> evolution of the Tesla door handle

I really like Tesla's approach to door handles - it's clean, polished, and gives a fine and smooth look. But was surprised to learn that China will ban them beginning next year. Other countries might follow suit as well.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/china-hidden-door-handles-cars-...

The main purpose of a handle is to open a door, not look polished. Looking polished is not helpful when you're dead because you couldn't get out of that car in an emergency . So IMHO it shouldn't be surprising that they're being banned.

There are obvious ways to design a door handle which looks exactly the same, but isn't electronic.

Yes, but it is expensive.

How many people have to die for aesthetics?

Form over function is not the correct approach for designing something that can kill you if it doesn’t work when you need it to.

Even in the new version it seems like there is no fallback method for a failure.

I'm convinced it isn't rocket science to design a flush handle that looks as clean yet has a manual operation fallback (preferably mechanical). Eg. Something like an integral hinge where you can push the short, base end in to pop the release (provided car is unlocked).

IMO their handles are stupidly over-engineered. It shows when you get problems like ice, etc. in northern climates.

I don't want my door handle to look clean. I want it to be something I can quickly and easily grab and pull.