To my way of thinking, when a circuit loses power because a GFCI tripped, the cause of the problem should be both obvious, and easy to access. For example, when it trips in the bathroom, you ought not have to go up three levels and canvass every bath in the house to fine the ONE GFCI that protects all the bathrooms.
When GFCI's came out, we often had only one for all the 'protected' receptacles - and that was usually found buried in the garage. From lurking in the gareage to lurking in one of multiple bathrooms; I'm not sure I see the progress made here! Nor do I see how moving the GFCI to the breaker panel on the outside of the house improves matters.
Yet, either of these scerarios meets the 'readilly accessible' standard. Having the GFCI IN the crawl space, next to the furnace you're servicing, does not.
There's no substitute for good design. Yet, good design and code compliance are different topics. I think the code committee is over-reaching.
You can always say "but some fool will ..." True enough; but the NEC, in Article 90, already makes clear that it's not a design manual, and that 'code compliance' may not result in the best design.
I am thinking of a "McMansion" I worked in, where there was a pair of mysterious blank-face GFCI's in the bedroom closet, mounted about light-switch level. It turned out that they protected the pumps, etc., for the whilrpool tub two rooms over in the bathroom; no, they were NOT on a common wall. Readilly accessible - but good luck if you ever need to find them!
