This weird situation created by cars that are mostly automatic but not quite fully automatic, have moved to screens for the dash or a permanently back lit dash, and increasingly bright DRL’s that pass for headlights in a lot of cities with sufficient street lights.

Having a car that is automatic in so many ways means drivers don’t have a habit of managing things manually. They probably have an automatic lights setting even and the driver doesn’t realize the auto setting has been switched off.

Having a dash that is always lit removes the obvious queue to a driver that they are driving with their headlights off at night.

And bright DRL‘s remove the obvious queue to the driver of a dark road in front of them.

None of these innovations is bad on its own. But the conflation of them all means about one in 50 cars I see on the road at night is driving with no tail lights on or any side markers.

Yes, they have reflectors and my headlights light them up so I can usually see they are there (in good conditions). But those lights are there to improve safety for everyone and it just really annoys me that this poor design choice seems to pervade so many makes models of cars. 😤