The Autonomous Cars News, Development, and Discussion Thread

[Hatman]

New video out by Waymo (Google):

• Video Link

[lrt's friend]

Let's see this in heavy traffic or a snow storm or black ice conditions.

[dubu]

that would be cool if you have 6 people and you split the cost up.

i want to see the driverless motorcycles. id only rid inside a enclosed.

in the winter time they would have to be stored, like up around a build or inside a building.

[JManc]

Am I the only one meh on the idea of driver-less cars...at least right now in this stage of technology? I have an Acura TLX which has semi driver-less features, meaning I have to pay attention but the car can pretty much drive self in cruise control (steer, break, accelerate/ decelerate). It sucks. Bad. When it rains the car will break thinking it "sees" a car right in front of it. I know true driver-less (Teslas, Google, etc) has far more sophisticated technology but they still lack technology with the insight to anticipate real world road conditions. /end rant.

[IrishIllini]

Originally Posted by JManc

Am I the only one meh on the idea of driver-less cars...at least right now in this stage of technology? I have an Acura TLX which has semi driver-less features, meaning I have to pay attention but the car can pretty much drive self in cruise control (steer, break, accelerate/ decelerate). It sucks. Bad. When it rains the car will break thinking it "sees" a car right in front of it. I know true driver-less (Teslas, Google, etc) has far more sophisticated technology but they still lack technology with the insight to anticipate real world road conditions. /end rant.

My issue with driver-less cars is that when I do drive, I actually like to control the vehicle. I hate being dependent on my car for commuting, entertainment, etc., but when I do find myself in my car on the weekend driving out to the burbs or somewhere not easily reached by transit, driving can be therapeutic if traffic doesn't suck.

[Hatman]

Here's the reason for the video, as explained by the Los Angeles Times:

Waymo will now put self-driving vans on public roads with nobody at the wheel
http://www.latimes.com/business/auto...107-story.html

Waymo, the self-driving car company created by Google, is pulling the human backup driver from behind the steering wheel and will test vehicles on public roads with only an employee in the back seat.

The company’s move — which started Oct. 19 with an automated Chrysler Pacifica minivan in the Phoenix suburb of Chandler, Ariz. — is a major step toward vehicles driving themselves on public roads without human backup drivers.

[...]

Waymo has long stated its intent to skip driver-assist systems and go directly to fully autonomous driving. It said the Waymo employee in the back seat won't be able to steer the minivan but, like all passengers, will be able to press a button to bring the van safely to a stop if necessary.

This is actually a huge step in the self-driving car development. Up until now everyone testing these cars had someone in the driver's seat ready to take over every individual function of the car. Now, while a person will still be on-board for safety, they will only be able to stop the car - not take over the individual actions of the car.
Waymo must have a lot of trust in their cars to do this. I think they are getting really close to launching regular ride-hailing services in warm, sunny places.

And soon after they will start service in snowy areas too, after they learn how to do that:
Alphabet’s Waymo Will Test Self-Driving Cars in Snowy Detroit
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...wintry-detroit

And as always, if you do own a car, and if you also posses a driver's license, you should be able to drive it in certain locations (like fun country roads, not crowded traffic). I think that a driver's license should be much harder to get - akin to a pilot's license. This is not because operating the vehicle is actually very hard, but that interacting with the people and environment around you is unpredictable, and drivers should be much better trained than they are now on how to deal with the unpredictability.
Ultimately, when the technology improves to the point that the 35,000+ road fatalities (in the US alone) are deemed preventable, they should be prevented from happening. Driving a car for therapeutic reasons will continue but be limited to certain agreed-upon times and locations, just like we have certain times and places or horses and carriages to use public streets.
If you like to drive and find this depressing, I recommend you take up driving a bike. (Since you actually provide the power for causing the bicycle to move, it is more accurately described as 'driving,' while steering a car should be considered 'riding a car'.) I find it even more therapeutic and it certainly is much better for your body. And don't worry, self-driving bicycles are technologically far behind the current state of self-driving cars :

• Video Link

[electricron]

https://www.yahoo.com/news/driverles...011836372.html

It couldn't avoid a semi-truck backing up into it.

[Sun Belt]

Originally Posted by electricron

https://www.yahoo.com/news/driverles...011836372.html

It couldn't avoid a semi-truck backing up into it.

Whoops.

Can these autonomous vehicles use the horn?

[JManc]

Originally Posted by IrishIllini

My issue with driver-less cars is that when I do drive, I actually like to control the vehicle. I hate being dependent on my car for commuting, entertainment, etc., but when I do find myself in my car on the weekend driving out to the burbs or somewhere not easily reached by transit, driving can be therapeutic if traffic doesn't suck.

Absolutely. Even an automatic takes the fun out of driving, the car taking over the driving would be even worse.

[dubu]

I hated driving a car in the city. I’d love if some golf courses were changed into dirt bike tracks. In California they are changing some golf coursesinto gardens and stuff

[M II A II R II K]

Why Self-Driving Buses, Not Cars, Need to Rule the Roads by 2050

https://www.inverse.com/article/4105...sport-changing

.....

- Amos Haggiag, one of the major players behind Las Vegas’s autonomous bus program, sees a future where cities crack down on self-driving cars and push people to take the bus instead. — “The city will start to massively and probably aggressively favor mass transportation over taxis and private vehicles,” Haggiag, the CEO of the transportation startup Optibus, tells Inverse. “Then what I think will happen is people will use mass transit and autonomous taxis in one holistic system.” — It’s not an unpopular idea, either. Assaf Biderman, associate director of MIT’s Senseable City Lab, told Inverse last May that such a solution could give rise to single-seater autonomous cars that ferry people to the outskirts of the central zone.

