for you if it’s necessary. You speed up because 80 mph feels like 60 in your quiet cabin. The traffic is slow, but no biggie; it’s fine.
You glance at the phone, brake a bit later than before, and so on.
You feel safe, but you aren’t.
Conclusion
As you may have guessed, the answer to that question in the title is – yes.
But look, modern cars really do make crashes less awful than they were before. You ARE safer in a modern car than you are in something from the 90s. All of these cool features save lives; that was never in question.
Unfortunately, the most important factor when it comes to safety is still the way you drive. No airbags and beeps can fully protect you from your mistakes.
They just make them a little less likely to kill you. But the majority is still on you, though.
