Davren said:

The OP posed a question, we all put forward a opinion of what the reason may be. You infer you have the deffinative answer.... fine... what silly things have been said?

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I don't think J333EVO is being rude. Afterall, We have all asked at one point how to turn the headlights on... its not like we all went away and read up on how to turn them on instead of just asking someone who knew how lol in this case.... asking why.
I'm glad I've now got knowledge about Citroen DS's and a history behind the Heel & Toe... so thanks all

I prefer to go with my answer, in other words a number of reasons, one of which is heel and toe-ing. Remember, the top hung accelerator is a (relatively) new development. Even in the early '70s there were a lot of cars with the floor hinged organ-pedal type, so the driver would place his foot at about a 45 degree angle with the ball of the foot on the brake pedal and the heel on the lower part of the gas pedal. You can't really put the heel of your foot on a modern accelerator as it's not long enough; unless you have a very short foot.

This was after all an adaptation to allow double de-clutching more quickly than simply breaking the act down into its component parts. I'm more inclined to think that nowadays the relative positions of pedals is about not hitting the right hand pedal before the middle one when braking.

Having said that, even in the '90s I can remember motoring jounalists complaining that one car was not as good as another simply because you couldn't h&t in it so manufacturers still pander to the whims of the motoring press.

A mate of mine who used to design buses and coaches tells me its a safety feature adopted by the vast majority of vehicle manufacturers throughout the world. It prevents what is known as "Unintended acceleration" and the explaination couldnt be simpler. In the event of both pedals being accidently applied the brakes will come on before the vehicle receives power and accelerates. Makes perfect sense to me and offers far more credibility than the H&T theory

He even sent me a link to back his claim up.

http://www.dscergonomics.co.uk/BusCabErgonomics.pdf

Thats quite a good one, I think thats checkmate.

I engine brake all the time, it's smoother and more gradual and helps to keep momentum, in order to improve ecconomy and save the planet yadda yadda

To The Beard: Mk5 golfs have the accelerator pedal hinged off the floor

sledge said:

A mate of mine who used to design buses and coaches tells me its a safety feature adopted by the vast majority of vehicle manufacturers throughout the world. It prevents what is known as "Unintended acceleration" and the explaination couldnt be simpler. In the event of both pedals being accidently applied the brakes will come on before the vehicle receives power and accelerates. Makes perfect sense to me and offers far more credibility than the H&T theory

He even sent me a link to back his claim up.

http://www.dscergonomics.co.uk/BusCabErgonomics.pdf

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I've heard this before! makes most sense to me too

The Beard said:

The first is that if the brake was at the same height, or lower than the accelerator, if you tried to carry our an emergency stop, you could hit the gas rather than the brake. As it is, if your foot is a little off to the right when you tried to stop, the brake pedal would already be partly depressed as you caught the gas, so you'd still have some braking effort.

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I think you'll find Sledge's answer concurs with mine.

fordy744 said:

To The Beard: Mk5 golfs have the accelerator pedal hinged off the floor

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That's quite incredible. VW must be the last maker to still do this. Do you know if other models like Jetta, Passat and the like have the same kind of throttle pedal?

i double de clutch every single down shift so every now and then have to heel and toe also

i'm milking 123k miles old syncros touch wood they all work perfectly when they have to at the moment i'd like to keep them that way without spoiling all the fun of spirited driving

i think the car makers would like to tell you that there doing this for safety so you catch the brake first and so on it's good for p/r

but secretly we all know these are fiats they are produced by italians of course it's set up for heel and toe in my car especially very similar pedal box to allot of alfas my bravo hlx 1.8 it's absolutely perfect can be achieved with no effort or bent ankles at all just glides throu the box any way i like even under full breaking kicking the abs in i can slide the box from 5th throu 4th 3rd with just a couple of fingers on the gear stick

i actually use my uper toe and lower toe slash ball if you drivers know what i mean as the pedals are level when the break is pressed and i wear sise 12!!! as mensioned i think toe and heel is from floor hinged pedals as in allot of race cars also but tbh seems a little more effort to me i tried it once in a bmw