.....

[Hatman]

Interesting video, if you're into the whole 3D/VR thing:

• Video Link

Also, there are literally so many headlines about new laws for self-driving cars I can't even keep up with everything. California, for example, will no longer require a backup safety driver to be present in test vehicles anymore - meaning that cars will be legally allowed to drive down streets with nobody in them. Meanwhile my home state of Utah could soon be the first state to legalize autonomous cars - not just for testing, but for everything and anything, so long as the same insurance laws remain in effect.
Viva la revolucion!

[plutonicpanda]

I believe CA's new law is just about someone being in the drivers seat. They will still be required to have someone in the car to take control somehow if things go awry.

[Hatman]

That is the way they currently test in Phoenix - no one in the drivers seat to take over, but an employee elsewhere in the car with a big red STOP button in case the car goes postal.

The new California law seems even more trusting that that though. From the article:

The new rules also require companies to be able to operate the vehicle remotely — a bit like a flying military drone — and communicate with law enforcement and other drivers when something goes wrong.

Which suggests to me that no one needs to be in the car. Otherwise there would be no requirement for remote operation, since the employee could simply get into the driver's seat and take over.

[plutonicpanda]

A pedestrian was killed in Phoenix area. Very sad though I hope people don't overreact and screw up testing.

[dubu]

Why not motorcycles like the lit motors that has gyroscope? More people ride motorcycles then drive cars in the world, more cars would be going backwards. Your screwed in the winter but there’s trains and bikes. There’s no snow or ice if a bike path is enclosed. You wouldn’t need it to be driverless because it’s small and you can park it easy, they are cheaper and make traffic go down since they are smaller.

[Hatman]

Update on the Uber Fatality:

Update 9 p.m. EST: According to a report in the San Francisco Chronicle, Herzberg was “[p]ushing a bicycle laden with plastic shopping bags,” and “may have been homeless.” After reviewing video footage of the impact taken by the Uber vehicle, Tempe police chief Sylvia Moir said that “it’s very clear it would have been difficult to avoid this collision in any kind of mode (autonomous or human-driven) based on how she came from the shadows right into the roadway.”

https://www.citylab.com/transportati...r-uber/555956/

Honestly, with all the weird and unpredictable stuff that happens on the roads and with people constantly breaking traffic rules, it's amazing this sort of thing hasn't happened already.

There is also this broad-view article:
A self-driving Uber car killed a pedestrian. Human drivers will kill 16 people today.
https://www.vox.com/science-and-heal...drivers-deadly

In the meantime, this tragedy will no doubt stoke fears about putting our lives in the hands of car computers. So let’s not forget that getting into, or walking or biking near, a car piloted by a human is one of the most dangerous activities we can do every day.

According to a report released by the Governors Highway Safety Association, there were 5,997 pedestrian fatalities in the US in 2016 — or 16 each day. Globally, road traffic is the fifth leading cause of death in the world.

What’s more, driving a car and being a pedestrian are particularly dangerous undertakings in America, relative to other high-income countries. The US ranks 41st out of 52 high-income countries on road traffic deaths per population, with only a handful of countries — including Qatar, Kuwait, Oman, and Saudi Arabia — trailing behind.

[Hatman]

Update on the Uber crash... Video footage has been released, and it's totally Uber's fault:

Tempe Police release footage of fatal crash from inside self-driving Uber
https://www.theverge.com/2018/3/21/1...video-released

For a human driver, maybe this would have still been an unavoidable crash. But for an autonomous car using Lidar sensors? This is completely unforgivable.

If you don't want to watch the footage yourself, the crash happened on a four lane road with a wide median. The pedestrian is crossing the road from left to right, while the Uber car is approaching in the right lane. That means the car should have been able to detect the pedestrian while she crossed a whole lane of traffic before entering the Uber's path. Then, it doesn't look like the car makes any attempt to slow down at all - the pedestrian is hit as she is on the right side of the car, meaning she had made it almost all the way across the Uber's lane.

What happened to the Lidar sensor? What happened to the radar? What happened to the infrared video sensors? What about the human driver?

How many systems had to fail in order for this crash to happen? This makes me very angry.

[M II A II R II K]

Here’s the real nightmare scenario for self-driving cars

https://www.vox.com/energy-and-envir...ising-business

.....

- There are reasons to believe that any private autonomous vehicle industry will not just increase VMT, but will pursue more VMT aggressively. --- The money the drivers receive from Uber and Lyft, from direct fees charged to passengers, is barely getting them by. They need supplemental income. Thus, advertising. --- And therein lies the germ of an economic dynamic that could doom AVs to fall short of their potential and do great damage along the way — the same way it did to much of the internet. I’m talking about advertising as a business model.

- If shared fleets of autonomous vehicles come to be funded primarily by advertising, we will end up with an auto industry even more committed to auto supremacy than the current one — at best a reluctant partner in any effort to make cities denser and more livable, at worst a committed foe. --- Never mind the fact that vehicle occupants will find yet another part of their day intruded upon by blinking, button-pushing distractions, losing time they might have spent in quiet contemplation (or, sigh, looking at their own smartphones).

- If vehicles do become rolling smartphones, “platforms” for a variety of ad-supported videos, apps, games, and services, we can expect the same incentives to take over transportation that dominate online services like Facebook or Candy Crush. To wit: Cars will want more of your time and attention. --- The only way to spend time with a car is to drive somewhere in it. Insofar as they get revenue from advertising, owners of shared vehicle fleets will want more people to go more places in cars. Their revenue will rise with VMT, so they will strive to maximize VMT.

.....

[dubu]

I think this fits
• Video Link