Letters to the Editor
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The beat of horses' hoofs (hooves?).
Though the vast majority of human beings rely primarily on their visual sense, we all still pay attention to the rest of our senses on some level. If you're not deaf, you are subconsciously listening to the sounds around you, and for the last one hundred years are so, since the automobile began to grow in prevalence, we've become accustomed to listening for the sounds of an engine.
Even before that, we paid attention for the sound of a horse galloping toward us. If it moves, it makes noise. If it moves and doesn't make noise, well, it's probably trying to kill us. Probably why the leap from silent Prius to ninja assassin is so easy to make. Might as well start naming new hybrid models after predatory animals. They'd probably sell better among mainstream America with names like that.
I think, until all vehicles are silent and we've retrained ourselves to be aware of them without hearing them, some device needs to be made part of hybrid engines that emits an attention getting yet not annoying sound.