Decibel detox: Fixing India's addiction to honking

How do you make Indians honk less?

BHPian evil_grin recently shared this with other enthusiasts.

Here’s what a horn is supposed to be used for:

warn others of the vehicle’s approach or presence, or to call attention to some hazard.

It’s for emergency use. To prevent a collision.

Here’s what a horn in India is used for

• Let me go first.
• Get out of my way.
• Don’t change lanes to land in front of me.
• Why have you stopped in traffic?
• The traffic light turned green 1 second ago.
• Some other selfish reason

None of these are even important. Forget Emergency. I find it difficult to fathom how we Indians are generally such gracious hosts at home but such inconsiderate drivers on the road.

How do you make Indians honk less?

Education? Through mass awareness campaigns or school education? That is a lot of effort and is unlikely to yield much results too soon.

Fines? It’s hard to define improper use of horns. Plus India’s traffic police is already too understaffed.

Remove? Can’t remove horns from cars. It’s an essential safety feature.

Here’s my suggestion.

Make the horn harder to press.

That’s all. Make it need say 3x the current amount of pressure to press. Most people dislike putting in too much effort in most things in life. Just making horns harder to press will discourage people from using the horn. And we’ll have less honking. In emergency situations, you’ll still be willing to press it harder.

This can’t be started by one car manufacturer. Because the buyers won’t like it. And it might lead to a reduction of sales. There are only two ways to get it done:

• The manufacturing companies team up to decide to make the horn harder to press together
• The government passes regulation to force every manufacturing company to do so.

We’re doing a lot to reduce air pollution from cars. Let’s do the something for noise pollution.

Here are the existing threads related to this:

The horn menace: Indians are honking way too much

No-Honking days in India

Here's what BHPian praveen789 had to say on the matter:

I can think of some cases which might not categorise as an emergency at that moment but more precautionary so making it harder to use in these scenarios might lead to an emergency/disaster

• To awaken jaywalkers deep in their own world while enjoying their music through earphones and strolling on the streets
• To awaken drivers who you can see drifting lanes from a distance who rarely bother to see in the rear view mirror
• On a blind curve to warn the other driver

Here's what BHPian a1m1 had to say on the matter:

As with everything else, it's going to take a couple of generations. Places like Goa and Mizoram, you'll see drivers not honk and maintain lane discipline (exceptions are there always), that's mainly because they have seen their parents drive without honking. Some parts of Bangalore, I've seen things get slightly better already- still lots of honking, but over the years on the same roads, have seen more drivers every year exercising restraint. The worst is the tier-2 towns where unnecessary honking and loud horns are at really ridiculous levels. The government can do their bit with awareness campaigns and ads featuring celebrities highlighting how stupid and pointless it is to honk in most cases. The fact is most honking is due to driver insecurity or inexperience, and some frustration. Slowly the idea will spread. And also important- crack down on extra-loud horns. (Even on a (supposedly) well-educated forum like this, you'll see several "the horn on my vehicle is not loud enough, can anyone suggest an after-market horn" queries.)

With the advent of EVs and with everything connected, wonder if there is a way to directly reduce the vehicle charge/range each time the horn is pressed and to reduce it dramatically, say if the horn is pressed 'x times in y minutes'. That ought to do the trick!

Here's what BHPian Shreyans_Jain had to say on the matter:

Horn is a basic safety feature, especially in Indian conditions where ANYTHING can happen at any time. I strongly disagree with any suggestions to make the horn inaccessible or hard to press or anything like. It needs to be pressed instantly, as a reflex action.

All that needs to be done is that the correct usage of horn needs to be taught during driver training. Our new driver training systems are improving, slowly we’ll get there.

As for noise pollution, I’d rather have stricter norms for two wheelers, the single biggest group of road users. Every time an Activa crosses by, I am surprised by how loud the engine is.

Here's what BHPian Hayek had to say on the matter:

Think fines are the way to go. The fact is that there is almost no circumstance in which honking is justified. If there are “Jay Walkers”, it’s because we have no footpaths - so cars should wait for them to pass. If someone is changing lanes, slow down. I do agree we need to fine folks who drive with the lane marking as a central axis, but that is no reason to honk.

We should probably insist on horns being linked to fast tag - if you honk once, pay ₹50; honk twice in a minute, pay ₹500 and so on.

Here's what BHPian drsachin had to say on the matter:

Fines may be a solution in Mumbai but not in Delhi NCR.

In Delhi the biggest problem is two wheelers and three wheelers who have absolutely no regard for rest of the traffic. They neither follow lanes nor redlights. I think 90% of two wheelers don't even view their rear view mirrors before changing lanes. The only deterrent they have is the honking by the car, who warns them not to change lane. If the person who is driving the car don't honk or don't slow down ,it's a recipe for sure shot accident. Irony is a large number of these two wheeler drivers either don't wear even a helmet or the helmet is just a showpiece with no real protection. These two wheelers are so brave that they regularly enter even expressways where it's clearly prohibited.

I have rarely seen any traffic police stopping these errant drivers for challans.

If one has to check the recklessly with which these two wheelers and three wheelers drive, just go to stretch from Cannaught place to Moti nagar, following pusa road. There are redlights at every 100meters. And no two wheeler or three wheeler stop at redlights. And they keep changing lanes juggling between cars like zombies.

Read BHPian comments for more insights and information.