> In the rear, it's almost impossible to access the manual release in an emergency. You have to pull out a floor mat and then pop open a panel that requires a metal tool to extract, and then reach blindly into a hole to pull the release. And this process damages the car, so you can't really practice in a non-emergency.

Just so you know, this is improved the latest (2023+) Model 3. There is now an easily removable panel in the door pocket, with a yellow cable to release the latch.[0]

I still hope they improve the mechanism to not require this, but they did at least improve it a bit in the latest model.

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S1jhCz12SKM

> I couldn't believe I was actually understanding it correctly and that this could be legal

I think laws are usually reactive. Why would there be a ban on such a silly thing.

In my experience, most passengers unfamiliar with the Tesla Model 3 instinctively use the emergency door release in non-emergency situations, rather than pressing the button as intended.

I have a model Y and it is the first car in my life where I need to give passengers a tutorial on how to enter/exit the car. Also, my mom in the front passenger seat just assumed the emergency door release was the normal one(because she has never pushed a small button to open a door in a car before), and she pulled it and a big "WARNING! YOU MIGHT BREAK YOUR WINDOWS DOING THAT" message popped up on the screen.

Id like to point out that the comment about the manual release is a bit disingenuous since most people accidentally use them when trying to get out as it is more akin to a traditional car than the intended method for opening the doors which is a thumb button. In my anecdotal experience anyway.

>as if they hopped into a 747.

I think escaping the 747 is , thankfully for those who fly , easier.

You may enjoy the book The Design of Everyday Things. I no longer blame people for pushing on pull doors, but the designers who failed at the appropriate cues.

I find public transit will often use electric doors, but they will also have ways to open the door or window manually in the case of an emergency which seems like the best middleground.

That said, when has a door handle ever been a major point of failure in a personal automobile? Electric door handles on cars for less wear is a bad argument, imo. My internal skeptic says Tesla saves as much money as they can on door latches, so they need it to be electronic to remain gentle enough it won't break.

> electronic handle puts less wear on the car as it can accurately actuate the door release and do it better than a human

More important is lessening wind resistance and noise. Tesla windows seal tightly against the moulding and they need to be lowered about a centimeter before opening or closing the door. The electronic latches do this automatically.

The electronic door handle being a safety issue has been discussed for a very long time and to the point it's surprising it's just now getting this scrutiny. Personally, I don't want to ride in a Tesla and this is one of a few reasons.

Same happened to us... we poked at the door "handle" for a few seconds.

> I've been a passenger in well north of 100 different ones over the years (Uber/Bolt/etc.) and had no idea there even was a mechanical release

I’d say these are grounds for removing them from the rideshare circulation until a user has completed a brief safety course.

My 2024 car is reliable, comfortable, nice to drive. With big doorhandles, easy to open and no instructions to passengers required.

If any, Chinese cars are usually loaded with bells and whistles to the top.

A normal car of yore with ac that gets from A to B, but is electric. Imagine that.

Why did Bloomberg write numerous instead of specifying the number?

I don't know about hardware redundancy, but yes for at least "easily verifiable limiters".

What is "hardware" anyway? Does a microcontroller-based integrator or debouncer count? Depending on how you define that, it can become a serious roadblocker. But anyway, I guess that point is moot for a door handle, you can fix it with stuff that is unambiguously hardware.

Another lesson not learnt from therac-25 (and really most disasters caused by humans) is that safety is a cultural issue, that needs to be taken seriously from top to bottom in the organization.

This is clearly not the case with Tesla.

Elon does watch or understand USCSB or their videos, he defunds them because he "knows better".

https://www.youtube.com/@USCSB

The funny thing is that Elon has been very critical of regulation in car design, such as the rules around the side-view mirrors (he wanted to get rid of them and replace with cameras).

But then they find something unregulated and manage to flub it so badly it makes a strong case for regulation.

I'm not sure if Elon was involved in these door handles on the interior, though I do recall he was very involved in the early touch-to-expose exterior handles and insisted they use them despite internal engineering pushback. I think a lot of the bad engineering designs seem to originate from internal engineers getting overruled by Elon.

This isn't a failure of regulation. It's a failure of engineering culture. It's an industry fad or circle jerk, same as any other.

Blaming "but the law didn't say I couldn't do this" fails to properly ascribe blame and serves to excuse the peddlers of bad culture.

The Telsa handle and copycats are figment of stupid engineering circle jerk culture allowed to run unrestrained. These people are disposed to do all sorts of insane actuator and automation implementations to avoid having to design a simple part to withstand the force of a human operating it.

There are many ways to do a fold flush manual handle/lever and hook that up to a traditional door mechanism and/or make it automatic (the latter is a feature of every high end minivan side door in the past 20yr).

The problem isn't that there was no regulator saying no The problem is that they wanted to do the stupid at all. If there was a law forbidding this particular implementation of stupid they'd find a different one. You can't legislate them all. You have to solve the culture.

It reminds me of the rise of SUVs leading to more rollover crashes in the 90s.

Before that, NHTSA didn’t run rollover crash tests - they added rollover crash tests in 2000 in response to SUVs.

Regulatory and safety agencies are usually reactive, and can’t anticipate every market change.

She was highly intoxicated and driving under the influence, reversed the car into a pond and died because of it. Whether or not the doors contributed to her death is a guess at best. When a car is submerged, you aren't able to open a door generally due to the weight of the water pushing in on the car. That car has a completely standard gear stalk as well, so blaming it on that make no sense.

I don't have sympathy for those who DWI. Luckily, she didn't kill anyone else.

My car maintenance costs since 2018 has been a gallon of windshield wiper fluid and new tires.

If you're buying a new car every two years, you could get the same low level of maintenance with an ICE Toyota. Or, you know, you can buy an EV from a company that knows how to make a door handle, and still get that low maintenance of an EV. There are many to choose from.

You can use the app to open the door if the handle is frozen. Still not a great design, might as well have a button instead.

>My car maintenance costs since 2018 has been a gallon of windshield wiper fluid and new tires

Just to be clear, you keep buying stupid and poorly designed cars to save a couple hundred dollars on oil changes? Which are the ONLY maintenance item you need to do on any brand new ICE from purchase to about 100k miles?

You repeatedly purchase brand new, luxury priced, "new car premium" priced cars to save a few hundred dollars?

Uhhh.... What?

My ICE car's entire maintenance budget since I purchased it 5 years ago has been about $300 worth of oil changes, once per year, and Europeans claim that's way too often.

Apparently non-retractable door handles have only a very minor impact on drag/efficiency: https://arstechnica.com/cars/2025/09/flush-door-handles-are-...

So, yes, I think you're right that they are largely just a gimmick.

I'm old and still somewhat feel electric windows is such a gimmick. For that inevitable day when I run my car off the bridge and into some body of water, I'll be able to get out of my car when I manually roll down my window. Electric windows are a death trap!

At some point, convenience routs safety, and the consumers have spoken