Crystal Conde

Research Paper
English 1101
First Draft
Note to Reader: Throughout my revision I focused most on getting away from the research
paper and incorporating more of my own voice. Originally it sounded very bland and dry so I
also tried to make it a little more interesting my changing the introduction. What else do you
think I should work on to make this paper better?

Technology in your Driveway
Close your eyes. Picture where you spend a bulk of your time each day. Work? School? Home?
Believe it or not the average American spends a bulk of their day in their cars. This seems like
an unlikely place, believe me I would have never imagined that we spend nearly 5 years of our
lives in a car either. That is what got me interested in this topic to begin with. If I am spending
so much time in my car I would want it to not only be safe but interactive, simplistic and even a
little fun. The use of technology has been on the rise and its implementation is widely seen in
cars worldwide. Technology can recognize our voices, iPhones scan our thumb prints and lock
screens of smartphones have face recognition. The same technological capabilities have been
recently transferred to a new world of ours, our personal vehicles. Fords new active sync
transfers cellphone information to the car and lets you command your phone actions through
voice activation. The increase in these small features has become popular throughout the
consumer market. The manufacturers took it a step further and created sensors that can stop
the car before an accident as well as park assist to get into those tight spots. People seem to
love these new features and it is making driving not only fun but safe. This technology is fairly
new, within the past 2 years, but it has shown promise thus far. Accidents rates in the UK have
dropped nearly 3% with a direct correlation to some of these features which is pushing the US
to follow in Britains footsteps.

Cars have been around since Henry Ford first made the revolutionary change
introducing the Model T in 1908. The Model T was a basic 4 cylinder engine powered vehicle
with 22 horsepower. The cylinders of a car mean that there are 4 pistons in the engine. The
pistons determine how much speed and power the engine gives. The power of the engine is
measured in horsepower. This type of car in this day and age seems almost unreasonable. The
cars now not only come with engines that are equipped with up to 400 horsepower. With a
vehicle of such high magnitude and force safety should be of top priorities to these car
companies producing such high performance vehicles, and it is.
US car companies must abide by regulations set forth by the US Federal government and the
Department of Transportation. The US Federal regulations include everything from seat belts,
airbags, child lock on the back doors, as well as the proper front and rear lights. These vehicular
regulations vary across seas and vary drastically throughout countries. For comparative analysis
I would like to look at the United States and Great Britain. The UK has set many safety
precautions that the US does not. The benefits of these are easily seen. The mortality rate due
to vehicular accidents for the US in 2011 was 34,080 (that does not account for pedestrian
death) coming from the US department of Transportation numbers in 2011. The equivalent to
the US DOT in England is call the Department for Transport and is broken down in providences,
recorded the fatality rate for 2012 was 1,754 deaths. The reason England has such low rates is
that newer model vehicles come standard with electrically assisted sensor brakes. This means
that the car can detect when an object is near and if the driver does not break within a few
meters the car will start to slow down on its own in order to prevent an accident. It is obvious
that presented by the facts that such increases do more good than harm. The number of fatal
accidents in the UK have shown a direct correlation with the technology implementation that
the country is in the midst of passing an under the European Certificate of Conformity the
vehicles that undergo inspection but have this feature or the option to install electronically
assisted sensor brake feature. It has not official been set into place but the ministry is actively
discussing this and will be set forth as early as 2015. Those cars that do not these guidelines will
be fined in the years to come (Electrically Assisted Pedal Cycles.)
England has a high provocative with technology in their vehicles and have been pushing
for assisted braking systems as I explained earlier. The main difference between England and
the US can be seen with a heavy use of back up cameras, something that the British have not
opted for quite yet. Rear back up related incidents caused more than 200 injures each year.
Ford, a US car company, has taken that into account. All Ford models SUVs, sedans, coupes and
trucks starting from 2011 some standard equipped with back up cameras. These small cameras
are placed in the back above the license plate, though in the past year they have changed the
location and made it very discreet placing it within the actual logo. Fords true price market
value has not increased thought the MSRP is going up. That is to be expected since the cars are
being more luxurious rather than conventional. Ford in a press conference stated, that they
wanted to promote safety above all and comfort second. If you are safe then in turn you will
feel much more comfortable in the car. Toyota has been doing the same. Because Toyota is part
of the Japanese district motors their prices are seen to be cheaper compared to domestic
companies. Toyota focusing on making their cars lightweight in order to make them more fuel
efficient. Toyota has to have a higher factor of safety because the cars are so lightweight. They
take precautions when it comes to circuitry and wiring. Toyota has had several recalls in the
past including the recent runaway Yaris where the gas pedal would get jammed. Toyota is
looking to improve safety with cars that communicate. Integrated systems on a most basic
level consist of wireless devices that let cars "talk" to each other and to roadside devices in
order to take safety precautions or give the driver advice. (Car tech) Toyota is a participant on
CAMP (Crash Avoidance Metrics Project), a project organized by the Vehicle Safety
Communications Consortium 3 (VSC3), an automaker alliance that is comprised of Nissan,
Honda, Toyota, Hyundai-Kia, Ford, General Motors, Mercedes-Benz, and Volkswagen. These
are all big recognizable car brands and quite a few have become a part of this Communications
Project which only further shows how technology is on the rise in cars.
I have explained quite a bit about these features but I have not explained how it works in
practice. The driver will first get a set of increasingly urgent visual and audio warnings when
their car approaches a potential threat. If they ignore them, auto braking may be applied to
prevent an accident, but even then the driver can retake control. Mr. Lovell a software
engineer working with self-braking for Toyota. He is very experienced, credited and has been
working with Toyota for nearly 12years he explains "If auto braking were to start, if the users
applies the brake or throttle all [automated] braking is canceled."
Technology has shaped the world we live in and now the cars we drive. The National Highway
Traffic and Safety Administration (NHTSA) and the Research and Innovative Technology
Association (RITA), the two U.S. government groups overseeing the technology, will make a
critical decision near the end of 2014 that will affect whether these safety features are here to
stay. The groups will rule whether to acknowledge if the technologies have advanced
sufficiently to make a difference the crash safety ratings and if any mandatory ruling will be set
in place. Who knows the seat belt was up for debate once too and now every car has one.
Looks like we will just have to wait and see

Crystal: any popular culture references you can bring in to make this interesting and relevant
to your readers? Do we see any of these technologies in car movies or TV shows or
commercials for example?
Keep going. See me as needed.






Work Cited
"Advanced Technology and Alternative Fuel Vehicles.. U.S. Department of Energy, n.d. Web. 27
Mar 2014. <http://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy01osti/27957.pdf

"ESQ - Vehicles." ESQ - Vehicles. N.p., n.d. Web. 27 Mar. 2014.

Los Angeles Times. Los Angeles Times, n.d. Web. 27 Mar. 2014.

Quick Reference Guide to the Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards and Regulations.
Published by the NHTSA. Web. Accessed 24 Mar 14.

"Tell Us What You Think of GOV.UK." Vehicle Safety Standards Information Sheets. N.p., n.d.
Web. 27 Mar. 2014.