The fact that traditional cars of today are often very noisy is inadvertently a way in which to avoid even more traffic accidents because the likelihood is that you will hear the car coming before you see it. However, a number of experts have suggested that the lack of noise from an electric vehicle could well be a safety problem in the future because instinctively many of us will listen for vehicles before crossing the road and if we don’t hear any we will feel safe to cross the road.
There has been talk of legislation to ensure that electric car engines make some form of noise to alert pedestrians but is this a step too far? Or is this a perfectly legitimate safety solution?