Buckle to drive is new feature for 2022 Silverado, Sierra, Hummer

[Dragoon]

I truly hope the Silverado ZR2 doesn't get this feature! Out in rural areas of the country, I know people use their trucks to work around job sites, out in pastures, and at ranches and farms. If you've done this kind of work out in remote areas or on your own private property, you know the need to drive along slow while having to make frequent stops to jump in and out of your vehicle to do things like mend fences, remove debris or whatever task requires miles of work that requires you to jump in and out of your vehicle.

Oh, how we love juicy news. But not all news is good news, and this little piece of “What were they thinking?” comes straight from gm-trucks.com. Buckle your seatbelt to drive. In pickup trucks. That’s right. Apparently, General Motors thinks it’s a good idea to force people to buckle up in order to put their trucks in gear. And while this may sound like a smart idea on the surface, truck owners know you don’t buckle up every single time you get in the truck.

When buckle to drive is good​

Getting out on the road? Buckle up. In general, it’s a good idea to have your seatbelt fastened while you’re driving. There may be a few exceptions to the rule, but we’re big fans of safety features here at Pickup Truck + SUV Talk. We encourage buckling up. And the safety studies show that in the event of a crash having one’s seat belt on is almost always safer than riding without one.

But — and there is always a but​

Pickup truck owners often use their trucks to work on the farm. Or move something from one side of the yard to another. They’re also likely to be hopping into a truck to back a trailer up another inch or two to correctly position the ball hitch under the trailer. In these cases buckling a seat belt is not only unnecessary but also terribly inconvenient.

The bottom line on buckle to drive​

From what we’ve read, it looks like the buckle to drive (or buckle to shift) feature is rolling out on the new 2022 Chevy Silverado, 2022 GMC Sierra and 2022 GMC Hummer. We do not know at this time if it will only be a part of teen driving features or if it will be standard for every driver. We are hoping that there will be some way to turn this feature off, so people who use their trucks for the purposes they were created will be able to do simple tasks without great annoyance.

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