I would say to all those people who want hybrids to make noise that the correct way to know if a car is approaching is to LOOK, not to HEAR. This is what my parents, school teachers and driving-licence teachers had always teached me.
Obiously blind persons can't look for a car, but they have special methods to know when to cross a street: sounding traffic lights, special trained dogs, etc.
And what about heavely congested cities? You can't hear a car coming with a lot of background noise! So they are telling me that cars should have a microphone and speakers to make a louder sound than the surrounding noise? (I hope you understand what I mean)...
It's like saying: "hey, no, I don't want a silent washing-machine because then I can't hear when it's finished!"

I wonder if I installed a speaker and ran a wire to my iPod, downloaded the sound of a 1969 Plymouth Barracuda Hemi revving and accelerating with straight pipes and just sat in front "revving" it they would drop all this nonsense.

Or better yet, maybe a Harley with straight pipes.

if hybrids should make loud noise, maybe the government should just ban blind people from going out alone after all. :blah:

Most brand new ICE vehicles are just as quiet as hybrids. Therefore, hybrids should not be treated any differently. The drivers should be responsible enough to look where they are going).

BUT, EVEN WITH 1960'S BIG BLOCKS, countless wildlife ends up victim to roadkill every day. So, obviously engine noise is NOT the solution (from 100 years of data). If ANY vehicle is going to emit noise, then ALL vehicles should emit noise. And to protect the animals, the noise that ALL vehicles should emit should be a LION'S ROAR. (that's going to make busy urban city settings exciting).
When the vehicle detects that the driver is on a winding road, it automatically turns on the roaring sound every fifty seconds. If not on a winding road, then the vehicle is silent. Problem solved ! (maybe a few blind people on winding roads will be saved every year from hearing the Lion's Roar)
And I'm sure teenagers will figure out how to turn the roaring sound on while driving through residential neighborhoods at 3am.

EXAMPLE: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aUfDxRelPHg Haha! This is going to be great!

.

I find that the Prius is easier to notice audibly. Newer gas engines are quiet. I can hear the inverter sing on a Prius when power or regen activates farther away that other cars.

Any word from NHTSA on when they expect to complete their study of hybrid involvement in pedestrian injuries, using all reportable crashes? My study was only for crashes involving deaths (because that's what's on the NHTSA public-use file). If NHTSA gets a clear answer one way or the other, from the full spectrum of reported incidents, that ought to be a pretty strong determinant of how this proceeds.

Also, thanks for keeping up the fight on this. This is one of those stories that just has so much appeal as "news" that it's not going to die on its own.

Nothing but given the change, I figured it might take a little while before NHTSA figured out which way to go. I'm worried that the new head of the Department of Transportation, former Rep. Ray LaHood, was one of the 30 co-sponsors in September 2008.

Yeap, it looks like we've got two years of nonsense to deal with again.

Bob Wilson

Yeah, that's "great" solution - reduce accidents by increasing car noise. Let's then make sure that the car noise is increased to the level where is could be heard by all :
a) those who are listening ipods while walking or cycling
b) those who are driving other cars (could be very useful if the car is in the blind spot, for example)
c) have I missed anybody?

Or even better, maybe all pedestrians should be equipped with noise devices so that car drivers could hear them coming.

Kangaroos are killed almost exclusively on long straight roads here, there are a lot of them though.
Truck cause most of those deaths but there are a lot of them too.
Good job Bob.

Are there any organized opponents to the noise makers ? Obviously, blind people foundations are uniting in proponency, but other than us individuals here chatting on a message board, are there any large organizations or companies lobbying in opposition to the noise makers ?

One would assume Toyota would put in a word to the negative in the debate.
There are more companies willing to support noise makers because they would prefer not to have hybrids in the market.
It's therefore up to the people who want hybrids in the market to make the noise so our cars wont have to.