Posted on 04/20/2013 2:07:54 PM PDT by LibWhacker
Google has been testing a fleet of autonomous vehicles on U.S. roadways for quite some time now, and other companies such as Mercedes-Benz are adding more advanced technology to aid drivers. We now have cars that can automatically stop, parallel park themselves and even detect when another car is in a blind spot. Google executives have previously said that they would like to see self-driving vehicles on the road within three to five years, however it may not happen that quickly. Industry experts believe that by 2020, car computers will handle much of the work when traveling at high speeds and five years later, we could finally see fully autonomous vehicles arrive “in meaningful numbers.”
The dates given are still “guesstimates,” Christian Schumacher, head of advanced driver assistance systems in North America for Continental, told The Wall Street Journal. She also noted that there are many obstacles the industry must overcome to make driverless cars a reality. One concern is the question of liability: Who should take the blame if a self-driving car gets in an accident?
Then again, accidents may be so rare that it could be a non-issue. Google’s self-driving cars have logged more than 300,000 miles across a wide range of traffic conditions and have not caused a single accident. Automakers and regulators in the U.S. and Europe are serious about the future of autonomous or semi-autonomous vehicles and have been pushing the technology in an effort to improve safety.
NHTSA researcher W. Riley Garrott revealed some interesting data this week at the SAE International World Congress in Detroit. According to the agency’s crash data, only 1% of drivers involved in a crash apply the brakes at full force prior to the impact, while 33% of drivers don’t apply the brakes at all. He said that accidents due to poor braking were found to cost society about $45 billion, based on data from 2006 to 2008, and that these new technologies would not only save lives, but also money.
As we patently wait for self-driving vehicles to arrive, Garrott noted that the NHTSA intends to make a decision by the end of the year on whether technologies such as “crash imminent braking” should be a standard across the automotive industry.
Can you explain the privacy concerns?
I’m still waiting moving sidewalks at train stations where trains wouldn’t have to slow down to get on or off.
Where is my flying car? Where is my electric car that goes 300 miles on a charge?
We already have driverless cars any way. Half the time stoners arent really there upstairs as things are now.
The DUI “Driving Under the Influence” industrial complex (lawyers, cops, judges and politicians) will covertly do everything in its power to make sure this is delayed or stopped for as long as possible. There is just to much money involved.
i doan follow that train of thot cuz why even have trains if you have moving sidewalks going as fast as trains
On the other hand, there will be a huge revival in the neighborhood saloon.
This will end drunk driving when it does happen.
I would prefer that they build anonymity into the system.
In the left or speed lane.
Don’t want!
That long?
12 years. I suppose so.
I will hunt you down and double park in front of your car. And that will be the least of your worries. I fly planes, you know.
Yeah, good point. How are they going to fix that? It seems like GPS navigation won't be perfected until 3035, at the rate they're going. I don't even use the GPS system that came in my truck anymore... It's an idiot. I turn on the map so I can get a general idea where I am, but I don't let it do the navigating!
Lol, that’s hilarious!
Driving yourself around like an idiot is not a Constitutional right.
This sounds great if you cannot drive although I’ll believe it when I see it. They’ve been saying that “self driving cars are just around the corner” since the 1950’s or so. There are a lot of weaknesses though. What if somebody hacks into the GPS system and causes thousands or millions of accidents? How about is the Red Chinese, the Russians, the North Koreans or Iranians EMP or otherwise take out the GPS satellites? Do the cars have enough AI to manage or at least “pull over?” I think I’ll pass for now.
Unless it has artificial intelligence and the voice of William Daniels, I’m not interested.
You forgot body shops! :-)
True story. BART the SF Bay Area subway, that’s been more or less a disaster since it started running in the early 70s was designed as a futuristic system run by computers (those lovely IBM mainframes of the late 60s!), and therein lay the problem. Critics accused the designers of neglecting the basic rules of designing a railway, such as providing sidetracks for disabled trains, and other flaws that have plagued this system for decades and cannot be easily corrected.
But anyway, the designers planned to have the trains run entirely by computers without an operator, and only freaked out realizing that passengers might freak out riding such trains. Today, the overpaid union operator that’s there in the lead car does very little except perhaps delay the closing of the train doors, the system is run by a computer. And driverless trains run at every major airport in the world.
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