Will Our Cars Become Our Chauffeurs?

Roland Piquepaille writes "According to this long article from EE Times about the 'Self-Navigating Vehicle,' the answer is a resounding yes. Many car experts think that autonomous vehicles which avoid collisions and communicate wirelessly with other cars will be the norm in two to three decades. In the meantime, the enabling technologies for self-navigating cars are emerging, from sensors embedded in the brake or accelerator pedals to more powerful computers. Already, partial solutions exist for adaptive cruise control or for staying in a highway lane. One day, we'll be able to do something else than driving our cars through traffic jams, saving us about two hours per working day. This is the future that engineers are building, but will you accept to be driven by your car? So many people like driving that the concept of a completely autonomous car might be delayed for psychological reasons, not technical ones. This summary contains selected details of the original article."

Comments

Re:Amazing technological breakthrough

[Vadim Grinshpun]

The parent is not quite as insightful as people apparently think.
Consider the fact that the distances one typically covers in the States are quite a bit greater than almost anywhere in Europe or the UK. Most areas are not that densely populated, and thus do not have many -- or frequently serviced -- transportation options. As a result of this, public transport is not nearly as well-developed or as efficient as the equivalents in other countries. It's not terribly convenient to use public transport to go anywhere unless you can stay within city limits all the time. That happens to be much less feasible in the states than in Europe.

Here're a couple of examples to illustrate my points.

1. I have to commute about 12 miles (~19km) to work every day. Time by bus+subway+bus: 1 hour
Time by car: 20-40 minutes, depending on traffic.
Multiply by 2 (commute back home) -- the difference is between 40 and 80 minutes per day, an hour on average.

2. I have to drive about 220 miles (~350km) to see my parents who live in another city every month.
Time by public transportation:
bus + subway+intercity bus+subway = 10 min + 20 min + 4 hrs + 1 hr = 5.5 hours.
By car, the trip takes 4 hours door-to-door.

Again, multiply by 2 for the way back, and we have about a 3 hour difference. Seeing as I typically go late Friday night or early Sat. morning, and come back on Sunday, 3 additional hours of time that I can spend with my family makes quite a difference. So does not having to be aggravated by crappy buses ;)

I hope this somewhat illustrates my point. And just to make things clear, I'm not talking about some tiny towns in the middle of nowhere--the above trips concern Boston and New York.

Defeats the Purpose of the Automobile

[K-Man]

One of the key aspects of the automobile, in contrast to other forms of transportation, is that it is more deadly to anyone getting in the way or disobeying the unwritten rules of the road. It's like the Mafia - they don't have to kill everybody, just enough to send a message.

Now, if suddenly we have cars which don't run red lights, and which stop every time for pedestrians or dogs, cats, etc. which appear in front of the vehicle, chaos will ensue.

Imagine walking down a crowded sidewalk. You're constantly being blocked, jostled, and otherwise impeded by people who show little concern for your presence, because you're not a threat.

If the motor-death equation is suddenly removed, the same situation will occur on our sacred highways - walking, bicycling, and other un-American forms of transportation will take over the streets!