In the category of features that have gone away but maybe should not have is the foot-operated high beam, or dip beam, switch. Today, if you want to illuminate your high beam headlights, you manipulate one of the stalks on the side of your steering column. Most manufacturers have made it such that pulling it back will switch the beams, although on some you push it forward. In many older makes and models, this was accomplished by a small round foot switch located at the far left of the floorboard with a simple single click to turn on the high beams and another to turn them off.
The foot switch disappeared in most cars by the 1980s. A couple of reasons have been set forth as hypotheses for this change. One is that cars became smaller and most switched to a front-wheel-drive platform, which reduced the area available in the footwell and below the floor pan itself. Another states that, for various reasons, it became cheaper to put the switch on the stalk and connect it to a relay to send power to the bulb. Perhaps a more reasonable explanation is that car companies were simply following trends, seeking to emulate and catch up to the competition.
No matter what the reason, with the proliferation of digital controls in modern cars, foot switches are just a thing of a bygone era.
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