Five Features EVERY Car Should Have -- But Are They Worth The Cost?

Blind spot detection --- Seriously? Adjust your mirrors smartly, pay attention to your surroundings and watch your rearview mirror for cars coming up. Seriously unnecessary and expensive

That capless fuel thing is so simple, but Ford patented it. Kudos, I suppose.

1) Capless Fuel Filler-- Cool idea, but totally unnecessary-- learn to just tighten the fuel cap-- mine works well.

2) Auto Up/Down Windows- and to think we lived with manual cranks for years- really not too big a deal, but my car has them and it's a useful feature. Still, how much effort does it really take for a passenger to hold his button down to lower or raise the window.

3) Bluetooth integration - Agree on this one and most new cars already have or offer this anyway-- They really do need to work on incorporating noise canceling technology to make the sound better for the party on the other end.

4) 3-blink blinkers-- it's a nifty idea in theory and I have this on my E90 335i. Again, don't see this as a huge advantage-- if fact it takes some effort to train yourself (being in the habit already of manually canceling the blinker) not to put the opposite blinker on when you mistakenly try to cancel it. A light press up or down causes a 3 blink flash, while a hard press causes normal activation that only cancels manually or if you turn 90 degrees. If you only drove a car with this feature from day one, it would work out better, but if you drive cars with and without it, you will invariably get frustrated with the feature.

5) Blind Spot Warning - ABSOLUTELY NOT-- this one makes my blood boil, but I can only post the rationale on an enthusiast site. As per chris760--- learn to check your mirrors, be aware of your surrounding, and drive. All we need is millions of cars with this safety feature lulling people into a sense of security and then not being fully alert to their surroundings. Some late model BMW's, Audi's, and Merc's, Acura's have this already and I'm sure there are others. Hopefully people just shut it off. My real HATE for this is that most are Radar based and make my Valentine One go nuts. Since it reads the number of sources, I can say there must be 4-5 radar emitters in an Audi S5 -- if you are behind one within a quarter mile, the detector will alarm. At least I know what it is, but it's an annoying disturbance only corrected by passing the offending car. Radar detection is useless with one of these in range-- now imaging if all cars had them-- forget being able to use a radar detector at all. On a related note, laser based cruise control is sometimes adapted for collision avoidance- meaning that the car will brake if it senses an impending collision-- Infiniti's and some Acura's have this feature-- as a result, the laser is on all the time, not just when cruise is active. If one of these vehicles is behind you or passes you in the opposite direction, you get a laser alarm from the Valentine One. Sigh..... Can't see this turning out for the better if more cars get these features.

Lastly, on the back up camera issue-- I think it would be very helpful. On my wife's truck, it is very useful to have the look down view to see your own bumper and the bumper of the car you are parking in front

2 more features we should all have

1) Sending Locations from Internet to the Nav--- I love this about my E90 335i--- if you go to Google Maps and find a location, one of the features is called Send To Car-- doing this causes the details to show up in a message queue in the car. If you play the feature, you can see which other manufacturers offer this feature. If the location chosen is say a business or restaurant, then the phone number gets transferred too. You then have the option of navigating to the location or calling a number if part of the message. It's nice not having to enter a location manually.

2) Direct Tire Pressure Monitoring with pressure readout. All new cars have monitoring. My last vehicle (Caddy CTS-V '07) and I assume most GM vehicles, as well as, my wifes Acura MDX have a nice little pictogram showing the pressure in each tire at all times. This is a fabulous feature and makes it easy to match them and regulate this within 1 PSI if desired. My BMW ('09) has direct monitoring of each tire, but only shows you a green light vs. error for each tire and will not alarm unless the pressure is really low. The design of the system is really behind the times for a technologically advanced company like BMW. There is no way to check the actual pressure without measuring it at the valve stem.

The Author of this post (Agent00R) is everything that is ,
the question should be not "how much will it cost",
but "can we do it";
and we CAN do it sir.
If it was up to people like this author of this here article, we'd still be in the dark ages, because new things cost money. Take your one-sided love for money and shove it, and give me the products of our civilization so that I can enjoy my existence. And it doesn't matter how much it costs, because I don't have the "money fetish".