It's been almost 2 years since Google first announced their work on a self-driving car and now they're making a move on it and partnering with Toyota. The new self-driving car features cameras and laser tracking hardware that reads movements and objects on the road and detects exactly when to signal, turn, accelerate and brake. It was presented earlier in 2010 as an unfinished experiment, but it was very capable of driving safely then and it still is. Google and Toyota have not set an exact date to put it into production or a price, but it is very possible that this technology would be safe for consumers to use by 2014 or 2015. Google and Toyota did say that they do not plan on replacing the driver with a machine, because the driver is still fully liable and responsible for what the car is doing. A driver would need to step in place and take the wheel at any time if the car seems to be making a mistake. They also do not want to take the joy of driving away from those who enjoy it. However, it may be much easier to set the car on self-drive during a 50 minute drive through a busy freeway at 8 in the morning.
The impact this has on the industry means putting a lot of responsibility on the companies themselves. Any error in the code operating the car and people will die. Cars would not only have to work together, but be able to detect sudden changes on the road very quickly even if the color of a certain object is not bright or different enough to detect. It would also mean more costs to fix these cars when a problem does occur. The move to digital and computer-operated cars means more work for the mechanic and possibly more of a need to send parts back to manufacturers. This will also create a fear from buying used cars, due to them always having older chips that may fail more easily, similar to the risks of buying used computers. Do-It-Yourself fixes will also decrease, meaning less control for the buyer and more for the company. however, the pros of having self-driving cars do out-weigh the cons. It is possible that accidents may decrease by almost 50%. Human errors will always be more than computer errors in most cases, so it will be more accurate in stopping potential accidents. These cars may even be programmed and used in film stunts to get a perfect shot at planned points on the road at certain speeds. I am one of the people looking forward to this, and I do hope that Google and Toyota live up to their word on keeping the drivers in control and simply giving them the option to access this technology.
ABC News video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-nYhKD8leAg
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References:
- Richard Blackden, "Google technology allows Toyota car to drive itself," The Telegraph, March 1st 2012; http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/transport/9117119/Google-technology-allows-Toyota-car-to-drive-itself.html
I am also very interested in the self-driving cars since I am interested in the topic of traffic jams. If the self driving technology is good enough in the near future, then when everyone uses computer operating cars the traffic can be better planned to make driving safer and faster. There are over 1 million people died and more injuries in the traffic accidents which caused mostly by disobeying the traffic law and human negligence. If everyone lets computers drive, then it is less likely to make these mistakes. Moreover, if the cars are connected into a network, then it can be more efficient just like airplane traffic control.
ReplyDeleteI was thinking it would be pretty amazing if cars networked and handled different situations on the road together. Even errors of one car can be detected by other cars and collisions are avoided. Unfortunately, you can't just get rid of all older cars, so it's going to be at least 40 years until it's possible to network like that. Maybe we'd be able to install a kit on older cars for purposes like these. I know I won't be getting rid of my 1996 Toyota for quite some time, so I don't expect any old car owners to do the same.
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