meyerweb

http://www.corvetteblogger.com/2015/...go-autonomous/

Corgidog1

I hope there will always be an option to drive a car.

proexpert

Autonomous? Maybe on the bigger interstate highways and others, but never on every road in this country. We can't afford to fix many of the roads we have now.

meyerweb

The autonomous cars in development now don't require any road improvements. They're completely self contained, using cameras, GPS, and computers to figure out where you are and what they have to do next.

scottsh

I just heard an account on the radio of Google's autonomous car describing how it was able to correctly handle navigating a construction zone with a flagman directing traffic. Incredible stuff.

VETJAZZ

What will be will be. Enjoy the ride, so to speak.

ratman6161

In the smallish city in Minnesota where I live, some fairly significant changes to some of our streets were made at least three years ago. This include closing one rail crossing and building a new street with a new rail crossing just up the way. Even with unlimited map updates, Garmin still does not know about that rerouting of traffic (though the NAV in my '14 C7 does). Neither the Garmin or my C7 NAV knows anything about the main road through downtown being closed and dug up for new sewer pipes or various other areas closed for construction. In one of those construction areas, just yesterday, suddenly there was a stop sign there that wasn't there on Friday.

All this is just to say that I think its unlikely that completely autonomous cars with no manual drive option at all are going to be around anytime soon.

Then think about liability issues and our law suit happy society. So I'm on the road home one day and my auto drive car is dutifully driving itself along. But it gets mud on its camera lens. Does it pull over and stop until I get out and clean it? If it doesn't, and a kid runs out in the street and gets run over (while I am presumably taking a nap) is the manufacturer liable? Am I? GM would say I should have stopped and cleaned my camera lenses

But wait.....what if its a Minnesota winter day with the slurry crap they put all over the road. Its pretty tough just to keep my headlights clean let alone a myriad of camera lenses. Once again, will it pull over and stop and refuse to go until they are clean...resulting in me stopping every five minutes on my 42 mile drive to Minneapolis?

Someday, maybe it will all work; even in small towns and even in ever shifting construction zones and ever changing weather conditions. But I don't see that happening any time in my life time (which I'm hoping will be another 30 years or so if I'm lucky).

PS: This is not academic on the camera lens issue. On my pickup truck I actually do have to frequently clean the lens on the backup camera in the winter. Of course the truck doesn't refuse to drive when the lens is dirty.

W88fixer

There has to be, what if a road ahead had a sinkhole that just appeared, that sort of thing does happen. Has to be a way to disable it and I’d disable it under any circumstances.

I lived in the ABQ, NM area for 24 yrs till 2011 and no way would I ever trust their DOT people to ensure any data base was up to date. They’d run you off a bridge overpass. Don

DAFFYDRUNK

So if cars will eventually be able to truly drive themselves, does this mean we can hit the bars and not have to worry about a designated driver?

proexpert

I was born in 1957. We were supposed to be flying cars by now. What happened to that? People are so stupid to believe this crap. Google should stick to internet searches.

Bill B 1

and what about you getting out in a bad place to clean the thing up and get run over yourself?? Technology is great....until it isn't.

LT1 Z51

As someone who works in Automotive I take Autonomous Cars with a grain of salt. There are use cases for exit to exit freeway driving, and for intercity driving. But for the systems to really work most cars (even the non autonomous ones) would have to communicate with each other.

Even if we get the sensor fusion (and that is still 20-30 years off) the ability to make decisions (such as do I hit the dog or the child in the street) may never fully mature.

The semi-autonomous, fully assisted car will be here in 10 years but you still will have to know how to drive and pay attention. Just as pilots still know how to fly a plane.

Lawnmower7200

Every Winter here (PA) we have potholes big enough to trash the tires and wheels on anything smaller than a 1-ton pickup. And for extra fun and enjoyment, they usually fill with slush so they're nearly indistinguishable from normal road surface during the day, and become essentially invisible at night. I'd like to see one of these Google Toy Cars take on one of those babies. I already know the outcome, having seen things like those ridiculous "Smart" carjokes going Tango Uniform from hitting one at speed.

I predict that in .... oh.... 25 years we'll look back at these attempts with the same sort of contempt that is reserved for '80s Space Cadet Shoulder Pad women's fashions.

hawkgfr

Is that the same as "most track capable" Corvette ever?

cor28vettes

Previews of coming attractions.

Corvette holding out is good news. The other good news is there should be many less highway fatalities while we enjoy our ride. So far this year we're at 19,000+ already. Nobody blinks an eye at those #'s anymore cause it's a repeat yr after yr. Till then, be careful out there. http://forums.corvetteforum.com/show....php?t=3362140

Vetteman Jack

Hope he is right.

jcthorne

The map databases are a refrence point for the autoomous cars just as they are for you. They make decisions based on what is evident as they are driving. Including new pot holes, detours and street signs not in the database.

They are doing this NOW. Not in the future.

The insurance and liability questions are mostly already worked out and insurance for a self driving car with a non-self driving mode is based on the liability of the human driver, the computerized driver is far less risk.

As far as the morality question is concerned. Its still a debate but in general, an autonomous vehicle owned by a person should always do what is in the best interest of the person. An autonomous vehicle owned by a service or the state should always act on the 'greater good' principle. This is just as would be done with human drivers.

Face it folks. The computer drivers will be better than 90% of the drivers currently on the road when they first come to market. And that day is closer than you think. Mainstream is still 10 yrs or more out but the first ones sold will be in the next few years.

Research versions are operating in a number of cities NOW.

LT1 Z51

As a person who works on automotive software I can say this statement above is false.

A WELL PROGRAMMED computer driver would be better than any human 90% of the time. 10% of the time no matter how well they are programmed they will be inferior (the depth of decision making isn't capable by machines because they can't blend data analysis like you can in a "social" or "human" context).

That being said, brakes and powertrain are easy and could be here in 5-10 years. Steering is 10-15 years out before we have something usable for autonomous on limited access roads, let alone in cities and neighborhoods, because the timing isn't there (you can't let a car drive 30 seconds, let alone 2 minutes, without steering input like you can brakes or gas in an error state).

jcthorne

Really don't know how you can say this when Google has autonomous cars running around Austin and other cities RIGHT NOW already doing this. Its not 10 yrs away. Its happening now with full government sanction on public roads and highways. They also have a large number of miles accumulated and VERY good driving record...0 at fault accidents.

This is not theory, its real world and working.

ratman6161

Ahhhh. You seem to be in Texas. Not to bad mouth Texas here because I was stationed there at two different times in the Air Force and loved it both times.

But....unless you have lived in other places, no offense, but Texans don't understand winter. And its difficult to describe the difficulties of driving from small town Minnesota 42 miles to Minneapolis at 5:30 AM (i.e. in the dark) in January, in a snow storm to those who have never done it.

If the plows have been through recently there may not be that much snow on the road but there will be the "slurry" they put on the road to keep it melted...which already makes the backup camera on my truck useless after the first couple of minutes and makes me often have to stop at least once just to get the headlights clear. If the plows have not been through, well....I'm on my own then. Either way, any kind of camera that's on the outside of the vehicle rapidly becomes useless. I suppose there can and will be other types of sensors but I doubt that they will pick up everything in these sorts of conditions. If you don't live here you might think I'm making up stories or describing rare occurrences. But I'm not. This is my life December though March + or - a bit.

That's not to say that auto drive cars would be useless. I can see many advantages, particularly on the interstates. But I am saying that I don't believe it will be possible to have cars that do not give the owner the ability to take manual control when needed.