preview

1900s Road Safety

Decent Essays

Car safety has improved tremendously since the 1900s. Car safety was never a big concern until more and more people were getting injured or killed in automobile accidents. In 2012, frontal airbags saved 2,213 lives, according to The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). Seatbelts weren’t required to be used, unlike today, which you can be fined for not wearing a seatbelt. Many incidents were starting to happen during the 1910s when driving, including speeding, collisions, and overall clumsy driving. Mankind started to notice the danger of driving, and wanted to make driving more safe. Inventors started to come up with safety devices, and that was how car safety was born. Some inventions that were made to make driving more safe, “Benjamin Katz invents the world’s first head rest for cars… reduce the severity of …show more content…

According to the NHTSA, “More than 15,000 lives are saved each year in the United States…” (Seatbelts - Saving Thousands of Lives). Seatbelts are saving many lives. Without seat belts, that would be about 15,000 lives lost. Just one invention saved 15,000 lives in a year. “In 1967, carmaker Mercedes-Benz started to develop airbags for its vehicles. Two developments prompted that move: the rapid increase of accidents during the 1960s, and a new federal law that mandated ‘automatic occupant protection systems’ for every car in the USA starting in 1969”(McCormick 1). Making a law that mandated ‘automatic occupant protection systems’ for every car in the USA was a major improvement. Automatic occupant protection systems are functions like airbags, automatic braking, functions that the car will activate itself. This can help before crash, as if you are driving at another car, the automatic brake system can kick in an tremendously slow your car down before impact, thus causing less

Get Access