Yep.
Because humans make a judgement as to whether to brake or not. I do and I assume I'm not special. If it's a child, no problem, cars can be replaced, squirrel, bag, cat, whatever, I check the rear view mirror, judge what it is and then decide.
I've had it happen to me. squirrel ran into the road, partner screamed, and while this was going on I still thought it wasn't worth slamming the anchors on, I did brake gradually. The squirrel was then off somewhere doing squirrel stuff.
Which means you will have some cars unexpectedly stopping and other car drivers not expecting it.
Yes it does.
There is a real reason as to why you need to suddenly brake. Ever done a driving test? Heard the examiner say, "in a moment I want you to stop as if a child as run out in front of you"?
Emergency Stop - Driving Test Manoeuvres - A Licence 2 Drive
Why?
This manoeuver is designed to teach you how to stop your car safely as quickly as possible. If a child runs out in front of your car, you don't want to be skidding and sliding all over the road.
How to do the Emergency Stop, Emergency stop on test
On your driving test the examiner will ask you to pull up on the left and then brief you on the emergency stop. He/she will say “Shortly I will be asking you to do the emergency stop as if a child had run out into the road, when I raise my right hand and say stop, you need to react as quickly as possible keeping the car under full control. You may see me look over my shoulder, please do not anticipate the stop until I raise my right hand.”
That's why we maintain spacing, so we can react and stop when unexpected things happen.
I do. Guy behind me?
I have a car, car brakes over something I might not have. Car behind, hits me. I end up with a lot of inconvenience and possibly an injury from the car behind going into me. Maybe the driver behind is also injured as well. We have two broken cars.
Hence above, if it's a child I'm stopping, who cares, otherwise I look in the mirror and make a judgement call on what it is and what's behind me and how fast I think he can stop.
Fact: People are inattentive and do run into the back of cars that stop suddenly in front of them.
Fact: False alarms from AEB systems will increase the number of times a car stops for no apparent reason.
It would be interesting to know whether this will be balanced by a decrease in instances of cars with AEB back ending someone.For which we would need to know the number of times AEB prevented an accident versus the number of times it was a contributing factor (leaving aside whose fault it was).
If you are uncomfortable that he is too close then do something about it - let him pass, whatever.
Maybe an inactive system can be fitted to all future cars, and when a certain threshold of equiped cars is reached (in a country or area) they can all be activated together. A mandatory lamp at the rear would alert non-equiped drivers to pay extra attention (?)
Like in Formula 1:
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Over here tailgating is How they drive. Animals are something you worry about. If we had squirrels on the roads I think I might not brake either. Kangaroos and Wombats kill cars (and sometimes occupants for kangaroos pissed off at coming through your windscreen).Hit a wombat at 70mph and the car will almost certainly be written off. They are very low so the bumpers and crumple zones are almost useless.
Anyway AEB is great if the driver doesn’t rely on it when things aren’t jumping out in front of the car in front. If you keep your distance it doesn’t matter how hard the car in front brakes.
It is good for avoidingwildlife but kangaroos appear bloody quickly. Volvo I think it was came over here a while ago to develop and test their system trying to get one that deals with Roos by looking at signs they are about to move. Many simply come across at bonnet or above height out of trees and travelling a damn sight quicker than a squirrel. Kangaroosare the ultimate test it seems.
I know you want to have an answer for everything but in the real world some people are assholes. People don't naturally assume the car in front will brake. People are lazy about keeping their distance, some are lazy about checking their mirror. Generally a car suddenly braking hard is rare and only done in an emergency and usually for a good reason.
This is one of the frustrating about the internet, it is difficult to get subtleties over.