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99% Invisible: Can you drive blindfolded?

Under CC license from Flickr user Nate Steiner.

California voters may have paved the way for a cleaner future when they passed Proposition 39, but they’re still famous for the gas-burning way they get around. California commuters often drive the same route, sometimes so frequently they might think they can navigate it blindfolded. 

In this episode of  99% Invisible, Tristan Cooke and Tom Nelson from the blog Humans in Design explore how the brain knows how to steer without really knowing how to steer, and what that means for steering wheel design. 

Click the audio player above to listen to the story. 

Test your own ability to drive blindfolded at the Tech Museum in San Jose exhibit Mythbusters: The Explosive Exhibition.

Roman Mars is host and producer of KALW’s 99% Invisible, a short radio show about design and architecture. The 99% Invisible podcast recently peaked at #8 in the iTunes rankings for all podcasts, as well as #1 in both the Arts and Design categories. He is also the host, producer and program director of Public Radio Remix from PRX, a 24-hour, experimental public radio story stream broadcast on XM 123 and public radio stations across the country. He was a founding producer at PRX/NPR’s Snap Judgment and Senior Producer at the Third Coast International Audio Festival.