DRIVING would be less of a cognitive burden if you could keep your eyes on the road, instead of looking down to check your speed, fuel gauge or satnav. That's the thinking behind a new touch-sensitive steering wheel, which allows drivers to call up information on a head-up display on the windscreen, just off the driver's line of sight.
"We're looking at very simple touch interactions that don't require a visual focus," says Victoria Fang, who built the steering wheel together with Lucas Ainsworth at Intel labs in Hillsboro, Oregon.
The touchpad steering wheel is designed to do away with the plethora of switches and buttons that currently sprout from car steering columns, controlling everything from the radio to the GPS navigation system.
The researchers used a 3D printer to create a secure housing for a sheet of touch-sensitive material that they then embedded in one of the broad spokes of a steering wheel.
Tests involving volunteers on a driving simulator indicated that users are most comfortable operating the touchpad using the thumb of their right hand. Quick taps on the pad accept actions recommended by the display, such as "dim headlights" or "view accident location on satnav", while a swipe towards the left dismisses a suggestion. Swiping up or down scrolls through a menu of actions. The researchers are also experimenting with subtle audio prompts when new items pop up on the display.
"We are continually engaged with car equipment-makers to collaboratively explore these concepts," says Fang, although she declined to discuss the specifics of which manufacturer might be the first to bring the device to market.
"The computer scientist in me says that's got to be the coolest car ever," says Peter Bentley, a software engineer at University College London. "But the petrolhead in me says driving should be about integrating the driver with the car and making the car feel like an extension of your body, not turning it into an iPad on wheels."
Still, Bentley says he can see the benefits of the touchpad "for simple activities such as choosing music or changing volume while driving, and perhaps setting the cruise control".
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