Top Stellantis Designer Wants to Remove All Touch Screens from Car Interiors

Some people love the latest developments in technology and all of the new updates, ranging from your smartphone to the touchscreen dash in your car. But there are also a few people that view touchscreens in cars as nothing more than a fad, with a top Stellantis designer being among them.

Thierry Métroz, chief designer for Citroën’s DS, hopes one day to be permanently rid of seeing touchscreens in car interiors.

“It’s a big trend at the moment to have [a lot of] screens, but I think it’s a little bit stupid, because in fact to have not any more dashboard, only a big screen, isn’t our philosophy inside DS,” Métroz told Autocar. “Our target is to delete all the screens in our future interiors. The problem with the screen is when you switch off your screen, you’re just left with a rectangular black surface with all the fingerprints. It’s not very sexy; it’s not very luxury.”

“Of course, we need to deliver the information for the driver,” Métroz continued. “It’s a big challenge.”

Arguing that touchscreens are distracting for drivers, a new question arises: how will drivers control the growing amount of functions in modern cars? Because by allowing automakers to concentrate all of the vehicle’s operations into a single console, a touchscreen system can be utilized across different models. Plus, some modes like GPS would require some sort of visual aid.

Métroz didn’t have an alternative solution to removing the touchscreens, saying that they would have to use “less intrusive” substitutes that offer “more serenity” to the driver experience.