By EWAN KENNEDY
19 March 2007

I’m becoming increasingly concerned about the poor visibility from the driving seat of many modern cars. Though today's new cars come in many different shapes and sizes, most have one thing in common; very wide windscreen pillars.

The pillars have been engineered to support the roof of the car in a severe crash involving a rollover. Indeed, it doesn’t always need a rollover to bring the big pillars into play, because they help strengthen the complete body by making it more rigid.

Curtain airbags also create problems as they are hidden within more and more windscreen pillars these days. And even if these airbags are an optional extra, the stowage space is sitting there vacantly taking up room and further fattening the pillar.

I suspect the great God, fashion, is another reason for thick A-pillars pillars. Sleek fronts on cars certainly look good, but if the windscreen has a big sweep backwards the pillars must be moved forwards to keep the top rail from spoiling headroom. And the greater the angle at which the windscreen pillars lie the more strength they lose. Therefore they have to be thicker again to regain their ability to hold the roof up in a rollover.

On the face of it these thick pillars are a good thing. But many have become so wide that they may be causing crashes due to the serious visibility problems they are creating.

It’s usually at its worst when on a winding country road that rises and falls as it wends its way around hills and dales. Very picturesque, but if the road takes a left as you drop down a hill the pillar on the left side can completely block the view of the road and any oncoming traffic, and vice versa on the right-hand side.

Then there was the car I tested recently where the right-hand A-pillar completely blocked my view of the edge of the inner circle of a roundabout.

I’ve even had a situation where a semi-trailer on the right of my car was totally masked for a few moments as the driver’s side pillar obscured it.

It can be argued that if you move your head you can regain the vision. But that doesn’t come as instinctively as you might expect, because it’s best to keep your head as still as possible when driving – just ask any trainer of racing-car drivers. Moving your head around can confuse the brain at times, spoiling the ongoing mental picture you have of your position on the road and the traffic around your car.

Perhaps these too-thick windscreen pillars are another reason why so many people are switching to 4WDs. Fashion is a funny thing; whereas cars are considered desirable if they are low and sleek, with 4WDs it’s exactly the opposite. Tall and bluff is what makes people want to be seen in one.

As I've said many times before, the whole object of safe driving is to avoid having a crash, not to survive one that could have been avoided by having the best possible vision of everything that is happening around you.