Sometimes I have to drive after dark in my city, and it never fails that if I drive any appreciable distance that I always see at least one person (often more) driving with their lights off. I do not need to tell y’all why this is dangerous. We’re a community of enthusiasts. We know. Plenty of us are driving older cars that predate the tech.
It’s not like they don’t mandate lots of shit already. Seatbelts, head restraints, airbags, and backup cameras are some of the most sensible things ever required for cars to have. Why are automatic headlights not on this list? There also needs to exist a mandate whereby the lights turn on if the driver turns on the wipers. Because if you need your wipers, you need your lights too. It’s common freaking sense.
Your headlights aren’t just for seeing, but for being seen. Ambient light sensors are so cheap that they end up in midrange TVs all the time. I blame the backlit gauges and myriad other interior lights. Ergo, it’s time to mandate automatic headlights. There’s no reason not to.
I’ll get off my soapbox now.
I do not like having headlights being forced on. There are situations often enough where either I don’t want to unnecessarily light up someone’s place or I simply want to be inconspicuous. But I absolutely support the option to use an ambient light sensor to darken the dash in that situation. Pretty sure that was one of the options in new legislation a few years ago. It was either force lights on with the uv sensor (Toyota?), add tail lights to the drl function (Mazda?), or turn off the dash lights if headlights are off and it’s dark out (haven’t seen this one). There are many streetlights in my area so missing headlights aren’t obvious for miles at a time to a less-knowledgeable driver
My car from 2006 has daytime runners and headlights that turn on automatically. Either can be turned off at any time with the press of a button.
My 2000 Camry did not allow the driver to disable the auto drl/headlights, only turn the headlights on manually. Every other auto-capable car I had though has been like yours, just an optional setting. That was a fluke at the time, but now it’s one of the valid ways to meet regulation in the US and has become more common. I want to say it was changed in 2019
i think they should have the default be “on” when the car is started. then the driver can actively turn them off if they choose to do so. most people just throw it into “automatic” mode and assume it’s the correct thing to do. we even get taught to do it that way.