Baby on board signs – are they obstructing your view?

The b-o-b signs are pathetic. They belong to the nodding dog, fluffy dice, bumper sticker brigade. Maybe we should all have, ‘How am I driving’ signs with phone number you see on many vehicles.

Less is usually more.

As a Driving Instructor I spend a lot of time teaching individuals the importance of looking correctly, taking in their environment and keeping themselves and others safe. Putting a huge obstruction in the window and restricting the drivers view in the interest of keeping your child safe sounds about as sensible as giving them a firearm in case a bear attacks! The same goes for air fresheners and other objects hanging from the rear views mirror.
Please find me the drivers that change their style, habits and approach after seeing these Baby on Board signs? The safe ones don’t need to, and the others don’t!
The only benefit is to emergency responders if a collision or incident occurs, and this is negated if the sign is left in when not in use. In fact, this ‘safety sign’ is a flashing light to shout “Vunerable individual” to any prospective car thief or mugger.
If you want to keep your children and loved ones safe on the road, contact a good, local Driving Instructor and get some refresher and defensive driver training. Better awareness, better skills and up-to-date training if worth far more than a sign!
Remember if you are 25-30 your training is potentially 8 years out of date, it was given to you by a person who learnt in the early 1970’s when there were 1/3 as many dangers on the road. So your skills are 40+ years out of date! Modern day trainers are versed in modern day techniques, you will be safer GUARANTEED, which is more than I can say for the Baby on Board signs!

We haven’t heard yet from anyone who uses or advocates the “Baby On Board” signs and it would be interesting to read such a response. Personally I am in the opposite corner so I am inclined to support all the comments above.

When these signs first started to appear I thought they were about as useful as those signs that say “if you can read this you are too close”. Just an amusing way of suggesting that drivers leave a bit more space fom the car in front. However, I later realised that there was a much deeper psychological message coming across, along the lines of “my baby is incredibly precious and his/her life is far more valuable than that of anyone else your car might hit or injure” – a proposition that I couldn’t accept. There is no inherent added value in a baby’s life over that of a grown-up person who has been educated and trained and is fulfilling a worthwhile role in society, although I accept that a baby is possibly more vulnerable in a serious collision and might be less likely to survive if flung like a projectile out of a poorly-designed or badly-fitted baby capsule.

Drivers owe it to all citizens to exercise due care and attention at all times; they don’t have to be reminded of their duty by sanctimonious signs in rear windows. So the driver who restricts their own all-round vision by putting a sign in the rear window is really the careless motorist. And sometimes they are not necessarily the most caring or conscientious of parents in their choice of child conveyance or manner of driving.

On the point about alerting the emergency services to the presence of a baby on board, I go along with Dean. The modern capsules are very protective, not inordinately expensive, and exceedingly obvious to anyone looking inside a vehicle that has collided, overturned, or been rammed. Parents who want to advertise their offspring should do as Wavechange suggests at the top of this conversation.

If ‘baby on board’ signs cause accidents, I wonder how many have been caused by stickers advertising the National Trust, English Heritage and a lot of other respectable charities that have not given any thought to the safety aspect of their stickers.

If you have signs or stickers on your car windows, why not get rid of them now? It could avoid an accident.