Hybrid cars may not be a good idea for the entire population. It turns out that the almost silent environmentally friendly cars pose a serious threat to the blind and visually impaired community. The American Council of the Blind is pushing the auto industry and government to develop ways in reducing this particular danger. The U.S Federal Highway Traffic Safety Administration held its first public meeting on this issue last week.

Now, obviously, the blind don't drive.  But Melanie Brunson, council executive director, points out that when walking, traffic noise is their only point of safety reference. "Traditionally, people who are blind or visually impaired learn to rely on their hearing and tactile cues to provide them with information about their environment, which they can use to navigate safely across streets and through other vehicular ways, such as parking lots," she said in a news release on Monday.

Furthermore, traffic sounds provide such information like the position of vehicles, their direction of travel, their rate of acceleration and the speed. "With this information, the pedestrian can make informed decisions about when to cross a street or other vehicular way safely," Brunson added. Without these sound cues people with a visual disability are at serious risk.

And the danger isn't even limited to blind or visually impaired people, points out Dr. Karen Gourgey, a member of the council's environmental access committee. Studies have shown that people with perfectly fine sight even have trouble hearing the cars because they use their hearing sense just as much as sight and may actually use hearing more to make street crossing decisions, though we may not even realize it. Children who haven't fully developed their hearing skills, and the elder community who may be losing theirs, will be affected as well. 

Hopefully the public meetings will come to some sort of consensus on a sensible solution for this potentially hazardous dilemma.