Posted on 02/14/2020 4:55:44 AM PST by Moonman62
Nobody is quite sure if, or when, self-driving cars will become fully mainstream. But an experiment run by Lyft with the technology appears to have been an unadulterated success. The ride-hailing service partnered with an automotive technology company called Aptiv back in 2018 to offer self-driving car rides in Las Vegas, and the companies have just announced that they've now served 100,000 customers.
In a blog post, Aptiv President Karl Iagnemma writes that people were overwhelming satisfied with their experiences in the self-driving cars.
"Notably, 98% of these paying passengers have rated their Aptiv self-driving rides 5-out-of-5 stars, with most stating this first-of-a-kind experience is something they are eager to try again," Iagnemma writes. "Together with Lyft, we are proving real-world viability and building consumer adoption. Providing riders with the opportunity to see Aptiv’s autonomous driving technology safely and confidently navigate to their destination is a real 'aha' moment for them."
Iagnemma writes that customers would often ask how the car works or what the car is able to see. All of the rides were monitored in real-time at Aptiv’s "command center" to make sure everything was running smoothly. The companies are continuing to serve customers as we speak.
The self-driving cars they've been using are a modified BMW 5 series. As hard as it may be to believe, there have been no accidents since Aptiv and Lyft partnered up two years ago. Though the cars are driving themselves, all of these rides have had a driver in the front seat in case something goes wrong.
Lyft isn't the only company working on giving people rides in driverless vehicles. Uber is currently testing out self-driving cars in Pittsburgh, and the company is planning on doing tests in Dallas, San Francisco, Washington D.C. and Toronto. These tests will also involve having a human driver behind the wheel while the car does the driving, and Uber employees drive the self-driving car around manually for a period of time to collect data before testing how the car drives on its own. Even once the vehicles take control, the tests won't involve customers yet, so you'll have to wait on ordering a self-driving car from Uber.
Uber was testing out self-driving cars in Phoenix, Pittsburgh, San Francisco and Toronto until a car was involved in a crash that killed a pedestrian in the Phoenix area back in 2018. Uber paused the program and then scaled it back when that crash occurred. Documents released by the National Traffic Safety Board in November claim Uber did not have a "formal safety plan" in place when the crash occurred.
Lyft is still testing out rides in Las Vegas with no discernible issues, and the company has partnered with Waymo to begin offering rides in self-driving minivans in Phoenix. It's not as cool as getting a ride in a self-driving BMW, but it's still a self-driving car, so be grateful. We're hoping one of these companies starts offering rides in self-driving McLarens—but we're not holding our breath.
Maybe that's what the customers like. Also, are they getting a free ride as part of the experiment? I'll bet they'd like that, too!
I doubt it is free.
“I liked that we didn’t crash. Oh! I also liked that we didn’t run over and kill any bicyclists.”
The article mentions paying riders. I missed it on the first reading.
“Any landing you walk away from is a good landing,” as I say after a ride with a teenaged driver.
Red Barchetta
Rush drummer and lyricist Neil Peart made several attempts to contact Foster during the recording of Moving Pictures but Road & Track did not have an up-to-date address and Rush were forced to settle for a brief "inspired by" note in the lyric sheet mentioning the story. In July 2007, Foster and Peart finally made contact with each other. Foster later posted on his website an account of their journey by motorcycle through the backwoods of West Virginia between stops on Rush's 2007 Snakes & Arrows Tour.
Barchetta, literally "small boat" in Italian, is the diminutive form of barca ("boat" or "craft"). In the automotive industry, the term is used for a two-seat car without any kind of roof.
Cars driven by people kill hundreds of people every day.
They are not driverless. “a driver in the front seat “.
No thanks. I am not going to sit in the “driver’s” seat while a program takes control of my car, watching and waiting for the cursed computer to buzz and flash lights telling me that there is a situation it can’t handle.
If I had been driving we wouldn’t be in that situation.
Automation can work in a controlled situation in which nothing unexpected happens. There is no street or highway anywhere in the world where nothing unexpected happens.
My Mama was right in naming me Thomas. I doubt this rosy story. I see one possible hole in this story. 100,000 rides taken, without an incident or injury; but with a driver at the helm in case something went awry. If there ever WERE an incident in which the driver had to intervene to prevent damage or injury; do you think Lyft would confess and tell us about it? The REAL test will be when the cars truly ARE driverless. I’ve had computers since 1988. Don’t TRY to tell me that in 100,000 trips, the computers in those cars never had a hiccup. JMHO.
I’d be willing to accept a fairly high level of risk for crashing to avoid having to inter-act with most Vegas taxi drivers. I’d still fell safer.
Wait until your self driving car doesn’t want to go where you program it to go.
“Take me to RNC Headquarters.”
“Sorry, Dave...”
Show me the robust set of requirements and design, and then the actual testing that shows compliance to those requirements.
Appealing to mass, uninformed opinion does not make anything safe. By “uninformed”, I mean the people have no specific knowledge of the self-driving system.
Smart cars...smart everything...what could possibly go wrong?
But how fast do the cars go? Autonomous travel is easy at low speed.
(I work at a company that makes sensors for autonomous vehicles)
Though the cars are driving themselves, all of these rides have had a driver in the front seat in case something goes wrong....
So what’s the point? They’re paying a driver anyway, why not just let them drive?
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