To Blame or Not to
Blame Automobiles
S.Q. Lapius wanted me to
teach him how to drive a motorcycle. It was a reasonable request, energy
crisis and all that, but what made it a dubious venture was that I had great
difficulty once trying to teach him how to balance himself on a bicycle.
As a matter of fact his command of the automobile left much to be desired, and
I had always assumed that he had gotten his driver’s license by way of some
sort of grandfather’s clause pertaining to horse and buggy, because I doubted
that he could pass a driver’s test.
“That’s just the point,
Harry,” Lapius said, countering my unspoken arguments. “My apparent
“erraticism” as a driver is really due to the fact that the American car is an
erratic animal.”
“Come come, Simon.
You aren’t going to blame an unbroken string of traffic tickets, minor
accidents and near calamities on the automobile. Surely you must accept
some of the blame.”
“Surely I will. I
accept blame for having bought the car in the first place. But beyond that,
the fault is all mechanical.”
I admired his intrepid
denial of complicity. “You know what they say, Simon, it’s not the nut on
the wheel that caused the accidents, but the nut behind the wheel.”
It had been a bantering
conversation to that point, but apparently I touched a nerve.
“Nut behind the wheel
indeed,” he exclaimed. “There are 50,000 deaths and 500,000 injuries annually
on American highways. This, despite magnificent four lane turnpikes with
median barriers and plenty of room for passing. But as soon as a road is
engineered large enough to permit two cars to pass safely, Detroit builds a
wider car. Americans didn’t start to buy foreign cars because they were
cheaper. That was a factor, of course, but they actually were more roadable,
as a result, safer. Recently in Europe I had occasion to drive a foreign
car over winding mountain roads. The compact auto, with positive steering
and a feel for the road took me through safely, despite the unfamiliar and
treacherous terrain. A behemoth of an American car on the same roads
would have been suicide to drive. Let’s look at some of the facts.
First, the steering. The average American car, for reasons that defy
comprehension, has too much play in the steering wheel before the front wheels
begin to turn. You have to guess your way into a curve, jiggling the
wheel to find the exact degree of rotation. The rack and pinion steering
of foreign cars turns the wheels into a direct ratio to the steering
wheel. This is a help.
“Secondly, the American
car is softly sprung. The manufacturers cater to the soft ride.
They brag that you can’t feel the bumps. Well you can’t feel the road
either. You are riding an animal that has faster reflexes than you have,
which has the power to purr up to a hundred miles per hour, and the driver has
no idea how fast he is really going unless he peeks at the speedometer, which
is usually hidden by one of the spokes of the steering wheel. In a
foreign car you can gauge your speed by the feel of the road.
“In addition, the
American car tends to wander. You can’t take your eyes off the road for a
moment. Otherwise you may find yourself brushing the fellow in the next
lane. Drive a European car and you will see the difference. The car
maintains its courses. Furthermore, because of the soft springing, the
body of the American car leans away from the chassis on turns. This tends
to pull the weight of the car to the outside wheels and threatens to overturn
it.
“Only in the last year
or two have disk brakes become standard on some of our cars, while they have
been installed on European cars for years. No, Harry, you can’t convince
me that it is the nut behind the wheel. It is the nut behind the drawing
board that is to blame.”
“Consider, if you will,
your posture in an American car. Forget that. Consider trying to
get into an American car. It requires training in Yoga. And once
inside you are only one step away from the lotus position.”
Lapius was just getting
up a full head of steam. “After all, Harry, I am not a tall man by
American standards, yet I can’t find a domestic auto in which I can sit without
my head rubbing against the roof. As a matter of fact I was developing
cradle-cap, which is why I first switched to foreign cars. Even in the
Volkswagen I can sit upright.”
“Boy, you sure are
turned on to this subject, Simon,” I said trying to placate him.
“I sure am. We
both see the accident cases coming in to the emergency room. Half a
million people crippled each year, many maimed for life. I claim it is because
of inadequate brakes, the inaccurate steering, the momentum of a poorly sprung
body, the excessive power all of which add up to poor readability. These
figures must be reduced. Do you realize that in too many cases the lucky
victims of auto accidents are the dead. If we could reduce the number of
accidents we would go a long way towards relieving the pressure on our
emergency rooms, hospitals, convalescent centers. And one way would be to
build safer cars, engineered more sanely than they are today.”
“And you are gong to
improve this all by learning to drive a motorcycle?” I asked innocently.
“Harry, you’ll
see. I’ll let you be my first passenger as soon as I master the device.”
“You know, Simon, for
the first time I am glad we are running out of gas.”